The Adventures of the Falcon was a half-hour detective show based on the character created in 1936 by novelist Michael Arlen. He'd been featured in a series of movies (1941-1949) and came to radio on the Blue network from April 10-December 29, 1943, played by Barry Kroeger; we don't seem to have any episodes existing from this version. The character returned on Mutual and NBC from July 3, 1945 until September 27, 1954. The Falcon was played by James Meighan (1945-1947), Les Tremayne (1947-1949), Les Damon (1949-1952) and George Petrie (1953-1954). Ken Lynch portrayed Sgt. Corbett, Falcon's friend on the police force.
The Adventures of the Falcon recycled a lot of the supporting roles and tended to give the same actors similar roles in each episode. They didn't credit their casts, but I'm certain I heard William Conrad, Bill Johnstone, Jackson Beck, Everett Sloane and Raymond Edward Johnson multiple times (Sloane played a heck of a lot of cool, conceited crime bosses who were practically all the same character); Larry Haines seemed to be in most episodes as well.
Beginning with "The Case of the Proud Papa" (June 6, 1951), the Adventures of the Falcon began integrating their sponsor (Kraft)'s commercials into the drama as at the halfway mark, the Falcon would visit the show's announcer Ed Herlihy at a lunch counter and listen patiently as Herlihy extolled the virtues of Miracle Whip in making salads and sandwiches. It was pretty common for comedy programs to integrate their commercials into their routines but it's odd and unique to hear them inserted into a dramatic show!
By 1952, the series' standard - which had been pretty good - dipped a bit as NBC seemed to have slashed the budget, resulting in a lot more stock music from their library in place of the show's previously modest organ music. The whimsical Miracle Whip commercials were gone too, replaced with stolid public service announcements. Those later episodes of the Adventures of the Falcon are just okay. There is some minor interest in "The Cast of the Dirty Dollar" (June 8, 1952) when the Falcon declares at the episode's end that he's quitting the detective business-- Sgt. Corbett doubts it and bets he'll be back next week; he wins that bet as in the next week's episode, the Falcon is called out of his brief retirement to become an international U.S. military intelligence operative, which is how he spent his last three months on NBC. Those last few NBC broadcasts are of minor interest because the show changed so drastically, with the Falcon now a jet-setting international operative and sounding lot like a contemporaneous NBC program-- Dangerous Assignment. Of course, almost every episode boiled down to answering, "who's the secret communist agent this week?" When the show returned on Mutual in 1953, the Falcon was back to being a stateside detective.
An episode from the later era with some particularly bad radio is "The Case of the Careless Corpse" (August 31, 1952). In one scene, the Falcon speaks to a criminal over the telephone while an associate tries to trace the call. As the Falcon and the criminal speak, the Falcon's associate can be heard talking in the background, trying and failing to trace the call. When the Falcon ends the call, the associate confirms he couldn't trace it. It must have been an attempt to sound realistic, like Dragnet, but it didn't suit the Adventures of the Falcon to have someone else speaking audibly in the background during a conversation. Robert Altman, this ain't.
I think the Adventures of the Falcon is, overall, an average detective show, but it had a pretty consistent quality that makes it easy to listen to. You certainly owe it to yourself to listen to at least one of the episodes with the dramatized Miracle Whip ads! I'm also fond of the Christmas episode "The Case of the Unwelcome Present" (December 24, 1950) which was the first episode I ever heard - it was a long time before I heard another episode from the series. That one is a delightful Christmas mystery show and I usually listen to it every December.
The Old Time Radio Researchers have a collection of 92 episodes of the Adventures of the Falcon at the Internet Archive.
Mr. and Mrs. North was a half-hour detective/comedy program based on a series of novels started in 1936 by the husband/wife team of Frances and Richard Lockridge. Mr. and Mrs. North became a popular stage play in 1941, a 1942 film that starred Gracie Allen, a television series and, for our purposes, a radio program.
We still have the pilot for the series, which was produced in 1941 for CBS and starred Peggy Conklin as Mrs. North (reprising the role she'd played on stage) and Carl Eastman as Mr. North. This pilot is very much a situation comedy and it didn't get picked up.
Mr. and Mrs. North finally landed at NBC with an emphasis on mystery (although still a light comedy), where it aired from December 30, 1942 to December 18, 1946. Then it moved back to CBS and ran from July 1, 1947 to April 18, 1955. Joseph Curtin and Alice Frost held the roles initially, with Richard Denning and Barbara Britton taking over the roles for the show's final 2 seasons; they were simultaneously portraying the Norths in a 1952-1954 television series. The Lockridges' books continued until 1963.
In the show's final years, Mr. and Mrs. North would open each episode with a dramatic scene - often including a woman's scream - then switch to the announcer for the show's standard opening. In the show's final year it became a daily 15-minute serial program (much as Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar did) but we only have one story from the serialized era. It looks as though it was only a serial program for two months from October-November 1954, then resumed being a half-hour weekly show.
Richard Denning's presence certainly gave the series a stronger comedic touch - he's probably best-known for playing opposite Lucille Ball in the radio series My Favorite Husband and his Mr. North seemed to treat the mysterious doings and goings-on with a detached bemusement.
Given Gracie Allen's involvement with the franchise, you might assume Mrs. North was a scatterbrained blonde - kind of like Jane Sherlock in Meet Miss Sherlock. However, Mrs. North was usually portrayed as simply an everyday woman who had no background in criminology but applied simple common sense (and good hunches) to solve crimes. Mr. North, as a publisher of mystery fiction, had a somewhat better background in detective work but most of the crime-solving was done by his better half.
Obviously, the entire franchise owes an enormous debt to Dashiell Hammett; the first time I heard Mr. and Mrs. North I assumed it was a rip-off of the Thin Man's Nick and Nora Charles. Whether or not Hammett influenced the Lockridges, the success of William Powell and Myrna Loy's 1934 Thin Man film popularized husband/wife teams who bantered, romanced and solved crimes together.
The supporting roles on Mr. and Mrs. North featured a number of familiar voices, including Frank Lovejoy, Maurice Tarplin (a bit distracting, given his role as the Mysterious Traveler), William Conrad and Jackson Beck.
The Old Time Radio Researchers have a collection of 75 episodes of Mr. and Mrs. North at the Internet Archive. Many surviving episodes are from the Armed Forces' Mystery Playhouse with Peter Lorre or Howard Duff hosting.
Philo Vance was a half-hour detective show based on the gentleman crime solver created by S. S. Van Dine, immortalized in a series of films (1929-1947), four of which starred William Powell. Philo Vance's first time on radio was over NBC as a summer program from July 5-September 27, 1945, sponsored by Lifebuoy. The series moved to ABC as a summer series in 1946, then became a syndicated program from 1948-1950. Jose Ferrer protrayed Philo Vance on NBC (we have only 3 episodes from his tenure); Jackson Beck had the role in the syndicated version.
Jackson Beck is best-remembered to radio listeners as the announcer of the Adventures of Superman but he's decent as a leading man - a bit stolid, but good. George Petrie played opposite Beck as John Markham, the New York district attorney. The Vance/Markham relationship is different from that of most radio amateur/professional pairings. Rather than a busybody who forces himself on the law and one-up them in their investigations, Vance was always called in to consult on cases by Markham. Vance even made mistakes in the course of his investigations, unlike so many smug radio detectives.
Vance's simple blend of confidence and humility certainly makes him different than most detectives. There are certainly flashier and funnier radio detectives you can listen to, but Philo Vance is, at the very least, inoffensive.
The Old Time Radio Researchers have a collection of 95 episodes of Philo Vance at the Internet Archive.
True Detective Mysteries was originally a half-hour syndicated mystery anthology program, based on stories that appeared in True Detective magazine. It was heard in 1936-1937. After that it turned up on Mutual (1938-1939, 1944-1958). Despite its lengthy run, we have very little of the series by which to judge its contents. There are 14 episodes from the original syndicated run; 2 episodes from 1946-1950 when the show was sponsored by O. Henry candy; and 4 episodes from 1957-1958, the show's final year.
It's a pity that we have so little remaining of a long-running series such as this. Most of the broadcasts from the 1930s are very similar to that of other shows I've talked about on the blog, such as Police Reporter. The late 1950s episodes are interesting for being strong crime dramas at a time when most radio drama was disappearing from the airwaves.
Strangely, the first episode - "The Rattlesnake and the Barefoot Bride" - is very similar to an episode of In the Name of the Law broadcast a year before and titled "July Fourth Picnic." They seem to be inspired by the same true-life murder but the production values are different. I wonder if In the Name of the Law had a link to True Detective that wasn't mentioned in the broadcasts?
I think True Detective Mysteries was a decent true-crime series. The presentation was middle-of-the-road but the quality in the series is consistent, even across decades.
The Old Time Radio Researchers have a library of True Detective Mysteries episodes here, on their website.
The Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show was a spin-off program from the Jack Benny Program, starring his popular bandleader Phil Harris alongside his real-life wife, movie star Alice Faye. The cast included Elliott Lewis as Frankie Remley, Phil's left-handed guitar player (more about that below), Walter Tetley as Julius Abruzzio the delivery boy, Gale Gordon as Phil's sponsor Mr. Scott (during the show's first season Gordon appeared in various small roles before becoming a regular in the 2nd year) and Robert North as Alice's nasal-toned brother Willie. Bill Forman was the show's announcer and they drew from the best of radio's supporting players (including many appearances by Sheldon Leonard as Grogan, a mobster friend of Remley's). In it's heyday, the show was written by Ray Singer and Dick Chevillat.
It began under the title of the Fitch Bandwagon, a long-running program that usually hosted musical numbers. Phil had even supplied some of the musical numbers in the show's past but as of September 29, 1946, Phil and Alice served as the stars and the same format would hold even as the show changed sponsors (Rexall 1948-1950, RCA-Victor 1950-1954). Under the formal name change to the Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show the series ran from October 3, 1948 to June 18, 1954. Whatever the name, whatever the format, it was always heard on NBC.
Given Phil Harris' immense popularity throughout the 1930s (believe it or not, his 1933 short film So This Is Harris won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject!), it was only a matter of time before he became the star of his own show. A frequent recurring joke on the Jack Benny Program would be Phil boasting of a new radio show he'd supposedly be starring in under the auspices of a second-rate (fictional) sponsor. Phil had led a few musical programs (such as Hollywood Spotlight; he used his signature theme from that show on Phil Harris/Alice Faye) and he served as a guest host here and there, notably when he spent the summer of 1944 as guest host of Kay Kyser's Kollege of Musical Knowledge.
But of all of Phil's starring roles on radio prior to he and Alice's program, perhaps the most fateful appearance was an episode of Stars Over Hollywood titled "Southern Hospitality" (April 18, 1942). It's a gentle comedy in which Phil appeared as himself and accompanying him as his sidekick and fellow musician was one Elliott Lewis. Lewis was a pretty busy man as a radio actor and had also performed alongside Phil on many episodes of the Jack Benny Program but that episode of Stars Over Hollywood demonstrated how well Phil and Elliott played off of each other.
For the Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show, Lewis assumed the identity of Frankie Remley, the real-life left-handed guitar player who had been a source of jokes for years on the Jack Benny Program; strangely, although many members of the band were used in jokes on Benny's show (Sammy the drummer, Bagby the piano player), Remley was the only one shared between the two shows - a sharing process that started out well (Lewis even made appearances as Remley on Benny's show) but ended poorly.
Lewis is a big part of what makes the Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show hold up today; his off-kilter sense of humour (frequently sardonic) and jovial personality (usually entering with a "Hiya, Curly!" directed at Phil) paired with his ability to exacerbate each episode's problem (frequently he would declare "I know a guy..." to handle Phil's situation).
Phil marrying Alice Faye was, in some ways, a great joke on Jack Benny; there had been many jokes on the Jack Benny Program about how Phil was considered a great lover, much to Jack's consternation. Phil marrying a real-life glamorous movie star played right into the joke, but they proved to have an enduring love for each other; unlike so many Hollywood couples, they really did love each other and Alice gave up her acting career to raise their children (when she did try acting later she found she hadn't missed it). Phil and Alice's children were played by Jeanine Roose (who started playing Phyllis in 1945 for the Jack Benny Program) and Anne Whitfield.
In the days the show was written by Ray Singer and Dick Chevillat it had a very strong formula, similar to what many television sitcoms would adopt in the following years. Typically, Phil would try to tackle some problem (be it buying a gift for Alice or, in one instance, trying to solve a murder) and Frankie would be either forced to assist him or force Phil to accept his help. After their initial failures at the task, Frankie would declare "I know a guy," often leading to an appearance by Grogan, who started out as a counterfeiter but soon became an all-purpose criminal. As Phil and Frankie's problems mounted, Julius would appear ("Mistah Harris, I brung da groceries!") and they would attempt to solve their problem by forcing (or tricking) Julius to help them.
Again, during the Singer/Chevillat years there would be two musical numbers in each episode, one sung by Phil, the other by Alice. Usually these were songs they had recently recorded and were promoting; in the RCA Victor years, those songs were recorded for RCA Victor, thus they served as a sort of commercial. A lot of songs were repeated over the years; some had been part of Phil's act since the 1930s. In the Singer/Chevillat years, there would always be a deliberately-poor segue leading into the songs, a gentle way of mocking how on radio shows, characters seemed to burst into song even when there was no possible musical accompaniment. The best jokes would follow the songs; in an episode where Alice sang her song while the characters were supposedly in an elevator, Frankie quipped "Nice band they had in the elevator," causing Phil to crack up (February 12, 1950).
The series had a gentle fall from grace. As of the fall of 1952, Elliott Lewis couldn't use the name of Frankie Remley any longer and so his character became "Elliott Lewis" for the final 2 seasons. Although Jack had moved from NBC to CBS in 1949 without much harm (it did mean Phil had less time on the Jack Benny Program), apparently CBS television wanted to keep the Frankie Remley jokes as part of Benny's act and didn't want to share with NBC any longer; at the same time, Phil was dropped from Jack's show (replaced by Bob Crosby).
When Elliott Lewis started portraying "Elliott Lewis" on the Phil Harris/Alice Faye show, his character became a lot less funny. Although the character was written as before, Frankie Remley was a legendary left-handed guitar player and butt of jokes; Elliott, despite claiming he was also a left-handed guitar player was not; the artifice of the character he was portraying became too obvious once his fictional character had the same name.
The songs had also become simply played from the RCA Victor recordings, thus lacking the fun segues the series had used. The recordings are also less spontaneous and the change in audio quality when they start likewise makes the listener too aware of the artificial nature of the program.
The series also began losing important names; Gale Gordon left, depriving the show of a great comedic foil for Phil; Robert North left and although the part of Willie was recast, Willie was written as a straight man from then on and his appearances were infrequent. Finally Singer and Chevillat left, leaving the show's final year to be written by Jack Douglas and Marvin Fisher, who wrote for comedy shows such as the Sealtest Village Show, the Martin and Lewis Show. The jokes in the last year are much more generic than the Singer/Chevillat jokes and most could have been used on Father Knows Best. There were a lot of stooges added in the final year, such as Richard LeGrand (best-known as Peavey on the Great Gildersleeve) who played Phil's dad, despite LeGrand's speciality being a New England hick and Phil being a southerner.
Despite all of this, I still find the Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show to be a very funny program, especially from 1946-1952, Singer/Chevillat's peak years. Phil was an appealing wiseguy and the show had plenty of smart-aleck stooges for him to play off. Gale Gordon's Mr. Scott character barely restraining his contempt for Phil is extremely fun to listen to.
One of the joys of this series is that we still have several examples of the program's warm-up show. It appears Phil usually worked the warm-up show himself, running a stand-up comedy routine to get the audience ready for the scripted program to follow and introducing each member of his band. It's rare to have any warm-up shows in existence, so these samples are a treat.
The Old Time Radio Researchers have a YouTube playlist of 249 Phil Harris/Alice Faye Show episodes (these include Armed Forces' versions and versions that include the pre-show):
Matinee Theater is how I've chosen to describe a series that was known under two names: Dangerously Yours (July 2 to October 15, 1944) and Vick's Matinee Theater (October 22, 1944 to April 8, 1945). It was a romantic anthology program that starred Victor Jory in the lead role; all the stories were well-known tales from famous novels, plays and movies. It aired as a daytime program, so it's very different from the usual fare I blog about; the target audience would have been stay-at-home women, the same as the more famous radio soap operas.
I've referenced this series before, back when I was covering adaptations of works from Alfred Hitchcock's movies; I blogged a bit about Mr. and Mrs. Smith here and I blogged about Rebecca here. In both instances, I singled out Matinee Theater for providing the worst adaptations of those works by omitting all the tension and conflict from the original works; it's especially bad with Rebecca in trying to give that story a happy ending!
So far as daytime programming goes I rate Matinee Theater as a cut above the usual fare - the production values were strong and the performing casts were larger than most daytime shows. However, outside of the lackluster adaptations, I also have to say I don't get much from Victor Jory as a leading man; in every radio show I've heard him in, his performance has felt too knowingly melodramatic, too stagey.
Many years ago I wrote a blog post about the first two issues of Marvel's 1949 Suspense comic book series: found here. As I noted in that post, those first two issues were the only issues which featured direct adaptations from Suspense's CBS radio scripts as the series was otherwise comprised of original material.
I suppose this post, then, is my third post on this subject as I found two more stories that were adapted from Suspense -- or, at least partially adapted from Suspense. Let's turn to Private Eye, a detective series Marvel published 1951-1952 and featured detective Rocky Jorden; for the longest time, I thought he was supposed to be the same person as the CBS adventure hero Rocky Jordan (1945-1951) but no, despite very similar names and Marvel's licensing from CBS at the time, they're not related.
Private Eye lasted a mere 8 issues and in that issue there are two different stories with plots very similar to stories heard on Suspense! Note that the 1952 publication date puts this well after the start of Marvel's 1949 deal with CBS. In the story "Nightmare for Two," (drawn by Vern Henkel, no writer credited) Rocky Jorden is riding in an elevator car when the car suddenly plunges to the bottom of the shaft. After workers use a torch to cut their way into the car, Rocky is surprised to discover one of the men who survived the plunge is now dead.
If you know your Suspense, you've already recognized the plot of "the After-Dinner Story" (October 26, 1943). It was adapted from a short story by Cornell Woolrich originally published in 1938. Of course, there's much more to "the After-Dinner Story" than the just the murder aboard the fallen elevator car, it's merely the inciting incident of the drama. Rocky's "Nightmare for Two" only used that particular situation for about 3 of its 7 pages but's it very interesting to see this minor rip-off.
However, that's just the first Suspense rip-off in that issue. The final story of that issue was dubbed "Panic!" (again by artist Vern Henkel with no credited writer) and concerns a woman facing execution who is accused of murdering her lover but she was suffering from a blackout and her memory of the incident was hazy. Rocky clears her and identifies the real killer because his testimony about having his arms raised when the woman shot at him is proven false due to the location of the bullethole on his coat.
Again, all you educated Suspense fans recall these are the details pertaining to John Dickson Carr's script for "the Hangman Won't Wait" (February 9, 1943), of which we only have the first half still in existence (but it was also adapted on Appointment with Fear as "the Clock Strikes Eight"). What's especially odd about this is Marvel had already published an authorized adaptation of this story in the first issue of Suspense (as "Here Comes the Hangman!").
So, what are we Suspense fans left with? A few more questions about why Marvel kept printing unauthorized plots from Suspense, for one thing. I continue to wonder if someone at Marvel had received access to CBS's script archive for Suspense and was surreptitiously filing off the serial numbers in order to make their deadlines.
One World Flight was a CBS program that aired as a sort of 13 episode mini-series from January 14 to April 8, 1947. It was created by Norman Corwin, who wrote, produced and narrated the series. The first 12 episodes focus on particular nations (such as England, Egypt, Australia and New Zealand) while the 13th sums up what was learned from the preceding episodes.
The series was inspired by the politician Wendell Willkie, who had died in 1944 but whose "one world" ideals would help found the United Nations. Corwin visited 16 different countries and interviewed people from all walks of life (government officials and passersby in the streets) to hear their thoughts about the state of the world and what they thought was needed to prevent another world war. It's a heavy subject but it's an interesting snapshot of attitudes around the world at the time.
There are certainly some disappointing reactions from various ignorant people - like one who goes off on an antisemitic tirade, blaming Jews for World War II. There's another who blames Black people for all the problems they've heard about the USA. But the most surprising ignorance is ignorance of world events; while in Egypt, Corwin spoke to a number of people who either did not know World War II had been over for more than a year, or who mistakenly thought Hitler had won the war!
Although a true believer in the greatness of his country, Corwin had the misfortune of being a left-wing patriot at a time where everyone in the left-wing was having their patriotism questioned. Corwin had been one of CBS' most prolific playwrights since his time on the Columbia Workshop, but One World Flight proved to be his swan song (so far as the Golden Age of Radio is concerned). One World Flight didn't really take a position on the USSR, with various people referring to it as a threat or optimistically hoping there might be a path to peace. It probably enraged those who simply wanted the USSR demonized; Corwin worked for the United Nations after leaving CBS but then wound up attacked by Red Channels and the House of Un-American Activities. But since he lived to be 101, Corwin had the pleasure of out-living his enemies.
One World Flight might not be your cup of tea if you're not interested in history or historical attitudes, but I found it an interesting glimpse at what people around the world thought after the war. Along with the ignorant remarks I mentioned above, there's plenty of sober thought from many of those whom Corwin recorded.
