Radio Recap: Night Beat

Night Beat was an NBC program that starred Frank Lovejoy as Randy Stone, a newspaper reporter who "covered the night beat." Each program would find Randy investigating a human interest story or stumbling into one during the course of events. It aired 1950-1952 and was sponsored for part of its run by Wheaties, part of it by Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer. Night Beat enjoyed a higher budget than other NBC dramatic programs so, for a change, I'm not here to register my usual complaints about NBC's repetitive musical choices. Night Beat had unique musical bridges, a large cast of characters (including familiar voices like William Conrad, Jeff Chandler and Howard McNear) and very good sound effects.

The pilot episode of Night Beat from 1949 is available and it's quite different from what the show became. It's not just that in the pilot Randy was called "Hank Mitchell" and was played by Edmond O'Brien, who went on to star in Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar instead (Frank Lovejoy used the same script for the 2nd pilot). In the pilot, "Hank" is outraged when a reformed criminal he knew is killed and is convinced his friend's old mob ties are responsible. "Hank" takes up a gun and goes seeking revenge; it's very noir, but -- outside of Randy's very noirish narration -- that wasn't the feel Night Beat ultimately went for.

Night Beat was a very humanist program. Randy Stone didn't solve problems with a gun or even his fists - like, ever. Typically, Randy would calm a person down by appealing to their character and what he learned about them across the drama. Indeed, Randy was a long-suffering protagonist whose goodness was often tread upon by the subject of that week's episode. In one episode, Randy was mugged by an old man who needed money for gambling. Randy then went looking for the old man to help him break his gambling habit and in the course of this he was repeatedly beaten up by bouncers at casinos. Randy seldom gets to prove his masculinity by shoving back, he's more likely to be the one who is shoved. In the era of noir-ish tough guys, this makes Night Beat's Randy Stone all the more unusual.

Towards the end, I wonder if Night Beat's budget was running out? One of the later episodes, "The Bomb On Flight 63," (September 4, 1952) uses a script recycled from NBC's the Silent Men that had been aired earlier that same year!

If you like a strong drama with a bit of action and mystery but think all the radio private eyes sound alike, you might do well to check out Night Beat for something a little offbeat. My favourite episodes include "The Man Who Claimed to Be Dead" (March 13, 1950) in which a man keeps insisting to Randy that he's dead and has men ready to vouch for it; "A City at Your Fingertips" (July 31, 1950) in which Randy dials a number at random and is answered by a woman being terrorized by her husband; "The Slasher" (November 10, 1950) in which Randy thinks he might have stumbled upon the identity of a man who disfigures his female victims; "Sanctuary" (June 22, 1951) in which Randy observes the showdown between the police and a man in a church tower; and "Somebody Stop Ann" (August 7, 1952) in which one of Randy's co-workers believes her children are in danger from her husband.

The majority of Night Beat is still in circulation and easy to find on old-time radio channels and websites. You can hear Night Beat on the Internet Archive.