OLD TIME RADIO -
12 AUDIO CD - 24 Shows
Suspense,
one of the premier drama programs of the Golden Age of
Radio, was subtitled "radio's outstanding theater of
thrills." It was heard on CBS from 1942 through 1962.
Approximately 945 episodes were broadcast during its long
run, and more than 900 are extant in mostly high-quality
recordings
Suspense went through
several major phases, characterized by different hosts,
sponsors and director/producers. There were a few rules
which were followed for all but a handful of episodes:
Protagonists were usually a normal person suddenly dropped
into a threatening or bizarre situation. Evildoers must be
punished in the end. The program made only occasional forays
into science fiction and fantasy. Among its science fiction
entries were "The Man who Went Back to Save Lincoln" (a time
travel fantasy) and an adaptation of Curt Siodmak's
Donovan's Brain, as well as an adaptation of an H.P.
Lovecraft short story, "The Dunwich Horror".
Alfred Hitchcock
directed its audition show (for the CBS series Forecast).
This was an adaptation of "The Lodger," [1] a story
Hitchcock had filmed in 1926 with Ivor Novello. Martin
Grams, Jr., author of Suspense: Twenty Years of Thrills and
Chills, described the Forecast origin of Suspense:
On the second
presentation of July 22, 1940, Forecast offered a
mystery/horror show titled Suspense. With the co-operation
of his producer Walter Wanger, Alfred Hitchcock received the
honor of directing his first radio show for the American
public. The condition agreed upon for Hitchcock's appearance
was that CBS make a pitch to the listening audience about
his and Wanger's latest film, Foreign Correspondent. To add
some flavour to the deal, Wanger threw in Edmund Gwenn and
Herbert Marshall as part of the package. All three men
(including Hitch) would be seen in the upcoming film, which
was due for a theatrical release the next month. Both
Marshall and Hitchcock decided on the same story to bring to
the airwaves, which happened to be a favorite of both of
them: Marie Belloc Lowndes' "The Lodger." Alfred Hitchcock
had filmed this story for Gainsborough in 1926, and since
then it had remained as one of his favorites.
Herbert Marshall
portrayed the mysterious lodger, and co-starring with him
were Edmund Gwenn and character actress Lurene Tuttle as the
rooming-house keepers who start to suspect that their new
boarder might be the notorious Jack-the-Ripper. [Gwenn was
actually repeating the role taken in the 1926 film by his
brother, Arthur Chesney. And Tuttle would work again with
Hitchcock exactly 20 years later, playing Mrs Al Chambers in
Psycho.] Character actor Joseph Kearns also had a small part
in the drama, and Wilbur Hatch, head musician for CBS Radio
at the time, composed and conducted the music specially for
the program. Adapting the script to radio was not a great
technical challenge for Hitchcock, and he cleverly decided
to hold back the ending of the story from the listening
audience in order to keep them in suspense themselves. This
way, if the audience's curiosity got the better of them,
they would write in to the network to find out whether the
mysterious lodger was in fact Jack-the-Ripper. For the next
few weeks, hundreds of letters came in from faithful
listeners asking how the story ended. Actually a few wrote
threats claiming that it was "indecent" and "immoral" to
present such a production without giving the solution.
In the early phase,
the program was hosted by "The Man in Black" (played by
Joseph Kearns or Ted Osborne) and many episodes written or
adapted by the prominent mystery author John Dickson Carr.
Escape was a similar anthology thriller and suspense
program. Both occasionally adapted the same stories, though
Escape had lower budgets--and thus, fewer sound effects and
name actors.
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CAN
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SHOWS LIST
CD 1
The Ten Grand -
1944-06-22 Episode 97
The Walls Came
Tumbling Down - 1944-06-29 Episode 98
CD 2
The Search For
Henri Lefevre - 1944-07-06 Episode 99
The Beast Must Die
- 1944-07-13 Episode 100
CD 3
Of Maestro And Men
- 1944-07-20 Episode 101
The Black Shawl -
1944-07-27 Episode 102
CD 4
Banquo's Chair -
1944-08-03 Episode 103
The Man Who Knew
How - 1944-08-10 Episode 104
CD 5
The Diary Of
Sophonia Winters - 1944-08-17 Episode 105
Actor's Blood -
1944-08-24 Episode 106
CD 6
The Black Path Of
Fear - 1944-08-31 Episode 107
Voyage Through
Darkness - 1944-09-07 Episode 108
CD 7
You'll Never See Me
Again - 1944-09-14 Episode 109
The Bluebeard Of
Ballaco - 1944-09-21 Episode 110
CD 8
The Man Who
Couldn't Lose - 1944-09-28 Episode 111
Dateline Lisbon -
1944-10-05 Episode 112
CD 9
The Merry Widower -
1944-10-12 Episode 113
Eve (The Black
Angel) - 1944-10-19 Episode 114
CD 10
The Night Man -
1944-10-26 Episode 115
The Singing Walls -
1944-11-02 Episode 116
CD 11
You Were Wonderful
- 1944-11-09 Episode 117
The Dead Of The
Night - 1944-11-16 Episode 118
CD 12
The Fountain Plays
- 1944-11-23 Episode 119
Black Curtain -
1944-11-30 Episode 120
This product was added to our catalog on Saturday 10 December, 2011.