Escape and Suspense!

Suspense-You Were Wonderful

In honor of Black History month, here is the Suspense episode "You Were Wonderful" with Lena Horne.

True to the title, Lena's singing is wonderful despite the bad sound quality of this recording. She sings "Embraceable You", a little bit of "One Dozen Roses" and "America" (My Country 'Tis of Thee). This is a very patriotic WWII era episode that touches on the racial issues of the time. The story is set in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

According to her biography on the Kennedy Center's website, Lena Horne often performed for the troops in Europe during WWII but on the condition that the audience would be desegregated. She was also the most popular pin-up girl of African-American soldiers!

"You Were Wonderful" aired on November 9, 1944. According to Martin Grams in Suspense: Twenty Years of Thrills and Chills, she was the first professional singer to appear on Suspense.

Download Suspense.1944.11.09_You_Were_Wonderful.mp3

Image of Lena Horne from (www.classicsavers.com)

Escape - Papa Benjamin

Escape's episode "Papa Benjamin" is based on the short story by William Irish (aka Cornell Woolrich). It is set in the French Quarter of New Orleans where a struggling bandleader named Eddie uses a sacred voodoo chant as a gimmick to help save his failing nightclub act. Unfortunately, Eddie doesn't take the threat of a voodoo curse too seriously.

This is an interesting story that will keep your attention. There is a moral here about what can go wrong when an artist steals a sacred work from its creators. In this case, Eddie steals then exploits a sacred voodoo chant that he does not fully understand and can not control. In the end, it all kind of backfires on Eddie.

The sound effects are good and the music is more impressive than the average episode of Escape. There do not seem to be any actual African-Americans performing in this episode but that is typical of the era in which it was made. This show was broadcast on January 24, 1948.

"Papa Benjamin" was also an episode of the television series Thriller in 1961. The short story also appears under the titles "Dark Melody of Madness" and "Music from the Dark". The 1965 horror movie anthology Dr. Terror's House of Horrors used this story as well.

Download Escape.1948.01.24_Papa_Benjamin.mp3

(Image from Morguefile.com)

Best or Worst - Perigi's Wonderful Dolls

This is an episode from the science fiction series X Minus One, which ran on NBC from 1955-1958.  It is the story of a doll named Toto and a little girl named Cindy. The story is set in Washington D.C. where Cindy's father works as a government official at the Pentagon. On an afternoon shopping trip, Cindy and her mother discover Mr. Perigi's Toy Shop, and Cindy's mother is talked into taking home a doll named Toto. He walks, talks, laughs maniacally, and performs a little song about dolls taking over the earth--but none of this worries Cindy and her mom.

They get Toto home and right away there is a showdown between the family dog and the doll. One of my issues with this episode is the name of the family dog, "Mr Blister".  Am I hearing that right? The name is distracting, but the family dog doesn't last too long with this doll in the house.

This episode was broadcast on June 5, 1955 and it is entertaining and memorable despite its essentially silly plot and Toto's laughing. Really, Toto does a lot of maniacal laughing in this episode.

Download xmin1.1955.06.05_Perigi's_Wonderful_Dolls.mp3

"Perigi's Wonderful Dolls" had previously been presented on the series Dimension X  on August 4, 1950. The story is the same but there are some differences in the script. I prefer the X-Minus One version, but the fight scene between the doll and the dog is better in the earlier version.  Dimension X's Toto seems scarier at first, but his tinny voice loses any fright value long before the episode ends.

Download Perigis_Wonderful_Dolls-DimX.1950.08.04_.mp3

(Image from Morguefile.com)

Suspense-Never Follow a Banjo Act

As I watched the Grammy Awards show this past weekend my mind drifted to the Suspense episode "Never Follow a Banjo Act."

The star of this episode is Ethel Merman, and even if you aren't a big Ethel fan, you will probably enjoy this. She plays Rosie Jones, a singing star of "mature talents," who is asked to work with a heart-throb boy singer named Terry Dane. She accepts but quickly finds out that the deal she made isn't all it is cracked up to be.

This episode is surprisingly creepy and dark, and it makes memorable statements about greed, the pop music industry, and "tousled hair". Why hasn't this episode ever been turned into a movie?

Suspense broadcast this episode twice. The first presentation starred Ethel Merman on February 4, 1954, and the second starred Margaret Whiting on March 2, 1958.  Ethel's is the better version. "Never Follow a Banjo Act" was written for Suspense by James Poe.

Download 540201_never_follow_a_banjo_act.mp3

Best or Worst?-Evening Primrose

What can one say about "Evening Primrose"?

It is the original story about people who dwell in department stores at night, as well as, the first story about mannequins actually being real people covered in wax. The author, John Collier (1901-1980) was a prolific writer, but "Evening Primrose" is his best known short story. The Twilight Zone episode "After-Hours" is reminiscent of "Evening Primrose".

The basic plot is that a poet named Charles Snell escapes from the harsh reality of the world by going to live in a department store.  On his first night, he finds a society of creatures lives there as well.  The only other human with them is a servant girl named Ella. Charles falls in love with Ella but from there trouble ensues.

So you might think that turning this story into a musical for television would be a bad idea -- but you would be wrong. A television musical version of this story was done for ABC Stage 67 in 1966.  Written by Steven Sondheim and James Goldman, it starred Anthony Perkins as Charles. Charmian Carr (Liesl from the Sound of Music) played Ella. Unfortunately, this production is not commercially available at this time. The first professional stage presentation of this musical was performed in 2005.

What can one say about Escape's version of this story? I personally don't feel that Escape excelled at stories about poets. This wasn't the only one they did that came out with chuckle-worthy results. Their version of "Evening Primrose" is interesting only because of the greater success of the short story and of Sondheim's musical.

This episode was broadcast on November 5, 1947.

Download escape.1947.11.05_Evening_Primrose.mp3

(Image from Morguefile.com)

Escape - Treasure Inc.

Last week I posted an episode about a doll with "a gadget" where all goes horribly wrong. This week's episode of Escape is about an island resort with "a gimmick" where all goes horribly wrong.  More than that, it is a story about greed and the consequences of arrogance.

The title of the episode is "Treasure Incorporated" and in it we travel to a lush tropical island in the Caribbean where a promoter named Eddy Gillespie decides to build a resort. The problem is Clive, the only other white man on the island. Clive warns Eddy not to go against the natural forces of the island, but of course, Eddy doesn't listen...

This episode was broadcast on January 24, 1950. As is the case with most of the episodes written by John & Gwen Bagni, it has held up well over time. Frank Lovejoy starred as Eddy and John Hoyt starred as Clive.

Download escape.1950.01.24_Treasure_Incorporated.mp3

Suspense-The Pasteboard Box

Don't let the dull title fool you.  "The Pasteboard Box" is one of the best!

This is a story about an evil twin and if you have ever watched Days of Our Lives you know that having an evil twin can be a really bad thing.

"The Pasteboard Box" is a cold-blooded tale with some good twists and no remorse.  It stars movie actor Joseph Cotten in the roles of both twins, Walter and Jack. Cotten's wicked voice is superb in this episode and fortunately, he made many other appearances on Suspense as well.

Set in New York City, "The Pasteboard Box" is a swift and clever story about identical twin brothers and a box that won't go away! 

This episode was broadcast on January 17, 1946.

Download susp.1946.01.17_The_Pasteboard_Box.mp3

Best or Worst? - The Doll

Ask me to single out the worst episode of Suspense and my mind immediately jumps to the episode "The Doll".  Is it the worst - or is it one of the best ever?  I can't tell anymore. It is one of my all time favorites. Unintentionally funny and surreal, "The Doll" can't be pinned down into any one category.  Suspense began their fifteenth year on the air with this episode on October 23, 1956.

"The Doll" stars Patty McCormack of the movie The Bad Seed and her performance is fine but everything else about this episode is out of whack.  The sappy, lilting music interferes by making it impossible to take anything that happens too seriously. Even worse are the sound effects for the beating heart of the doll which are SO LOUD and distracting that the actors have to strain to be heard over it.

The story begins this way:

A seven year old girl named Val gets a doll from her new stepmother for a birthday present. The doll has "a gadget". You wind it up and its heart beats. Val names the doll after her dead mother (who died of a heart condition). Val becomes convinced that the doll will die too if she doesn't keep it constantly wound up.  Val's father and stepmother argue about the doll because it may have been a bad idea and decide to burn it in the incinerator after Val goes to bed. Val overhears this and runs away but can't get very far because she has always has to keep the doll wound up and...well, from there it just gets better and better!

Suspense broadcast this episode on October 23, 1956.

Download the_doll.mp3

Suspense - On a Country Road

"On a Country Road" is regarded as one of the classic tales of Suspense because it embodies all of the things at which the radio program excelled.

So now, ignore the traffic, the rain, the nearly empty gas tank, as well as those news bulletins about the escaped crazy woman on the loose, and come take a drive down a lonely side road with Cary Grant.

"On a Country Road" was first broadcast on November 16, 1950 and starred Cary Grant, Cathy Lewis, and Jeannette Nolan. It was repeated on January 4, 1954, December 9, 1954, and May 10, 1959, with a different cast each time. The radioplay was written for Suspense by Walter Bazzar. The television show Suspense presented this story once on March 13, 1951 with John Forsythe in the lead role.

Download Susp.1950.11.16_On_a_Country_Road.mp3

(Image of Cary Grant in North by Northwest from Wikimedia Commons)

Rev. 7/10/07

Escape - Three Skeleton Key

If there is one thing that the two namesakes of this blog have in common it is "Three Skeleton Key," a classic horror tale about rats narrated by Vincent Price. First made famous by Escape, this radio-play was then broadcast two more times on Suspense after Escape went off the air. Based on a 1937 Esquire magazine short story by the French writer George Toudouze, the story was adapted for Escape in 1949 by James Poe.

"Three Skeleton Key" is set on the coast of French Guiana in South America.  This is a coastline that is also famous for its penal colony on Devil's Island.

Quite a bit of information about "Three Skeleton Key" is available on the Internet. You can read more about it at the One Act Virtual Museum.  The One Act Players have posted Toudouze's original short story, and there is also a detailed article by B.A. Peterson at horror-wood.com.

Rats, Vincent Price, and a lonely lighthouse...this episode is a classic of vintage radio. 

The performance of this radio-play considered to be the best was one that Escape presented on March 17, 1950. They also performed this story on November 15, 1949, and August 9, 1953, but with different casts both times. Suspense brought back this radio-play with Vincent Price in the lead role on November 11, 1956, and October 19, 1958.

Here is Escape's "Three Skeleton Key" from March 17, 1950.

Download three_skeleton_key.mp3

Rev. 7/27/07