Showing results by author "Hollywood 360" in All Categories

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's detective genius, Sherlock Holmes, first came to NBC radio in 1930, starring Richard Gordon. By 1939, Basil Rathbone took over as Holmes, with Nigel Bruce as Dr. Watson. The duo were simultaneously starring in a very popular series of Sherlock Holmes' movies for the Fox and Universal studios.

Richard Diamond, Private Detective came to NBC Radio in 1949, starring film actor and crooner Dick Powell. Powell had recently played Philip Marlowe in the popular RKO film Murder, My Sweet and jumped at the chance to play a suave detective on the radio. Diamond was a lighthearted, New York - based private eye who enjoyed ribbing the cops and singing songs to his millionaire girlfriend, Helen Asher.

This collection contains 13 of the greatest science fiction shows ever broadcast during the golden age of radio - including two episodes each of Dimension X, CBS Radio Workshop, and X Minus One, plus three episodes of Suspense and Escape. You'll be entertained by stories from such master science fiction writers as H. G. Wells, Aldous Huxley, Graham Doar, Mary Shelley, H. L. Gold, and George Steward.

Damon Runyon was a newspaperman and writer. He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of New York City's Broadway that grew out of the Prohibition era. He created a little world of characters that live on even today in such classic movies as Little Miss Marker and Guys and Dolls, both based on Runyon's stories. Actor Alan Ladd's Mayfair Productions brought Runyon's short stories to radio in the early 1950s.

My Favorite Husband hit the CBS Radio airwaves in 1948, starring Lucille Ball and Richard Denningas Liz and George Cugat - who later became Liz and George Cooper when confusion with bandleader Xavier Cugat prompted a name change. Set in the fictitious town of Sheridan Falls, the show follows the happily married couple, residents of 321 Bundy Drive, through mischief and various predicaments, from faked illnesses to trouble with exes.

Made as a prequel to the hit film The Third Man, this radio show was created to follow the adventures of the popular character Harry Lime, played here and in the movie by Orson Welles. The 1949 film The Third Man won an Academy Award and was an international success, called "magic" by Roger Ebert and "one of the finest films ever made" by The New York Times.

This collection contains 12 amazing Sherlock Holmes adventures, starring Tom Conway and Nigel Bruce.

First heard on network radio in 1948, Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar chronicled the adventures of freelance insurance investigator Johnny Dollar, "the man with the action-packed expense account". For 14 years, it was one of the most popular detective shows on the air, lasting until the final days of network radio drama in 1962. Each story started with a phone call from an insurance executive calling on Johnny Dollar to investigate an unusual claim.

The Black Museum was a weekly radio crime drama produced for the BBC in 1951 and based on real-life cases from the files of Scotland Yard. Orson Welles, who was living in London at the time, was both host and narrator for these dramatized stories based on Scotland Yard's Black Museum, which housed its collection of murder weapons and various ordinary objects once associated with historical crime cases.

Lucille Ball and Lee Bowman auditioned for the roles of a married couple in a radio pilot for a new comedy, My Favorite Husband, based on the novel Mr. and Mrs. Cugat by Isabel Scott Rorick. The concept was very well received and within a few weeks the weekly sitcom was established. Bowman was replaced by Richard Denning and during the first season, the Cugats were renamed the Coopers, who lived “in a little white two-story house” in the bustling, small suburb of Sheridan Falls.

Duffy's Tavern, first heard in 1940, was co-created and written by Ed Gardner, who played Archie, the manager of Duffy's Tavern, which was a flea-infested dive in New York City. Archie's abuse of the English language quickly became a favorite feature of the show. Regulars on the show included Duffy's man-hungry daughter Miss Duffy; Clifton Finnegan, the classic village idiot, played by Charlie Cantor; Eddie the waiter, played by Eddie Green; and Clancy the cop, played by Alan Reed. Duffy himself was never heard on the show.

The Whistler was one of radio's top mystery programs, airing from May 16, 1942 until September 22, 1955. The Whistler was an ominous narrator who opened each episode with, "I am the Whistler, and I know many things, for I walk by night. I know many strange tales, many secrets hidden in the hearts of men and women who have stepped into the shadows. I know the nameless terrors of which they dare not speak."

This collection contains twelve of the greatest mystery shows ever broadcast during the golden age of radio! You'll hear Richard Widmark starring in Inner Sanctum Mysteries, Orson Welles in The Black Museum, Peter Lorre in Mystery in the Air, William Conrad in The Whistler, Ernest Chappell in Quiet, Please, Everett Clarke in Lights Out, Harry Bartell in Escape, and Fredric Marchin a tale well calculated to keep you in Suspense, plus many more.

Produced in New York, Murder at Midnight came to ABC Radio in September of 1946 and featured horror stories with supernatural twists. Raymond Morgan, a former Long Island minister who had left the cloth for the excitement of radio, was the foreboding host who each week uttered the lines, "Midnight, the witching hour, when the night is darkest, our fears the strongest, and our strength at its lowest ebb. Midnight, when the graves gape open and death strikes."

This collection contains twelve of the greatest comedy shows ever broadcast during the golden age of radio. You'll hear Ozzie and Harriet Nelson in The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet, Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll as Amos 'n' Andy, Robert Young in Father Knows Best, Jim and Marian Jordan as Fibber McGee and Molly, William Bendix as Chester A. Riley in The Life of Riley, Lucille Ball in My Favorite Husband, and more.

Raymond Chandler'scelebrated hard-boiled private eye, Philip Marlowe, made his radio debut in 1945 on the Lux Radio Theatre with "Murder, My Sweet", starring Dick Powell. Two years later, NBC brought the character to the air in his own weekly series starring Van Heflin: The New Adventures of Philip Marlowe. A summer replacement for The Bob Hope Show, the series was short-lived, ending September 9,1947. CBS revived it in 1948 with TheAdventures of Philip Marlowe, starring Gerald Mohr.

The Whistler was one of radio's top mystery programs airing from May 16, 1942 until September 22, 1955, sponsored by the Signal Oil Company. The Whistler was an ominous narrator who opened each episode with: "I am the Whistler, and I know many things, for I walk by night. I know many strange tales, many secrets hidden in the hearts of men and women who have stepped into the shadows. I know the nameless terrors of which they dare not speak."

Here are 12 episodes from the greatest detective shows ever broadcast during the golden age of radio, with the legendary stars that made them great. You'll hear Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes and Nigel Bruce as Doctor Watson, Sydney Greenstreet as Nero Wolfe, Howard Duff as Sam Spade, Chester Morris as Boston Blackie, Dick Powell as Richard Diamond, and Jack Webb as Dragnet's Sergeant Joe Friday, plus more gumshoes like Philip Marlowe, Bulldog Drummond, Michael Shayne, and Johnny Dollar.

This collection contains 12 of the greatest mystery shows ever broadcast during the golden age of radio, featuring the legendary stars that made them great. You will hear Orson Welles, Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, Vincent Price, Basil Rathbone, Joan Fontaine, and other stars in classic radio episodes from such radio shows as Suspense, Escape, The Whistler, Inner Sanctum, The Screen Directors Playhouse, and The Weird Circle, among others.

This collection contains 12 episodes from the greatest science fiction shows ever broadcast during the golden age of radio, including a two-part Suspense episode starring Orson Welles, written by Curt Siodmak, author of The Wolf Man, one of Universal Pictures' biggest hits. Other classics include stories by H. G. Wells, Robert Heinlein, Frederick Pohl, and Murray Leinster on Dimension X, Escape, and X Minus One.