A Golden Age of Radio Classic

I’m a firm believer in using your imagination. In today’s society, we can plop down in front of the TV and watch shows and not really have to think about what’s going on. Everything is right there on the screen. However, back in the days before television, there was radio.

Radio was a medium that brought the listener’s imagination to life! You and I could listen to the same show, but each see our own version because we’d picture things differently. There is a reason that so many folks used the phrase “theater of the mind” when talking about old time radio.

One of the best radio dramas was a show simply called Suspense. If I had to describe it, I’d say it was the radio version of the Twilight Zone. I say that because there was often a twist at the end of each show. If you really want to hear REAL acting, Suspense featured it every week! Actors and actresses only had the use of their voice to display the wide range of human emotions – and they did it flawlessly!

Suspense was a half-hour drama series that aired on the CBS radio network from 1940 to 1962 (for the first half of 1948, episodes lasted for 60 minutes). That multi-year run made it one of network radio’s longer lasting dramatic series with nearly 950 episodes produced.

At its height, the radio series featured a cross-section of well known Hollywood actors and actresses (it was aired from Los Angeles from 1943 through into the 1950s) who were attracted by the quality of the scripts and show’s production values. For years, the host was simply “The Man in Black” who would almost whisper the opening line “. . . And now, another tale well-calculated to keep you in . . . Suspense.”

82 years ago today, Suspense aired one of its classic episodes. It is an episode that will often come up when anyone speaks of the Golden Age of Radio. It starred a young Agnes Moorehead (who would go on to play Endora on TV’s Bewitched). I am talking about the classic “Sorry, Wrong Number.

“Sorry, Wrong Number,” a classic suspense radio drama, explores the chilling scenario of a woman accidentally eavesdropping on a murder plot. The episode, broadcast on May 25, 1943, tells the story of Mrs. Stevenson, a woman who listens to a phone call between two men planning a murder. She realizes the crime is set to happen that night, and she desperately tries to alert authorities. Sadly she finds her efforts blocked by indifference and bureaucracy, leading to a terrifying climax where she realizes she might be the intended victim. 

In an essay by Christopher H. Sterling, he says,

In a modern era of digital cellphones, the impact of this period program is sometimes difficult to understand. But when it was originally broadcast in the midst of World War II, in an analog era of operator-assisted telephone calls and shared “party” lines, radio listeners could readily identify with the situations they heard.

Sorry, Wrong Number was initially broadcast live twice on May 25, 1943 (once for East Coast listeners–with a minor flub in one line—and then repeated for the West Coast). It was rebroadcast other eight times (on August 21, 1943; February 24, 1944; September 6, 1945; November 18, 1948; September 15, 1952; October 20, 1957; and February 14, 1960).

In 1948, the play was made into a movie starring Barbara Stanwyck and Burt Lancaster. The film is excellent, but nothing compares to the amazing performance of Agnes Moorehead on the radio version.

Do yourself a favor, pull up a chair and give it a listen. Let your imagination go wild! Listen to what she is able to convey simply with her voice. Let’s go back 82 years and enjoy a masterpiece!

Source: Christopher H. Sterling Essay