"Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar" was the last detective standing at the end of radio drama's original classic era, outlasting everyone else - Sam Spade, Richard Diamond, Sherlock Holmes, The Saint, Phillip Marlowe and dozens of others. "America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator" is arguably better-loved now than he was in the middle of the 20th century. Now Project Audion presents a new Johnny Dollar script, written by Patrick Keating in the style of the original episodes, and transcribed live (via Zoom) in the classic audio drama manner. Johnny Dollar travels to Texas to learn about the Damiani Diamond and what has happened to it...

Project Audion's cast includes:

Pete Fernbaugh in West Virginia

Kristen James in California

Glenn Hascall in Kansas

Lefty Rosenthal in Toronto Canada

Caleb Fisher in Virginia

Norman and Denise Cline in Kentucky

with production by Larry Groebe in Texas

S2 E9 - The Golden Horseshoe, part 2

In the conclusion of this two-part adventure, the Tec returns to Tijuana, Mexico, to discover just who murdered his client. Once he arrives, however, there's any number of possible suspects. Story by Dashiell Hammett, adapted and dramatized by Pete Lutz.

CAST:

Pete Lutz as THE TEC

Noah Diamond as VANCE RICHMOND

Jeff Moon as ED BOHANNON

John Bell as THE FOUR WITNESSES

Rhiannon McAfee as KEWPIE

Mark Kalita as GOOSENECK

Dana Gonsalves as GORMAN

Ian Federgreen as HOOPER

Jason D. Johnson as O'GAR

With Darren Rockhold as THE ANNOUNCER GUY

Music by Ross Bernhardt. Post-production and mixing by Fishbonius Sound Design.

S2 E8 - The Golden Horseshoe, part 1

In this two-part adventure, the Tec is sent by a worried wife down to Tijuana, Mexico, to find her husband. Our hero has a swell time south of the border, but when he returns, he finds a house full of murder! Story by Dashiell Hammett, adapted and dramatized by Pete Lutz.

CAST:

Pete Lutz as THE TEC

Noah Diamond as VANCE RICHMOND

Amanda Sisk as MRS. ASHCRAFT

Carole Krohn as the LANDLADY

Jeff Moon as ED BOHANNON

Paul Arbisi as LUSK and JAMOCHA

John Bell as THE POLICE CAPTAIN, THE BARTENDER and PEDRO

Frank Guglielmelli as THE NEIGHBOR and THE COP

Angela Young as CORA and the STENOGRAPHER

Rhiannon McAfee as KEWPIE

Joe Stofko as the OLD MAN and

Jason D. Johnson as O'GAR

With Darren Rockhold as THE ANNOUNCER GUY

Music by Ross Bernhardt. Post-production and mixing by Fishbonius Sound Design.

SUSPENSE, Episode 55

Premiered May 10, 2024

Suspense is one of classic radio's most highly-regarded dramas -- with good reason. It sustained a remarkably high quality level of dramatic tension for 20 years, as the many surviving recordings attest. But a handful of episodes are lost - and Project Audion now recreates one of them. "The Life of Nellie James" was intended as Suspense's premiere, but circumstances pushed it back to the third episode. It was performed once, live, on July 1, 1942, but never heard again. Until now -- as Project Audion, kicking off its fifth season, brings together a transcontinental cast in a live transcription of "The Life of Nellie James" from the original 1942 script. A dreadful murder takes place in the Simon James home, and justice is done ...or is it? It's a tale well-calculated to keep you in ...Suspense!

Featured in our cast are –

Patte Rosebank in Canada

Tim Burns in Kansas

Andy Hartson-Bowyer in Virginia

Richard Huitema in Florida

Mel Rose in Pennsylvania

Pete Lutz in Texas

Art Brown in California

Denny Thompson in Colorado

Frank Guglielmelli in Pennsylvania

Sharon Grunwald in New Jersey

Larry Groebe produced and directed from Texas

CRIME CLASSICS, Episode 52

Premiered Feb 9, 2024

The first woman executed for murder in the United States was hanged in 1778. In 1953 her shocking tale of love, hate, conspiracy, and murder was brought to life in the audition script for a new CBS radio drama series - "Crime Classics." Crime Classics was a sort of mid-century predecessor to today's true-crime podcasts. The audition episode, titled "The Crime of Bathsheba Spooner," featured some of radio's finest actors, writers, directors, and musicians. Unfortunately, this thoughtful adult true crime series only lasted a year before succumbing to the inexorable advance of television. Now, Project Audion premieres a recreation of the show using the original, uncut audition script, including material that never aired seventy years ago. In addition, we visit with Andrew Noone, author of a recent book on the 1778 murder, trial, and execution of Spooner. Join us and listen to the modern passions that inflamed Revolutionary America, as our transcontinental cast gathers via Zoom to perform a true "Crime Classic."

The cast includes –

David Phillips in Virginia

Patte Rosebank in Toronto Canada

Kyle Bonn in Oregon

Scott McKinley in New Jersey

Mick Wheaton in Washington

Pete Fernbaugh in West Virginia

Tom Konkle in California

Donna Patton in Tennessee

while Larry Groebe produced and directed from Texas

Peter Lorre is an actor with such a distinctive voice and presence that even now, 60 years after his death, he's still instantly identifiable. It's surprising he didn't do more radio dramas, but he did host and star in "Mystery In The Air" in 1947. As a summer replacement show, there were only 17 episodes, and only 8 or so recordings exist -- so Project Audion asked Pete Lutz to create a NEW Mystery in the Air script. The result is both light-hearted and supernaturally spooky, and thanks to our transcontinental cast of talented voice actors, sounds just like an unheard episode from this terrific vintage series:

Pete Lutz in Texas

Lothar Tuppan in California

Jeff Billard in Massachusetts

Geri Elliff in Texas

Angela Young in Florida

John Bell in Alabama

Bob Beaumont in California

with Larry Groebe (in TX) handling sounds, music, and production

EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it! Big Story radio drama recreated by Project Audion!

Newspaper reporters were once heroic figures - exposing rackets and corruption, taking down the powerful and giving voice to the powerless. The "Big Story" series from audio drama's original classic era (the mid 20th century) celebrated the newspaper reporter - selecting true headlines and converting them into gripping dramas, much like Dragnet did with police.

Audion's December offering is a story set during the Christmas holiday, and while there IS an appearance by Santa Claus and a happy ending - this is a drama, pure and simple - of murder, greed, and redemption. Hmmm…maybe a Christmas theme after all! Our cast reaches from Canada to across the United states to recreate this lost original script just as it was done back then, so you can hear it for the first time since December 20, 1950! Our cast:

David Phillips in Virginia
Donna Patton in Tenessee
Trevor Rines in Canada
Sean Massey in Texas
Julie Hoverson in Washington
Dana Gonsalves in Texas
Scott McKinley in New Jersey
Ken Raney in Texas
and Larry Groebe did the heavy lifting

Who was it who made that phone call to the emergency room, the one that set off the horrible chain of events that took place in The Dark? Project Audion recreates the episode "The Dark" from LIGHTS OUT - one of classic radio's most imaginatively gruesome shows. It's an episode show that hasn't been heard in its complete form since January 1938! "Lights Out" was the work of master radio dramatist Arch Oboler, and he memorably redid "The Dark" 25 years later as a highly abridged adaptation for an LP called "Drop Dead" - the only recording you could hear until now. But Project Audion worked from the original half-hour 1938 script to deliver extra thrills and chills, and leading to a climax where -- well, that would be telling, wouldn't it? Who's afraid of The Dark? You will be!

Our cast features: Jacob Palka in Illinois

Douglas Herrman in California

Denise Cline in Kentucky

Robert Stevenson in Indiana

Sounds, production, and direction by Larry Groebe in Texas

Hi-Yo, Silver! The Lone Ranger is perhaps vintage radio drama's single most famous creation. Yet the Masked Man's formative years from 1933 until 1938 are essentially lost to us because no recordings were made. Original scripts DO survive, and Project Audion has selected episode #266 (out of nearly 3000!) from October 12 1934 to recreate. In 1934 the Lone Ranger and Tonto are not quite as we remember them, and the story -- featuring a cattle rancher, the coming of the railroad, and a "greasy half-breed" named Magdalena -- is rough-edged, less sensitive and streamlined than in later years. But this was the Lone Ranger that took the country by storm during the Great Depression. Now, for the first time in nine decades, this early version of the Lone Ranger rides again!

The cross-country cast of Project Audion's transcribed-live recreation includes

Lone Ranger: Dennis Thompson

Tonto: Ken Raney

Announcer: Greg Vestal

Steve Greencliff: Norman Cline

Magdalena: Pete Lutz

Tad Brewster: Scott McKinley

Gwendolyn Wiggs: Angela Young

Mother Wiggs: Sharon Grunwald Father

Jerimy Wiggs: Chuck Daugherty

Larry Groebe produced, directed, and cleaned up after the horses.

It's the year 2090. There are signs that a pandemic is coming - a pandemic which will kill millions of innocent people - again. Because it's happened before. But this time, just maybe, we know what - or who - is causing it...and a chance to stop it.

That's the setup for "Syndrome Johnny," a lost episode from a nearly-forgotten science-fiction anthology radio drama from 1953 called "Tales of Tomorrow." The television version of "Tales of Tomorrow," which actually came before the radio edition, is considered one of the first serious scifi video series. The TV edition spawned the radio offshoot, which hoped to fill the void of the recently-cancelled and now-classic series "Dimension X," adapting stories from Galaxy Magazine. Failing to find a sponsor, it only lasted a few months. The sound quality of the few recordings that survive is mostly quite poor, and our recreation "Syndrome Johnny" doesn't survive at all.Our transcontinental cast performs in the classic audio drama tradition - live in one uninterrupted take - to recapture the spirit of this pioneering science fiction show for a national audience for the first time in 70 years.

In our cast: Trevor Rines, Canada

Tim Burns, Kansas

Jack Ward, Canada

Greg McAfee, California

Rhiannon McAfee California

Gary Layton, Texas

and Larry Groebe, Texas

NBC BEST PLAYS: The Petrified Forest, originally aired 9-20-1953; remade for Sonic Summerstock Playhouse 2023 by the Narada Radio Company

In the midst of the Great Depression, Alan Squier, a failed writer, now a disillusioned, penniless drifter, wanders into a somewhat frowzy roadside diner in the remote town of Black Mesa, Arizona, at the edge of the Petrified Forest. Here he meets owner Jason Maple, his daughter Gabrielle, and Gramp, Jason's father, who regales anyone who will listen with stories of his adventures in the Old West with such characters as Billy the Kid. Eventually the diner is overrun by gangsters, headed up by Duke Mantee, who has escaped prison and is being chased down by the law.

The Petrified Forest was a 1935 stage play by Robert E. Sherwood, made into a 1936 film that starred the principal actors of the stage play, Leslie Howard (Squier) and Humphrey Bogart (Mantee). 

CAST:

Darren Rockhold as ANNOUNCER

Les Marsden as GRAMP MAPLE

Gino C. Vianelli as BOZE HERTZLINGER

Bobby Vela as the TELEGRAPH LINEMAN

Paul Arbisi as JASON MAPLE

Carole Krohn as GABBY MAPLE

Ebony Rose as PAULA

Chuck Wilson as MR. CHISHOLM

Stephanie Stearns Dulli as MRS. CHISHOLM

Carl Thomas as JOSEPH

David Ian as JACKIE and the RADIO VOICE

Dana Gonsalves as DUKE MANTEE

Duane Noch as RUBY

Tre' Minor as SLIM

Frank Guglielmelli as the LEGION COMMANDER

Pete Lutz as ALAN SQUIER

Music was sourced from the public domain.

Recorded over Zoom in July 2023, with actors from Texas, California, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Illinois. Originally released 8/13/23 on the Mutual Audio Network as a feature of the 2023 Sonic Summerstock Playhouse festival.

SONIC SUMMERSTOCK PLAYHOUSE '23:

BBC Radio 1966 production of John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, remade by the Narada Radio Company.

ANNOUNCER: Julia Eve

GEORGE was played by Dana Gonsalves

LENNIE by Les Marsden

with Pete Lutz as CANDY

Chuck Wilson as THE BOSS

Austin Hanna as CURLEY

Victoria Fancki as CURLEY'S WIFE

Norman Cline as SLIM

Paul Arbisi as CARLSON

Doug Fain as WHIT and

Carl Thomas as CROOKS

Produced & directed by Pete Lutz; mixed & mastered in Corpus Christi, TX by 63audio

Recorded over Zoom in June 2023, with actors from England, Texas, California, Kentucky and Illinois. Originally released 7/30/23 on the Mutual Audio Network as a feature of the 2023 Sonic Summerstock Playhouse festival.

ALICE THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS, a new production of Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre, is set to launch on Tuesday, May 30th, 2023, to all the online retail sites, including Amazon, Audible, Apple Store, Ratuken Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Downpour, and Walmart.

Listen here to a scene from this production and please support this excellent production company by making your purchase of their dramatization of Lewis Carroll's timeless classic.

ALICE THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS - By Lewis Carroll

Adapted for audio by Diane Vanden Hoven – Directed by George Zarr

Post Production: David Farquhar

Release Date: May 30, 2023, Everywhere Audiobooks Are Sold.

Cast In Order of Appearance:

GEORGIA LEE SCHULTZ - Alice

NOELLE DUPUIS – White Queen

PETE LUTZ – White King

SKYE GOULBOURNE – Tiger Lily

TRISHA ROSE – Rose

ASHLEY BANKER – Red Queen

GEORGE ZARR – Conductor

ROB TYMEC – Paper Man

HEIDI STEWART – Beetle

ELLIN WALLIN – Owl

BILL CRAVEN – Tweedle Dum

KEITH BURNETT – Tweddle Dee

JOHN JARVIS – Humpty Dumpty

JEFF DUPUIS – Messenger

MICHAEL CROUCH – White Knight

Project Audion recreates an extraordinarily rare and early lost episode of the classic audio drama Suspense. When CBS premiered the the show in June 1942, it wasn't immediately evident that it would become one of the all-time great radio dramas, running for 20 years and nearly 1000 stories. Indeed, in this (just Suspense's fifth-ever episode, from July 15, 1942), while all the typical ingredients are in place (in this instance, a murder aboard a moving train) the show hadn't quite yet settled into the style that would soon define classics like 1943's "Sorry, Wrong Number." Heard for the first time in 80 years, our recreation of this lost Suspense episode -- "The Witness on the Westbound Train" -- is taken from the single known surviving script. It features the same transcontinental cast of vocal actors who appeared in Project Audion's very first episode, along with additional talented voices who have appeared in Project Audion shows during the past three years.

The Cast: 

MARK: Pete Lutz, TX

JOE: Doug Fain, KY

DORIS: Patte Rosebank, Canada

CONDUCTOR: Denny Thompson, CO

LAWRENCE / RANDOLPH: John Mauldin, TN

BILL / BAGGAGEMAN: Dick Huitema, FL

ANNOUNCER / WAITER: Robert Stevenson, IN

DIRECTION / PRODUCTION / SOUND: Larry Groebe, TX

PROJECT AUDION - The Lineup: "The Scared Schoolmarm Scrape"

Project Audion’s newest cross-country OTR recreation is an episode of the police drama "The Lineup" which hasn't been heard since it was originally broadcast in January 1952. The Lineup was added to the CBS radio schedule after Dragnet became a massive hit, and ran for four years on radio, plus six years on television and a 1958 movie.

The lead cop role (which was portrayed in 1952 by Bill Johnstone, who was a former "Shadow" and “Whistler”) is here played by Ed Dennis, an actual law enforcement officer for four decades. He even used his own handcuffs in the show's final scene.

Our full cast: Ed Dennis / Illinois

Dan Keenan / Colorado

Chris Marcellus / Utah

Angela Young / Florida

John Bell / Alabama

Barry Katz / Florida

Kim Titus / Texas

Denny Thompson / Colorado

Tom Wilkins / Illinois

Ken Raney did SFX from Texas, Denny Thompson directed, and Larry Groebe produced the show.

PROJECT AUDION #40: I Was a Communist for the FBI

(Orig. rel. 3/10/23) What's black and white and Red all over? “I was a Communist for the FBI”, that’s what - the Cold-War era radio thriller that purported to tell the real-life story of Matt Cvetic, who posed as a member of the Communist Party while actually spying for the FBI. Whether true or fantastic, these half hour “radio noir” dramas put forward the fears which the Red Menace held for mid-century America. Most episodes of this taut melodrama can be heard today, but a handful of episodes are lost, and Project Audion’s March show is one of them. The script to “Citizens of Nowhere” was pulled from archives in New York and is performed by our nationwide cast for the first time in 70 years.

MATT CVETIC: Jeff Billard, MA

KAY MORONI: Holly Adams, NY

ANTON REISLING: Pete Fernbaugh, WV

DORA REISLING: Julie Hoverson, WA

BEEKER OF THE FBI: Caleb Fisher, VA

COLBY: Greg Vestal, TX

ANNOUNCER & VOICE: George Taylor, TN

Production, direction, and audio by Larry Groebe, TX

PROJECT AUDION 39 - Little Ham from Harlem, by Langston Hughes

Project Audion presents a world premiere of an unrealized radio play by the famed Black poet Langston Hughes. What might radio drama's Golden Age of the 1930s, '40s and '50s have sounded like had Black creators been allowed time on the airwaves? Back then, radio was almost exclusively a stage for White entertainers, with only a handful of secondary roles and occasional guest appearances offered to people of color. In 1943, Langston Hughes took the lead characters from a successful theatrical comedy he had written eight years earlier - "Little Ham from Harlem" - and proposed creating a daily soap opera around them. Hamlet Jones of the Singing Shoe Shine Parlor, and Tiny Lee, his "stout but beautiful" lady friend, would have been the main focus of radio's first Black soap opera. It would have taken the radio audience around Harlem life as Hughes knew it, encompassing everything from numbers-running to local night spots. But "Little Ham" would have not been just a soap opera. It was also full of comedy, and each episode was deliberately scripted to feature songs from the cast worked into the action. Langston Hughes wrote the show's first two 15 minute episodes, then shopped his concept to networks, syndicators, and advertising agencies. But in the 1940s, no one would take a chance on such a progressive idea. As Hughes noted some years later, 'My Agents stated flatly "It is just abut impossible to sell a Negro writer to Hollywood or radio, and they use Negro subject matter very rarely."' His two completed scripts for "Little Ham" were filed away, unproduced and unheard. Now Project Audion brings the show to life for the first time.

"Little Ham from Harlem" features the talents of Black actors from across America, and is preceded by an interview with Dr. Vanessa Valdez, Director of City College of New York's annual Langston Hughes festival, who offers insights into Langston Hughes' work and impact.

Our cast features:

LITTLE HAM: Lee J. Green, NE

BUSTER: Robert Stevenson, IN

SHINGLE: Willie Macon, FL

PAPA MACK: Carl Thomas, TX

TINY LEE: Yle Blackburn, CT

SUGAR LOU: Tabetha McNeal, VA

LAWYER / STRANGER: Sean Massey, TX

ANNOUNCER / CUSTOMER: Norval Soleyn, NY

with production and direction by Larry Groebe in Texas

Craufurdland Castle in Fenwick, Ayrshire, keeps its secrets close. It has been held in the same family for almost two thousand years.  It is the early 1800s.  Janet Craufurd, Lady of the house, writes in her diary, charting the progress of renovations to the estate which has suffered years of neglect.

But Janet’s mind is not easy. She suspects that the house has its own story to tell – a story lost in a secret passage, in hidden rooms, in dusty books and neglected papers. And someone is watching her as she searches for answers; someone she cannot see but whose presence she senses as she works.

There Goes Craufurdland is the final play in An Ayrshire Trilogy, three audio dramas which celebrate Ayrshire and its people. The Trilogy is supported by Creative Scotland.

In 1786, Robert Burns sent a copy of his book, Poems, Chiefly in The Scottish Dialect, to Mrs Frances Wallace Dunlop of Dunlop in Ayrshire. She was so taken with it, and with him, that she became his patron and later, his confidant.

But the voices of these two strong and determined characters still resonate across the years through their letters. Their friendship endured for a decade before their differences drove them apart. The Lady and The Poetfocuses on this platonic relationship, which was like no other in Burns’s short and eventful life.

The Lady and The Poet is the second play in An Ayrshire Trilogy, three audio dramas which celebrate Ayrshire and its people. The Trilogy is supported by Creative Scotland.

An angelic fantasy tale set on a remote Scottish island. The bees have all left , apparently forever, and spring has not arrived. Everything is out of kilter and only Breagh, it seems, can put it right. High Spirits is about finding friendship and facing fear. “You’re a child of the air. Your job is to cross the barriers that separate the different elements in this world. Your job is telling stories, and bringing back harmony.” High Spirits is part of An Ayrshire Trilogy, three audio dramas which celebrate our rich history and culture. The Trilogy is supported by Creative Scotland.

Continuing our special run of Christmas and holiday shows, we proudly present the latest release from our friends at Project Audion: My True Story: A Christmas to Remember.

Project Audion's December classic radio recreation is a lost episode from a virtually-lost series - how’s that for a Christmas present from the past! “My True Story" was on the air from 1943 to 1962 on three networks, but it's all but forgotten today, as maybe 10 vintage recordings survive from perhaps 5,000 original broadcasts!

A daily cousin to the daytime soap operas, "My True Story" produced a nearly hour-long complete drama five days a week - an astonishing achievement. Our Christmas Eve 1958 episode (#3,833), also titled "The Orphan In The Auditorium," asked the question, "What happens to a child who unexpectedly meets Santa Claus?"

It's full of poignant, heart-tugging emotion for the holidays, and was recreated from an original script saved by the 10 year old actress who played “Dot,” with a far-flung Zoom-based cast performing live…

Wendy: Holly Adams, NY

Dot: Rachel Pulliam, MO

Momma / Mother Sams: Sharon Grunwald, NJ

Santa: Ken Raney, TX

Announcer: John Bell, AL

Rachel Pulliam directed, and Larry Groebe created the music and handled production

Old-time Radio Essentials continues its 3rd season with an episode of Broadway is My Beat – "The Lars Nielson Murder Case"! This one's Paul's pick, and there's lots of police procedural-goodness in the selection, followed by fast-paced discussion of its merits by the three co-hosts. Will our upstairs neighbor call the cops on us for talking too loud? Tune in and find out!

And since we're on the subject of finding things out, while you listen you'll learn if we feel this entry meets the following criteria:

Your feedback means a lot to us! A review at iTunes or at your usual podcatcher would be appreciated.

Next Time: Pete uses his turn to bring in a special guest!

Season Three of Old-Time Radio Essentials continues! This time it's Dave's pick -- but he's invited Essential Listener Marshal to choose something for us to enjoy and discuss. (NARADA RADIO COMPANY)

And since we're on the subject of discussion, we hope to determine whether this entry meets the following criteria:

Your feedback means a lot to us! A review at iTunes or at your usual podcatcher would be appreciated.

Next Time: An episode of Philo Vance!