Audiobooks and Old Time Radio
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – The Hall of Fantasy: ‘The Shadow People’
A program back in the 1950s which could provide some nice chills was The Hall of Fantasy. While the series is probably not one of the best remembered (or regarded by some) since it didn’t employ big name actors and the slim budget the show operated on led to somewhat…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – BBC Radio 4: ‘The Shadow Over Innsmouth’
I know a lot of people dug the edit I put together of At the Mountains of Madness BBC Radio 4 did a few years back and now, as a Spooktacular treat, here’s the BBC production of The Shadow Over Innsmouth – another of H.P. Lovecraft’s classic Mythos tales! You…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Dimension X: ‘The Veldt’
We hear from the pen of Ray Bradbury once again on one of the first science fiction programs to make a bow on radio, Dimension X. While a lot of episodes of Dimension X went a bit overboard with heavy handed moralizing, every once in a while you’d hear a…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Suspense: ‘The Hitch-Hiker’
Talk about an episode which has nearly everything – Orson Welles; A script by Lucille Fletcher; Atmospheric (and unusually minimal) sound effects. The Hitch-Hiker, which is spelled in the style of the day, is surely one of my favorite old time radio scripts and just might keep you guessing until…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Lights Out: ‘Death Robbery’
Time for more Arch Oboler and Lights Out! During the 1930s, 40s, and 50s – in radio or film – if you wanted to scare the audience you gave Boris Karloff a call. I get a kick that by all accounts Karloff was the epitome of the quiet English gentleman (and…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Suspense: ‘Sorry, Wrong Number’
What has to be no doubt one of the most famous radio stories of all time (outside of Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds) has to be Sorry, Wrong Number. The radio play was performed eight times from 1943 through 1960 with Agnes Moorehead giving a one woman tour-de-force each…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Lights Out: ‘Poltergeist’
TGG’s October Spooktacular – Lights Out: ‘Poltergeist Once again we’ll take a spin with Lights Out for some scary fun. You have to appreciate how most episodes of the series start out innocently enough and then begin to ramp up until it gives you a good sock at the end.…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Suspense: ‘The Dunwich Horror’
H.P. Lovecraft’s stories didn’t make too many appearances on radio back in the day but every once in while you’d actually catch a tale here or there. While I can’t say the Cthulhu Mythos translated overly well to a thirty minute format at least here we get in interesting performance…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular: Quiet, Please: ‘Whence Came You?’
Tonight we have another Wyllis Cooper production and this time around it’s the well regarded – but sometimes underappreciated – Quiet, Please. I have to say Quiet, Please is one of my favorite radio shows, although many of the existing recordings of a lot of the episodes are nearly unlistenable…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Lights Out: ‘Cat Wife’
One of the best of the early radio shows devoted to giving listeners the creeps was Lights Out. Although Inner Sanctum Mysteries gets a lot of credit as the scariest of the programs in the 1930s (mainly due to the creaking door sound effect which opened the show) for my…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Escape: ‘Zero Hour’
While there were quite a few science fiction authors who found their work making its way to radio perhaps none found their tales resonating with more listeners, and being considered classics of the medium, than Ray Bradbury. As one of the masters of science fiction (although I always categorize his…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular: The Weird Circle – ‘A Terribly Strange Bed’
While Escape and Suspense are probably two of the best remembered long running radio shows, where horror stories would appear, there are other programs which featured spook tales as their main focus. One of these shows was The Weird Circle. Although the series only ran for two seasons (from 1943…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – The Mercury Theater on the Air: ‘Dracula’
I always point out my favorite radio performer was the indomitable Orson Welles. It’s more than likely we’ll be hearing from Mr. Welles more than once this month but I wanted to share Welles’ earliest starring turn, as Dracula (among other characters from the classic novel), for his Mercury Theater…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Suspense: ‘Ghost Hunt’
One of the most popular – and longest running – radio programs devoted to stories which nearly always featured a slow burn was Suspense. For over twenty years some of the most famous radio spook stories aired on the series, although Suspense didn’t make too many forays into horror or…
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – CBS Radio Mystery Theater: ‘The Crack in the Wall’
Following the death of their teen daughter during a house fire, her bereft parents move to a new home but can't seem to repair a hole in their basement wall. Gradually, cries of a voice that seems startlingly like their daughter's begins to flow through the hole...
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TGG’s October Spooktacular – Escape: ‘Three Skeleton Key’ with Vincent Price
One of my favorite old time radio actors has to be Vincent Price. While Price is best known for his turns portraying villains in a multitude of horror films, he did spend a lot of time playing less vile characters (most notably The Saint) on many radio programs. Here Price takes on James…