Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | iHeartRadio | Email | TuneIn | RSS
Race is hired to protect plans for a new family style aircraft.
Original Air Date: April 23,1949
Become one of our friends on Facebook… http://www.facebook.com/radiodetectives
Take the listener survey at http://survey.greatdetectives.net
Give us a call 208-991-4783
Follow us on Twitter @radiodetectives
Click here to add this podcast to your Itunes, click here to subscribe to this podcast on Zune, click here to subscribe to this feed using any other feed reader.
89) Bill Goodwin: To most people, commercials are merely interuptions in their entertainment. However, Bill Goodwin was the master of making commercials entertaining. Working as an announcer for Bob Hope and later for George Burns and Gracie Allen, Goodwin made the commercial breaks entertaining and laugh out loud hilarious as he inserted ads for Swan Soap or Maxwell House Coffee into the plot of the story with comedic brilliance. In addition to his announcing gigs, Goodwin was a reliable comedic actor, often appearing on Screen Guild Theatre and Lux Radio Theater.
Raymond Burr would find stardom in television as Perry Mason. His radio career began a decade before. Burr was a character actor for most of his radio career, playing roles similar to those taken by William Conrad with many heavies and cops, although Burr was not nearly as prolific. Burr provided support for programs like Suspense, The Line-Up, and Yours Truly Johnny Dollar. In addition, he worked himself into two recurring roles in crime dramas featuring Jack Webb. He was radio’s most brutal cop, Inspector Hellman of San Francisco Homicide on 
Frances Langford had a long association with radio that began in the mid-1930s and lasted for more than a decade and a half. She appeared on musical programs with Rudy Vallee and Dick Powell, but she was best known for her association with Bob Hope. During World War II, she toured with Hope overseas. She also played Blanche on the iconic radio sitcom, The Bickersons.
Brad Runyon had little in common with Gutman because not only wasn’t he a villain, but unlike Gutman, Runyon was a man of action. This also separated him from Nero Wolfe, who relied on others to do his legwork. Runyon, however was solidly in the hard-boiled school of private detection, taking and giving his own lumps. Runyon was tough, intelligent, and attractive to the ladies despite his girth, but also was a little sensitive about the subject. At the end of an episode he bemoaned, “Nobody loves a Fat Man.” Radio audiences begged to differ.
However, the Fat Man wasn’t the only large radio detective. In 1950, NBC brought the Big Guy to radio. In the lead was Henry Calvin who definitely had the build for the part. In the latter half of the 1950s, he would play his most memorable role as Sergeant Garcia on Disney’s Zorro and in the 1960s would appear in a variety episode of the Dick Van Dyke Show as Oliver Hardy with Van Dyke as Stan Laurel.
However, there the similarities end. We find that Lucius Crane investigates his own cases with only a little help from the sidekick. The mystery is well-written. Middleton does fairly well as Crane. There was a little stiffness early on, but this was not unlike trying on and getting comfortable in a new set of clothes. Overall, the show worked quite well and could have been an interesting program.
Sixteen years after Gunsmoke came to television, he got a crack at a starring dramatic role as the title character in Cannon. Frank Cannon was an ex-cop who was a private detective and freelance troubleshooter. Cannon was a gourmet chef, but also a martial arts and weapons expert who could more than hold his own in a fight and was a great driver when a chase scene was called for.