Parker Fennelly and Abby Lewis star as an older couple from Maine on a vacation tour of Saudi Arabia. They are enjoying the sights and sounds of their exotic excursion which included a series of events recounted in this broadcast. They had an encounter with a fortune teller, found a sacred object, and received an ominous prediction of death. The story is by Jack Johnstone under the name “Jack Bundy,” which, along with “Jonathan Bundy,” were used for his Suspense scripts. “Bundy” was the maiden name of his wife.
Seeking a souvenir of their Arabian trip, they visit a curio shop in the holy city of Mecca. The wife sees a small green idol that is very unique; she wants to bring home. The husband, who believes that he is an expert bazaar price negotiator, attempts to purchase it. The shop owner keeps refusing the escalating offers and desperately tries to stop them. He warns them of a terrible curse related to the idol, “the fingers of death.” The husband belligerently buys the idol anyway, dismissing all talk of curses as emanating from ignorant beliefs in magic and superstition. The warnings they receive provide an ominous sense of foreboding that permeates the rest of the story’s events. The couple learns their lesson, too late.
Some geographic and cultural context can help in the appreciation of the story. An important site, Kaaba, is generally accurate as described. According to Britannica, it is “near the center of the Great Mosque in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and considered by Muslims everywhere to be the most sacred spot on Earth.”
A curio shop in Mecca run by a Hindu, as noted in the story, was unlikely at this time, just from a demographic perspective. According to Wikipedia, there are over 700,000 Hindus in Saudi Arabia, but Mecca is considered a Muslim-only city. Hindus in Saudi Arabia are mainly from India and Nepal, and are on generally on work permits. Their population in Saudi Arabia has been growing significantly in recent decades, but at the time of this story, it was probably very small, and was definitely below 1%.
A green “Ramkar” idol in the story is considered a symbol of hope, purity, and devotion for Hindus, and might be jade or emerald. The particular green color is sometimes referred to as "Rama Green," similar to sea green or light teal. Lord Rama is considered the seventh avatar (incarnation) of the god Vishnu in Hindu mythology.
There are some cultural references and word pronunciation that were of their time and might be considered offensive or ignorant to modern ears.
The program was recorded on Tuesday, September 5, 1961. The session began at 11:00am and concluded at 2:30pm.
The Green Idol was originally planned for broadcast on September 10, but was rescheduled for September 17. CBS Sports was following the home run totals of Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle as “Battle of the Batters,” a half hour program that was broadcast in place of Suspense on September 10. The network broadcast a similar program on August 13, which also pre-empted Suspense. Both players were chasing the record of Babe Ruth to hit 60 home runs in the 1927 season. There was a difference in this particular year. The American League added two teams for the 1961 season, and extended the number of games from 154 to 162 to accommodate the extra teams. Ford Frick, American League Commissioner ruled that for someone to break Ruth’s true record, those eight additional games would not count toward the record; a player had to do it no later than the 154th game. At the end of the season, Mantle was hospitalized with a hip infection, but that problem was only developing at the time of this broadcast. Mantle’s other leg injuries slowed his home run pace down. Maris could not break the record by that game, but hit his 61st home run in game 162. Mantle finished with 54 home runs.
This was Parker Fennelly’s only appearance on Suspense. He was 70 at the time, a professional performer for more than 50 years. It began in 1915, but he became best known on radio as “Titus Moody,” a regular character in “Allen’s Alley” of the Fred Allen Show. You can see him in one of his later “roles,” as a spokesperson for Pepperidge Farms bread products at this YouTube clip https://youtu.be/vH3pR94gMo8?si=AvKhQyjVVeRRjH-f He passed away at in 1988 at age 96.
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THE CAST
Parker Fennelly (Herbert), Luis Van Rooten (Al Hamid), Guy Repp (Fakir), Abby Lewis (Ethel), Mercer McLeod (Dr. Etherington), Ronald Liss (Elevator Boy)
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