This episode opens with a WW2 Victory public service announcement. There are usually two different versions in circulation, one full program and the other with the Victory PSA edited out.
The script was adapted by Peter Lyon, this broadcast is based on Dorothy L. Sayers’ short story The Adventurous Exploit of the Cave of Ali Baba featuring her detective character Lord Peter Wimsey.
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https://archive.org/details/TSP420819
THE CAST
Romney Brent (Lord Peter Wimsey aka Joseph Rogers), Berry Kroeger (Narrator), William Malten (Number One), Ara Gerald (The Lady), Cathleen Cordell, Victor Beecroft, Roland Bottomley, J. W. Austin, William Podmore, Ian Martin; CBS network announcer: Ed Fleming
Robert Lewis Shayon was guest studio director, subbing for John Dietz who was unavailable. Dietz was a staff producer and director at CBS New York and could be heard on many programs, including Casey, Crime Photographer. Shayon would rise to become a top CBS executive responsible for groundbreaking radio documentaries and You are There. He would leave CBS and become a noted media critic and an Ivy League professor of media and broadcasting even though he did not have a college education!
With Charles Vanda away for military service, William Spier is in charge. This is the earliest surviving complete program produced by him. Spier developed his production savvy over the years in March of Time and other early programs, building on his extensive background in music as a critic and composer, some of which he earned in his early twenties. Suspense researcher Keith Scott notes this episode as the first indication of Spier’s influence on the musical side of Suspense, especially in the bridges between scenes.
Newspaper listings indicated One Hundred in the Dark would be broadcast this date, but that script was withheld until 1942-09-30.
This performance includes Ian Martin, one of five actors (the others are Guy Repp, Roger DeKoven, Ted Osborne and Joan Lorring) to appear in the inaugural summer season of Suspense and its final season in 1962.
Suspense was pre-empted the following week for a special promotional program about the movie Holiday Inn, which would add Irving Berlin’s White Christmas to favorite songs of the holiday season. The movie was released a few weeks prior.
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