This is another Lucille Ball appearance. Her character realizes her purse is stolen… she finds it… and it’s got $10,000 in it! That’s more than $170,000 in 2023US$… What will she do? The script is very demanding as most of it is a near-monologue of narration with only incidental interactions.
The script was written by Virginia Radcliffe, 30 years old. It was her only Suspense script in a long radio writing career. She was best recognized for many years of writing for Cavalcade of America. She also contributed two scripts to Theater Five, one of which was nominated for a Writers Guild Award. In her post-radio career, she wrote extensively about conservation. She died in 1976 at 62.
Only the east recording has survived.
The New York Subway plays a role in the story, and it’s surprising how much of its station stops are inaccurate. Spier lived and worked in the City, so he and others might have sought some better congruence with the actual system. The train station used is 161st Street, also known as the Yankee Stadium stop which is used by the 4, B, and D lines of the system. You can sometimes see that train on television as it runs behind the stadium bleachers during games. That run of the lines is elevated above the street. In the story, the "old lady" needs to get off at 169th Street and there is no station at that street, but the closest is 167th Street.
It’s not just the broadcast that has the issue. This story was included in Suspense Magazine #3. That version has stops at 157th and 163rd. It's likely the magazine editor/adaptor worked with the script that Radcliffe originally submitted, prior to any subsequent versions with edits by Robert L. Richards, Spier, and any production specifications were added. It may seem like quibbling over nothing, but Suspense often made a point of getting these kinds of things right. A PDF of the story is available on the same page as the audio files.
At the very end of the drama, "meatless Tuesday" is mentioned as a humorous item as she can’t get the steak she kept thinking about (the joke is set up early in the story). This was a wartime initiative to preserve meat supplies to ensure there would be enough for the armed forces.
LISTEN
TO THE PROGRAM or download in FLAC or
mp3
https://archive.org/details/440622
THE CAST
CAST: LUCILLE BALL (Ge Ge Lewis), Pat McGeehan (The Greek), John McIntire (Wino / Axis agent), Harry Lang (Fat man / Whistling for old lady), Jeanette Nolan? (Old lady / waitress), Joe Kearns (Man in Black), unknown (Conductor)
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