This is a popular Suspense episode and a favorite of William Spier. It stars Ronald Colman in his first of six appearances on Suspense. It is an adaptation of a 1910 short story by W.F. Harvey. An artist is strangely compelled to draw a picture of a very large fat man who is on trial. Later, he goes for a walk on that same hot August afternoon, and sees the same fat man inscribing a gravestone with the artist’s name and epitaph!
The story is adapted by Mel Dinelli and follows the original text of the story very closely. The original story can be read at https://americanliterature.com/author/w-f-harvey/short-story/august-heat Harvey’s more popular work was Beast With Five Fingers which became a 1946 movie starring Peter Lorre. (The trailer can be viewed at YouTube https://youtu.be/x73kkuy45KA)
The story was originally announced in CBS publicity as “Summer Heat” and changed back to the original title. Listen for Dennis Hoey, better known as “Inspector LaStrade” in the Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes movies.
The script was presented again during the hour-long period of Suspense. It was still a half-hour version and was paired with another presentation of Wet Saturday. The hour-long version of Suspense was plagued by management problems. Of the 19 broadcasts, only 9 were original.
Spier liked the story very much and repeated it on 1949-04-22 when he was producing Philip Morris Playhouse. It also starred Ronald Colman.
There are two surviving recordings. The east broadcast has an extended appeal by Colman for the Seventh War Loan Drive. It began two weeks prior to this broadcast and raised $14 billion, which is about $230 billion in US$2023. The war loan drive was focused on the Pacific front since Victory in Europe was at the beginning of May. Victory in Japan day would not be until September. Just the evening before this Suspense episode, Colman appeared in a special program on NBC that featured many stars from around the country in support of the war drive.
The west recording does not have the appeal. Neither recording is flawless, but the west recording is better with fuller sound.
This is the first of many appearances on Suspense by Ronald Colman. The British actor was very successful in movies since the late 1920s and had four Oscar nominations. On radio, however, he was sometimes an entertaining comedic character playing himself on The Jack Benny Show as a neighbor of Benny. In 1950, he had an endearing role in The Halls of Ivy that had a nice mix of comedic and dramatic scenes that showed his range and also a charismatic connection with the radio audience. At the time of this broadcast, however, the public knew him for his serious roles. Wikipedia has a good overview of his very long career. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Colman
LISTEN
TO THE PROGRAM or download in FLAC or
mp3
https://archive.org/details/TSP450531
THE CAST
RONALD COLMAN (James Clarence Withencroft), DENNIS HOEY (Charles Atkinson), Gloria Gordon (Maria Atkinson), Peggy Rea (Cockney girl), Joe Kearns (Signature Voice)
Hat tip to Craig Wichman who found that August Heat was in a DC Comic Secrets of Sinister House issue 12 from 1972. https://readcomiconline.li/Comic/Secrets-of-Sinister-House/Issue-12?id=139396&readType=0#28
###
