Kirk Douglas returns to Suspense in another fine performance. He plays a mystery author plagued with such a bad case of writer’s block that his career is threatened. To break the block, he decides to get away for a refreshing change in scenery, and heads to London. He walks through an area that still shows the effects of war with some homes and buildings in rubble. One of them was a place where Edgar Allan Poe stayed when he visited the city. A box had been found from the rubble by the son of a family that lived across the street. He looks into the box and realizes it has a three-page summary of an unpublished Poe manuscript, one which the author took an innovative approach to mystery writing that he had not used before. He pays the family who found the box £5 and happily returned home. He took Poe’s work, developed his own story following it exactly. He then destroys Poe’s original manuscript to be certain his deception won’t be discovered. His stolen plotline and approach is so good that he wins an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America. He barely has a chance to bask in the glow of the award and his return to success when a Poe expert suddenly appears. He knows exactly what he has done and threatens to blackmail him to keep the plagiarism quiet and send money to the family in London who found the box. Then the story takes a turn… to murder.
At the beginning of the story we learn that the brother of the love interest of Douglas’ character always wears gloves. It’s such an odd comment that you know it will be used later in the story.
This is yet another Suspense story where justice is served but misapplied.
The Edgar Award for mystery writing is named after Poe. At one time, the organization presented awards for radio mysteries. A list of awardees is at their website https://edgarawards.com/category-list-best-radio-drama/
Suspense won Edgars for 1948, 1950, and 1960. In 1954, the E. Jack Neuman script for The Shot won an award. Sorry, Wrong Number won in 1960, in recognition of its years of durability in the final year of the radio drama category.
Listen carefully at about about the 9:15 mark. In the background. you can hear an Edgar Award being given to Sam Spade for best radio drama with William Spier’s name mentioned. That series won an Edgar a few months prior to this broadcast.
The story is by scripter Bob Platt who also wrote for The Whistler.
One network recording has survived. It is not known to which coast it was broadcast. There is a seven second pause to network ID (“7s”).
LISTEN
TO THE PROGRAM or download in FLAC or
mp3
https://archive.org/details/TSP471002
THE CAST
KIRK DOUGLAS (Phil Martin), Cathy Lewis (Anne Fleming), Wally Maher (Lieutenant John Kirkland / 3rd critic), Eric Snowdon (Dr. Sellgrove), Verna Felton (English Woman), Raymond Lawrence (English Man), Jerry Hausner (Henry), Frank Albertson (Awards host / First critic), Joe Kearns (Signature Voice / Cab Driver / 2nd critic)
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