Singer Dick Haymes plays a paperhanger named Gerald Brewer. He’s trapped in a quaint elevator with in a posh and expensive home as two murderers wait for him to come out so they can make sure he will never testify as to what he saw and heard them do. This is not one of the series better or memorable episodes. The script by Morton Fine and David Friedkin can make the listener claustrophobic, like they’re caught in the elevator, too. That is a creative aspect to the overall unsatisfying production. It’s definitely a downer of a story, and Haymes seems too monotone to convey the story’s underlying tension and the danger to his character’s life. We can’t really know if this the style that Haymes brought to the story or if he was following Lewis’ direction and vision for the production.
The story begins when his character, Brewer, completed his work for the day. He used the elevator to return to the ground floor, but it stopped between floors. He’s stuck! He makes some fruitless cries for help. There is no one there to hear him. He wants to get home to his wife, but he is helpless until the owners return to re-start the elevator. One of the owners does return: the husband (Mr. Rogers) and his girlfriend. Brewer decides to keep quiet when he figures out there is trouble in the air. They don't realize Brewer is there and can hear them talk about their plans. The husband intends to murder his wife when she arrives home. His girlfriend is anxious for him to do so. Brewer realizes he may be in danger because of what he has heard and what he might witness, so he tries to hide in the darkness of the suspended elevator. The husband and the girlfriend suspect that someone might be in the home, but they are interrupted when they hear the wife’s car outside the home. She comes into the home and is murdered by the husband. They still wonder if someone is in the home and is aware of what transpired. Brewer’s wife calls the house, and the girlfriend answers the call. Mrs. Brewer is wondering if her husband is still there because he did not return home at the normal time. Now they realize that he’s probably stranded in the elevator. When they try to re-start the elevator to find out, Brewer engages the emergency stop button, thwarting their attempt to confront him. Rogers and the girlfriend decide to cover up their malfeasance by making the scene look like a robbery gone wrong. He empties his gun with random shots to make it seem there was a struggle between the wife and a supposed robber. Rogers makes a mistake: he drops jewels and the gun into the elevator as a frame or to possibly bribe Brewer. When Brewer reminds Rogers that he didn’t wipe the gun of its fingerprints, he realizes he has now trapped himself in a stalemate with Brewer. The girlfriend panics and Rogers’ temper explodes, beating her until quiet, and violently killing her. He has nothing to live for, and is essentially immobilized. Now, Brewer can finally leave. He calls his wife first, apologizing for being late because he was trapped in an elevator, and he’ll explain when he gets home. He has the evidence against Rogers, and it’s safe to assume he calls the police. Rogers is presumed left alone in the house, defeated, left to the authorities and the legal justice that will eventually come down on him.
Elevators were known as “bird cages” when they were made of metal frames that allowed passengers to see outside into the open areas around them. They often had ornamental metalwork art designs, sometimes including fine woodwork, designed to fit into the architectural elements around them. The “cages” were frequently found in commercial buildings in the late 1800s and early 1900s, as well as residences of the very wealthy.
The drama portions of the program were recorded on Wednesday, May 13, 1953. Rehearsal began at 1:00pm and the tape session began at 6:00pm.
This was Dick Haymes first and only appearance on the series. He was a popular vocalist in the 1940s with the Harry James and Tommy Dorsey orchestras. He appeared in many movies and had an extensive recording career. His radio musical variety show was sponsored by Auto-Lite from 1944 to 1948. They dropped the sponsorship of his series when the company chose to pursue the opportunity of sponsoring Suspense. Haymes career and life is summarized at Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Haymes
He appeared in three Suspense television episodes. As best can be determined, kinescopes of those appearances have not survived.
About a couple of years earlier, Haymes starred in an unusual ABC radio series, I Fly Anything. He played a pilot with a plane for hire to do any job that was legal. The program lasted from November 1950 to September 1951. He had hoped to bring the series to television. A few weeks after the show’s premiere, the regular cast was expanded to include George Fenneman, better known as a radio announcer, and Georgia Ellis, prior to her famous role as Kitty on Gunsmoke. Only two episodes of the series are known to have survived.
LISTEN
TO THE PROGRAM or download in FLAC or
mp3
https://archive.org/details/TSP530525
THE CAST
DICK HAYMES (Gerald Brewer), Joe Kearns (Harry Rogers), Charlotte Lawrence (Janice), Larry Thor (Narrator)
COMMERCIAL: Tom Holland (Hap), Harlow Wilcox (Announcer), Sylvia Simms (Operator)
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