Ronald Colman returns with another performance as half of a stage mentalist act where his wife suddenly shows signs of true psychic ability. Instead, it’s a ruse by the wife and their agent who have plans to run away together. More details about the story are at the original posting.
The original post is at https://suspenseproject.blogspot.com/2024/05/1951-03-08-vision-of-death.html
The recordings of the 1951 broadcast may be directly accessed at https://archive.org/details/TSP510308
Only Charles Calvert repeats his supporting roles (he doubles) from the 1951 production.
The original publicity was for The Voyages of Sinbad with Colman. Sometime before the broadcast of the prior week’s Pigeon in the Cage, this repeated script was selected and Sinbad was shifted over to Escape and broadcast six days later. Ellis wrote the script and was producing and directing Escape at that time. This is an abridged image of the cover page, courtesy of Larry Groebe of The Generic Radio Workshop and Project Audion:
Many newspapers did not receive the publicity with the revised programming in time and were still listing Sinbad as the Suspense broadcast. It is not known why the change was made. It could have been a change in Colman’s schedule, or Colman and Lewis felt it was not a good fit for his talents, or the final script would not be ready in time.
Keith Scott reminds me that Colman's biographer, Sam Frank, wrote "[This was a] rare villainous part for Colman and one of his best radio roles, period. Sharply conniving and cynical performance and story." It's worth the re-listen.
LISTEN
TO THE PROGRAM or download in FLAC or
mp3
https://archive.org/details/TSP530601
THE CAST
RONALD COLMAN (Jud Stone), Mary Jane Croft (Aurora Stone), Hy Averback (Harry Arnold), Benny Rubin (Stanford / Manager), Julie Bennett (Phone operator), Charles Calvert (Telegram guy / Bartender), Larry Thor (Narrator)
COMMERCIAL: Ken Christy (Oscar Auto), Harlow Wilcox (Announcer), Sylvia Simms (Operator)
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