Agnes Moorehead stars in a story designed to rattle young drivers and their parents into being more aware of safe driving. In this story, the climax has three rods racing for a bridge only wide enough for two. Yikes! Moorehead portrays a school teacher who tries to intervene to prevent a senseless slaughter. She rents a room in a home where one of her students lives. He’s a brash youngster with a hot rod car and loves high speed driving and racing. Police bring him home one night with a report that he has playing a deadly game of “auto roulette,” a game in which two cars head toward each other at 70 miles an hour. The game is to see who will give way first to avoid a crash. She learns of plans for a three-car race for a two-car bridge, she tries desperately to make the teenager listen to reason, he is in no mood to do so.
Morton Fine and David Friedkin wrote the script. It is always difficult to write a script that does not spring from the organic creativity of the authors. This is why writing for advertising or public relations can be so challenging. The production is presented “commercial free” (but infused with corporate image-building) by Auto-Lite. These stories are rarely good, and you get a sense that the actors do their best to sound like they are not “punching the clock” and not caught up in the story. One of the reasons actors liked appearing on Suspense was that the scripts were often more compelling than other assignments.
Auto-Lite president Royce Martin and Ralph Thomas of the American Automobile Association appear in the spot usually reserved for the mid-show commercial. Martin was also on 1950-08-31 True Report. He was pre-recorded at that time.
The program was rehearsed and recorded on Friday, September 4, 1953. Rehearsal began at 11:00am to 1:30pm and then from 3:00 to 5:00pm as a full dress rehearsal including the speakers from AAA and Auto-Lite. Recording was done from 5:00pm to 5:30pm. This was a full recording, not just drama only, to allow for the commercials to be recorded with Martin and Thomas to avoid and problems the speakers who were inexperienced with radio live broadcasts. Recording the full program also allowed time for the production and pressing of records that would be distributed to schools. Scripts were also made available to the public.
At the end of the broadcast, Agnes Moorehead receives a Golden Mike Award from Elliott Lewis for the prior season. No episode is mentioned, but it was either for Death and Miss Turner or The Signalman. It was likely for the former.
Rene Garriguenc composed the music for this episode; a reason for the absence of Lucien Moraweck is not known.
LISTEN
TO THE PROGRAM or download in FLAC or
mp3
https://archive.org/details/TSP530921
THE CAST
AGNES MOOREHEAD (Barbara Warner), Joseph Kearns (Mr. Douglas), Sam Edwards (Bobby Morrison), Michael Chapin (David Cooper), Paula Winslowe (Mrs. Morrison), Herb Butterfield (Officer Cleaver / Charlie), Larry Thor (Narrator)
COMMERCIAL: Harlow Wilcox (Announcer)
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