Tag Archives: radio

Jan 02

Theatre of the mind

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As you know, I just got through with a play performed in the style of an old-time radio show. The Internet has been kind to radio drama — or maybe I should just call it audio drama. Not only are there several sites that allow you to listen to numerous classic radio shows, but I keep finding a surprising number of original productions, released in the form of podcasts. These tend to be comic, simultaneously parodying and paying tribute to the classic medium. Some are better than others.

  • Illusionoid: This is a science fiction parody — apparently largely improvised, and you can tell. Colin Mochrie of “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” was a guest on a recent episode.
  • The Apple Sisters: Set in 1943, with an Andrews Sisters-like singing group.
  • Thrilling Adventure Hour: This comedy series features a variety of comic talent, including well-known comics or actors like Andy Richter or Josh Malina. The A.V. Club recently picked it as one of the year’s top podcasts.

If you prefer old-time radio, you can find it several places. Here are just a few:

Dec 26

Wait wait … I should have told you

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It occurs to me that I should have posted something last week about “Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me!” in advance of the BBC America TV special, for those of you that aren’t already familiar with the show. There may yet be a few additional airings of the special on TV; check your listings. But in any case, even if you missed the chance to see the show, you’ve always got the chance to listen to it.

I told the folks at Mountain T.O.P. last summer that it’s proof of how much I love Adults In Ministry that I attended two weeks last summer. The first week I attended AIM, I missed the first local concert in decades by my favorite band, Daniel Amos. The second week I attended AIM, I missed a taping of “Wait Wait” in Nashville, the first chance I’ve ever had to hear the show in person.

“Wait Wait … Don’t Tell Me!” is a public radio panel quiz show based on a humorous take on the week’s news. it airs each weekend on public radio stations nationwide, or you can listen to it or download it from http://waitwait.npr.org. If you like “The Daily Show,” there’s a good chance you’ll like “Wait Wait,” although “Wait Wait” makes fun, not just of political news, but also of quirky little offbeat news stories. “Wait Wait” has been compared to the great British tradition of panel quiz shows, which may be what attracted BBC America’s attention to the show. There’s only one prize, and it has no monetary value. I’ll get to the prize in a moment.

“Wait Wait” is hosted by writer Peter Sagal, with Carl Kasell as announcer. (His title is “official judge and scorekeeper.”) For most of the show’s history, Kasell did double duty; he was the newscaster for the news breaks during NPR’s “Morning Edition,” and the show gets a lot of mileage out of having him say or do things that aren’t in keeping with his authoritative, voice-of-the-news image. Kasell has since retired from “Morning Edition.”

The show has a three-member celebrity panel. Most of them are not household-word celebrities; rather, they’re mostly writers or quick-witted comedians. Frequent panelists include Tom Bodett (the voice of the Motel 6 “We’ll leave the light on for you” ads), P.J. O’Rourke, Roy Blount Jr., Paula Poundstone, Kyrie O’Connor, Paul Provenza, Alonzo Bodden, Charlie Pierce, Amy Dickinson, Luke Burbank, Adam Felber, Maz Jobrani and Mo Rocca.

The show has several different segments. In some of the segments, the panelists are answering questions. In other segments, call-in listeners answer questions. There’s also a “Not My Job” segment in which a well-known celebrity (as prominent as, say, Tom Hanks) is asked multiple-choice questions about a topic designed to be as far as possible from that celebrity’s normal personality or profession. For example, Mike Rowe of “Dirty Jobs” was asked trivia questions about the advertising mascot Mr. Clean.

The call-in listeners, as well as a designated listener on whose behalf whom the “Not My Job” celebrity is playing, receive a special prize if they win their segment. The prize is that Carl Kasell will record the outgoing message on their home answering machine or voice mail. The show’s writers usually come up with some funny message to take advantage of the situation; you can hear some of the past messages at the show’s website.

My favorite segment on the radio show is the “Bluff the Listener” game. In this segment, each of the three panelists relates a bizarre news story, but only one of the stories is true. The call-in contestant must guess the true story.

Last weekend’s BBC America special was a pretty good translation of the show into TV. They used the same taping session to create both the TV special and this week’s radio show, although the content isn’t exactly the same. For example, the “Bluff The Listener” game is on the radio show but not the TV special. The one thing people have commented on about the TV show is that everyone is wearing headphones, just as they normally do for the radio show tapings, which looks a little funny on TV. But for me, that just added to the charm, a reminder of the show’s origins.

If you get a chance this week to see the TV special on BBC America, do it, but in any case be sure and check out “Wait Wait” online or on your local NPR station. It’s always good for a laugh.

Nov 11

Theater of the mind (brought to you by Lady Esther cosmetics)

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As I explained yesterday, I’m going to appear in a play which tells the story of “It’s A Wonderful Life” as it would be presented on old-time radio. Actually, movies and radio scratched each others’ backs during the golden age. If you’ve ever read the trivia pages for old movies on the Internet Movie Database, you’ll note that many of them were turned into radio plays, using the top two or three stars from the original movie, surrounded (I presume) by the type of versatile radio utility players we’ll be channeling on stage.

IMDb says that there were, in fact, two such adaptations of “It’s A Wonderful Life,” both broadcast in 1947, not long after the movie was in theaters.

I was looking up old radio shows online – there are plenty, at sites like The Internet Archive, RadioLovers.com and the Old Time Radio Network. I haven’t found “It’s a Wonderful Life” yet, but I’m right now listening to another Jimmy Stewart classic: “The Philadelphia Story”, in a 1947 Screen Guild Theater adaptation with Stewart, Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant in their original roles. The story is quite condensed – into a 30-minute radio show! — which works just fine for the audio format, although it requires some clunky exposition, both as dialogue and from the announcer at the beginning of each act. This seems to have been produced in front of a live audience. It’s one of three different radio adaptations mentioned by IMDb; the other two were 60 minutes in length, one with Ruth Hussey and Virginia Weidler in addition to Stewart, Grant and Hepburn, the other with only Stewart from the original cast.

In those days, of course, once a movie left the theater it was gone – the very biggest hits might possibly be rereleased, but everything else disappeared into the vaults once it ended its original run. There were no TV broadcasts, no DVDs, no way to re-view something you’d enjoyed seeing on the big screen, or catch up with something you’d missed. So these radio adaptations were, in their day, a nice bit of instant nostalgia, as well as a way for stars to promote themselves and their upcoming projects. The Screen Guild Theater adaptation of “The Philadelphia Story” ended with mentions of where you could see each of its three stars in current screen projects: Stewart’s current project at the time was … wait for it … “It’s A Wonderful Life.”

I have, on cassette tapes, the adaptation of the original 1977 “Star Wars” movie which was done for the BBC with Mark Hammill and Anthony Daniels reprising their film roles. The BBC approached George Lucas for permission and he agreed, but only if his alma mater USC was involved in the production. This was done as a serial, and actually includes scenes which were cut from the movie, emphasizing young Luke Skywalker’s admiration for, and later reunion with, Biggs, a neighbor on Tattooine who joins the rebel alliance. I haven’t listened to it since I originally bought it (I also heard it on public radio when it first aired in the 1970s, perhaps the first public radio I ever listened to). I need to break it out and give it a listen.

Nov 10

Dramatis personae

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I’m going to be in a play over the holidays. I can tell you what; I just can’t tell you where.

OK, to bring the story up to this point: I’ve enjoyed occasional participation in community theater, and last spring, I played the lead in “Cash On Delivery,” at the Fly Arts Center in Shelbyville. It was the first time I’d ever had a solo lead part, and a huge one at that, but I had a great time, with terrific castmates and a great director.

This fall, some of those same folks formed a new theater group, the South Of Broadway Players, not so much to compete with the existing group at the Fly as to offer a more flexible and democratic alternative. A few people are already participating in both groups, depending on what they’re interested in trying out for and their personal schedules. I did not try out for the group’s first play, “Here’s Killing You, Kid!”, because the timing wasn’t right. But I was excited about the new group. I attended one of the organizational meetings.

“Here’s Killing You, Kid!” was presented as a dinner theater at the Duck River Restaurant in Shelbyville, with one final performance at a restaurant in Normandy. The Duck River Restaurant was, I am told, delighted with the production, and it did good business. The SOBs (and, yes, we’ve embraced that acronym) hoped that the Duck River Restaurant could host several such performances throughout the year, and then the group might also do a more traditionally-staged production at some point, perhaps using a school theater over the summer or what have you.

The next SOB production will be “WSOB Presents: It’s A Wonderful Life.” This is one of two similar adaptations of the beloved holiday movie in the form of an old-time radio show. Instead of using sets and costumes, a small group of players performs the play on a stage set up to look like a radio studio. Each cast member does numerous characters, and there’s a sound effects man over to the side producing sound effects, with occasional help from other cast members. Little or no memorization is required, because everyone is reading from scripts, just as radio actors did. Part of the fun is seeing the same actors doing different voices, sometimes even having conversations with themselves.

We had auditions last weekend at the Duck River Restaurant. I enjoyed reading the parts and looked forward to the play. Production dates had been set and announced, with performances to take place right before Christmas and during the dead week between Christmas and New Year’s.

Then, a day or two later, the restaurant announced it would go out of business after one last music event this coming weekend. So now, the SOBs have the rights to the play, and a cast, but nowhere to perform it. Our director and producer are scrambling to find a suitable and available space.

Anyway, I got formal notice today that I’d been picked for the cast. I don’t know yet which characters I’ll be doing.

I’ll let you know as soon as performance details have been nailed down.

Oct 23

Wait, wait — it’s Dick Van Dyke!

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NPR may be having a bad week, but my favorite NPR program had a very, very good week. The “Not My Job” guest on “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” is the legendary Dick Van Dyke — a man who has done so much for entertainment that host Peter Sagal joked that the DVD was named after him.

The very clever “Not My Job” quiz they concoted for him included a question about “Dick” Nixon, a question about a new Chrysler van, and a question about the world’s largest dike.

But the highlight comes at the very end of the segment. As Peter is wrapping things up, Mo Rocca begins cheerily humming the “Dick Van Dyke Show” theme song, which leads Dick to reveal that it has lyrics — and then, he offers to sing them.

Listen to the whole show at the NPR web site or your local station, or listen to just the Dick Van Dyke segment here:

By the way, I think I’ve passed along this story here before, but the “Star Trek” theme also has lyrics — but for a mercenary reason. When creator Gene Roddenberry hired Alexander Courage to write the theme, the contract reserved the right for Roddenberry to write lyrics for it later. Once the show had become a modest success, Roddenberry exercised that right — not so that the lyrics could be used on the show, or even used at all, but because writing the lyrics made Roddenberry the co-writer of the song and entitled him to half of the royalties! Courage resented this maneuver and, reportedly, refused to write any incidental music for the show after that.

Sep 28

That great smokehouse in the sky

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I posted a link to a video of Sir Cecil Creape earlier on Facebook, and in the process of doing that I ran across some blooper tapes from Nashville TV in that same era. Here’s Pat Sajak, in his weatherman days, with the late Dan Miller:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXNJyE-LCDo

It wasn’t the only time Dan got tickled. Several minutes into this next video, you’ll see Dan with Huell Howser, doing a followup to one of Huell’s human interest stories, this one about a pig:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOVwOFLfifs

This one begins with a brief clip of a very young Chris Clark, but most of it is taken up by an announcer for the “Carl Tipton Show,” who can’t make it through a live ad.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JTCYBCQ0XI

Sajak, by the way, mentions his radio show on WSM-AM. I once won a Polaroid camera from him on that show. During those days, WSM – the traditional, clear-channel home of the Grand Ole Opry – played country music at night but adult contemporary pop during the day! The two different formats were buffered in the morning by Teddy Bart’s live “Waking Crew” show, and in the afternoon by an hour of news at 5 p.m.

Jul 11

Ring-Ding smackdown

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Normally, I’m disappointed when “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” is on break and runs a “best of” episode — after all, it’s a topical news quiz — but this week’s compilation, based on listener favorite suggestions, is pretty darn good, and a great introduction to the show if you’ve never listened to it.

In one of the repeated segments, they ask TV’s Craig Ferguson — who is open about being a recovering alcoholic — three questions about a man who has a more literal monkey on his back.

But the highlight of the package is an appearance by healthy food expert Michael Pollan — who gets into a hysterically-funny argument with panelist Paula Poundstone over the importance of comfort foods like Twinkies and Ring-Dings. Even if you don’t listen to the whole show, skip ahead in the NPR player to this segment.

Jun 10

Lauren Order, Ginger Vitis and Dave Reckoning

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I admit I haven’t listened to the funny and informative “Car Talk” in a while — I need to, if only for a good laugh — but one of my favorite parts of the show is the credits. In addition to the actual credits, there are some joke credits, based on excruciatingly-bad puns. For example, the show’s loan officer is I.O. Silver, the sports information director is Linus Scrimmage, and so on. Some of these are used for a long time, others rotate in and out. Anyway, I just discovered that there’s a comprehensive list, past and present, at the show’s web site.

If you’ve never listened to the show, find it on your public radio station. Even if you know nothing about cars — maybe especially if you know nothing about cars — you can listen just for the entertainment value. MOVIE TRIVIA: Tom and Ray Magliozzi were the voices of Lightning McQueen’s original sponsors in the Pixar movie “Cars.” Their characters even get to use Tom and Ray’s normal “Car Talk” signoff: “Don’t drive like my brother!” “Don’t drive like my brother!”

Feb 22

I was joking

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A couple of people took my post about podcasting a little more seriously than I intended it.

I was listening to Jesse Thorn’s “Jordan, Jesse, Go!” podcast at MaximumFun.org. I had previously heard Thorn’s interview series “The Sound of Young America,” which is both a podcast and, in some areas, a public radio program. I was unfamiliar with “Jordan, Jesse, Go!”, in which Thorn and co-host Jordan Morris, plus a guest, can ramble on at length, without worrying about the radio time slot (or, apparently, about a censor).

Of course, I’ve long been a fan of Leo Laporte and his podcasts at This Week In Tech.

I was just playfully saying that it would be fun to have podcasting as a job. I don’t have a good idea for a podcast at present, nor do I have the tech to do a professional-sounding podcast right now.

I grew up in radio, as many of you know; I worked at WHAL-AM starting at the age of 15, and I worked in radio for a year after college.

Some years back, I hosted a regular Wednesday night talk show on WZNG-AM (the successor to WHAL-AM). I enjoyed it, and would probably have kept doing it, but it became a burden to book guests — it seemed as if I was always coming down to the wire — and the owners of the station said they’d start paying me once they sold all four sponsor positions in the show, and it didn’t look like that was going to happen. I didn’t mind doing the show for free, and I didn’t mind having trouble booking guests, but I minded the two of them together.

I think I would enjoy doing a podcast at some point — but I’d have to have a focus for it, and a way of talking to guests, and some idea that anyone would actually listen to the thing. I’m not Leo Laporte, who has a wealth of tech information and can carry a show by himself — only he doesn’t have to, at least not on “This Week In Tech,” because he has so many contacts in the tech industry whom he can bring on as panelists.

Jan 17

They might be guests

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For some reason, the audio for this week’s “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me” didn’t get posted to the web site until this morning, but it was worth waiting for: John Flansburgh and John Linnell of They Might Be Giants are the guests this week on the “Not My Job” segment.

They have to answer three trivia questions about … wait for it … Andre The Giant. You will be stunned at who used to drive Andre to school as a boy, at least according to Cary Elwes on the “Princess Bride” DVD commentary track.

A good episode all around.