Radio Hollywood

The BBC Radio 4 Archive Hour has a special treat this week for fans of classic USA radio drama. It takes a look at The Lux Radio Theater. The hour long live radio drama show ran from 1935 to 1954 each week presenting radio play versions of popular movies of the day, performed by major Hollywood stars, but often not the same ones who appeared in the original movies. Like the Alan Ladd version of Casablanca, replacing Bogart.

The Archive Hour presenter, Jeffrey Richards tells us how and why the program was created. The program was the invention of the J Walter Thompson Advertising agency in service of their client Lux Soap. Richards also informs us that the program, through it's long history, had a way of also selling certain values such as "The Family". Listening to some of the programs today, one can feel a certain wholesomeness that is not so apparent in some other commercial shows of the era such as Suspense, The Whistler, Inner Sanctum, or Quiet Please.
It really shows how the mass entertainment mediums, radio first, and then television helped form American's view of itself in the advertiser's image. Richards only suggests this. He doesn't explore it deeply. That is not the purpose of Radio Hollywood.

But what we have is a fine hour about the program with many interesting and amusing stories and excerpts. My favorite was how longtime host Cecil B. DeMille was booted off the show after a dispute with the American Federation of Radio Artists (AFRA).

Many of the original recordings of the Lux Radio Theater are available on the Internet Archive. Give them and the fine BBC Radio 4 Archive Hour a listen. The Archive Hour is available until Sunday Nov. 22, 2009.