This post is brought to you by Strange Adventures by G. W. Thomas which features the novella “The Black Wolf”, about a group of French Canadien trappers facing off against a band of killer wolves led by strange black wolf. The beast comes from a wrecked ship and it wants those coffins filled with Transylvanian dirt… This is a Northern tale set in Labrador in the 1890s, so there is history and Horror but there is also action. A good strange adventure needs both.
Werewolves and other shape changers like were-cats are an obvious first choice for Radio Horror. Unlike a lumbering mummy, the werewolf makes plenty of sound with growls and howls and violent attacks. The mummy victim has to do things like say, “Look, it’s lumbering towards us. It has its hands around my neck!” The selections range from copyright freebies like Frederick Marryat’s “The Werewolf” to newer scripts that include real and fake werewolves. You simply aren’t expecting the lycanthrope to be real on Dragnet or The New Adventures of Mike Shayne. Mystery programs like fake supernatural creatures, a kind of cake-and-eat-it-too deal. Still, they are fun while they last. I Love a Mystery did a fifteen part werewolf tale showing that the fake werewolf can cover a lot of ground. The later ones, from the 1970s, aren’t technically Old Time Radio but they were done in the same spirit. The Beeb (BBC) even did an adaptation of a classic werewolf film.
The Witch’s Tale
The earliest one I could find was from this series based largely on a Pulp magazine in the style of Weird Tales. I wrote about it at length here.
Lights Out
Lights Out is probably the OTR program that most people think of when you talk about old Radio Horror. “The Cat Wife” stars Boris Karloff, who for my money, makes everything better.
Dark Fantasy
Dark Fantasy was a short-lived program out of Oklahoma. This episode uses an island as a bottleneck for our werewolf. This will be done again in “Werewolf Island”.
The Weird Circle
The Weird Circle focused on really old stories (no fees to writers), adapting Frankenstein and other classics. They did two lycanthropic tales, fairly close together.
“The Werewolf” by Capt. Fredrick Marryat (1944)
“The Middle Toe of the Right Foot” by Ambrose Bierce (1944)
Strange Adventure
Strange Adventure was short-lived in 1945 but when each episode is three minutes long, short-lived is what you get. Talk about a Radio title close to my heart!
The Shadow
Radio’s most famous character, voiced by Orson Welles, the creepy intro guy was so popular he spawned his own Pulp magazine. Despite the supernatural appearing hero, the show was not actually Horror but a Weird Menace/Mystery series.
“The Werewolf of Hamilton Mansion” (1947)
Escape
Escape was classic thriller material from 1947 to 1954. It was the poor sister to the highly popular Suspense, using many of the same actors.
“Taboo” (1947) by Geoffrey Household
The New Adventures of Mike Shayne
The New Adventures of Mike Shayne was the second of three Radio versions. Mike Shayne was played by Jeff Chandler. This werewolf story takes place in a swamp, another favorite bottleneck for werewolves, after haunted castles and islands.
“The Case of the Bayou Monster”(1948)
Dragnet
More famous for the television show spawned from the Radio program, Dragnet was one of the first realistic cop shows. So why a werewolf? Must have been October.
I Love a Mystery
I Love a Mystery was one of Radio’s best and long-running shows, with its lovable trio of heroes, Jack Packard, Doc Long and Reggie York. Many of its story-lines involved fake monsters like “Temple of the Vampires”. The show inspired cartoons like Scooby-Doo in 1969, when OTR was a golden memory. Reggie York is played by Tony Randall in 1949-1952.
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 1 (1949)
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 2
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 3
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 4
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 5
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 6
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 7
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 8
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 9
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 10
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 11
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 12
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 13
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 14
Bury Your Dead in Arizona Part 15
“Bride of the Werewolf” (1952)
Romance
A show for the ladies, mixing adventure with romance. I was a Teenage Werewolf?
BBC
The BBC is well-known for its stylish and literary presentation of good Horror and Science Fiction fare. These are after the Golden Age of radio but still very much in that spirit.
An American Werewolf in London (1981)
CBS Mystery Theater
CBSMT is probably the closest thing the US has to the BBC, creating some great werewolf shows. These two scenarios have campers in the woods facing a werewolf.
“Night of the Howling Dog”(1975)
Conclusion
In this day of “podcasts”, I have to admit I am more enamored with the old Radio shows. The sound quality is not as good and sometimes the cheese is laughable but when it works, it works well. Werewolves had their share of fun as you can see from these selections. I think ghosts were more common but harder to pull off. These shows range from the tongue-in-cheek to the deadly serious. The fake werewolves are not as satisfying but that is always the case. The performances by Horror film royalty like Vincent Price, Peter Lorre and Boris Karloff are always welcome. (All three were famous for their characteristic voices, and no wonder they excelled at atmospheric Radio shows. I Love a Mystery had a character named Michael who did a mock Lorre accent that forced the actor to threaten legal action. The character was dropped. I still enjoy The Grinch Who Stole Christmas every year but it is for the Boris Karloff voice and singing as much as the Chuck Jones animation.) I hope these shows will spice up (not Pumpkin spice!) your Spooky Season.
For more Old Time Radio Horror programs, go here. Or here.
Mythos Horror & Ghostbreakers at RAGE m a c h i n e
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