Project Audion: Classic Audio Dramas for Modern Times

"Sergeant Preston of the Yukon" (actually called "The Challenge of the Yukon" for most of its 16 years on the radio) was one of the greatest juvenile adventure radio series ever - part of a trinity of kids' shows that originated from Station WXYZ in Detroit. (The others were "The Green Hornet" and "The Lone Ranger".) It chronicled the never-ending adventure of the noble Mountie and his wonder dog Yukon King, maintaining law and order in the wilds of the frozen Northwest.

While there are nearly 700 surviving recordings of this classic show, Project Audion located a MISSING episode's...

What makes "The Great Gildersleeve" a great radio comedy? Historically, it was the first-ever spinoff series, and its classic sitcom characters were more deeply and warmly drawn than its parent show "Fibber and McGee and Molly," but no less funny.  Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve was the unforgettably blustery Water Commissioner of Summerfield, portrayed with a famous laugh full of innuendo by Hal Peary (and later Willard Waterman). Gildy's interactions with his nephew Leroy and nNiece Marjorie; friends like Judge Hooker, Peavey the druggist, and Floyd the barber; and his romantic entanglements with Leila Ransom's and others delivered laughs every week. A...

To begin Project Audion's sixth season, we're once again returning to that all-time classic audio drama, Suspense.  Once again, we've accessed a script from one of the very few lost episodes of the show, and are bringing back many of the actors from Audion's very first episode in 2020 to recreate it. 

This 1950 episode, "Deadline," is a powerhouse story of a newspaper editor whose fast-breaking stories on the Chicago underworld increase his paper's circulation beyond his wildest dreams... but which may also prove to be the stuff of his nightmares. It is indeed a classic tale "well-calculated to...

What's more exciting than premiering a recreated lost episode of a classic audio drama? Premiering a completely unknown and lost show! Such is "Wayfaring Men," Project Audion's latest offering. "Wayfaring Men" was a dramatic summer 1933 CBS serial about the lives of the hoboes, tramps, and bums who were numerous during the Great Depression. Not a single recording of the show exists, and almost no background information either, but Project Audion came into a handful of original mimeographed scripts, and has selected one episode from June 1933 to bring back to life.

But wait - there's more! Not only...

Project Audion brings back another iconic mid-century situation comedy classic: “Our Miss Brooks.” In the 1950s, the character of Connie Brooks was everyone’s favorite English teacher - sassy and smart, but starry-eyed in her unrequited desire for biology teacher Mr. Boyton. Actress Eve Arden’s portrayal was so iconic she made the jump to television four years after the radio version launched in 1948 - and even filmed a movie adaptation in 1956. Robert L. Mills, writer for Bob Hope, has crafted a fresh episode of the show for Project Audion that matches the originals, laugh for laugh.  So - step back...

Project Audion brings you "The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes," recreating an episode which has remained unheard for eighty years. There's no more famous detective, real or imagined, than Holmes. His creator, Arthur Conan Doyle, pretty much defined the mystery-detective story, and 138 years later Holmes and Watson are still part of popular culture. In 1945, Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce portrayed them weekly on the Mutual Radio network. Our selected script (which aired only once, on January 15, 1945) "The Curse of Doctor Anselmo," carries its own mystery - the secret identity of the man who co-wrote it pseudonymously. Will you...

Long, long before George Burns became the senior citizen movie star of films like "The Sunshine Boys" and "Oh God!" he was familiar to radio and television audiences across the country as the grounded half of the comedy couple Burns and Allen, with real-life wife (and vaudeville partner) Gracie Allen playing the ditzy dame of the duo. Theirs was a 25-year run on the airwaves, and now for Project Audion, Pete Lutz has penned a fresh new Burns and Allen script that recalls the best of their radio work during World War II, right down to their sponsor of...

Our Christmas present for you is a lost episode of the classic detective drama "The Adventures of Philip Marlowe" with a holiday theme! Because Audion's previous Philip Marlowe restoration became its most popular episode ever, we returned to our archives to unearth a Marlowe script which hasn't been performed or heard since December 19, 1948 -- "The Three Wise Guys." "The Adventures of Philip Marlowe" ran for three years on network radio, with new noir-ish tales from  author Raymond Chandler's detective. In this episode, it was the night before Christmas and (as Marlowe says) "a sweet girl was in trouble.  But th...

The Jack Benny Program returns with a delightful all-new radio episode penned by former Bob Hope staff writer Robert L. Mills just for Project Audion. Jack and his regular gang - Mary Livingston, Phil Harris, Dennis Day, and Rochester - send up the movie classic "Casablanca" with  some of the movie's original cast in guest starring roles.  Jack takes the Humphrey Bogart part, inevitably. Join project Audion's talented transcontinental voice actors as they perform together in real time (like the old radio-drama days) this brand-new episode of the Jack Benny Program that sounds like it came from the 1940s! Ou...

"Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar" was the last detective standing at the end of radio drama's original classic era, outlasting everyone else - Sam Spade, Richard Diamond, Sherlock Holmes, The Saint, Phillip Marlowe and dozens of others. "America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator" is arguably better-loved now than he was in the middle of the 20th century. Now Project Audion presents a new Johnny Dollar script, written by Patrick Keating in the style of the original episodes, and transcribed live (via Zoom) in the classic audio drama manner. Johnny Dollar travels to Texas to learn about the Damiani Diamond and what...

Brought back to life after nearly 90 years buried at the Library of Congress, Project Audion recreates the very first script Arch Oboler created for NBC's famous late night horror drama "Lights Out." Lights Out stories gave the listener free rein to imagine the worst. And in the hands of a master storyteller like Oboler, the worst could be terrifying indeed - like a good campfire ghost story, reinforced with sound effects. 

"Burial Services" took a simple, horrifying premise - being buried alive - and wrapped a moody story around it, one whose shock value comes as much f...

For fourteen years beginning in 1943, the CBS Radio network brought its listeners "Romance" - an anthology of half-hour love stories both classic and new, serious and comic. A story like Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice" would seem to be a particular challenge to condense to a single half-hour, but Romance captured the essence of the tale in a brisk, highly entertaining adaptation that was performed three times during the show's long run.

The vintage mid-century recordings sound muddy and are not always well cast, so it became an ideal candidate for Project Audion to recreate. Enjoy the...

In terms of sheer fun and laughter during radio's classic mid-century era, it's hard to beat the Phil Harris/Alice Faye show. A spinoff from Jack Benny, bandleader Phil Harris and his family found themselves in classic sitcom predicaments week after week. Now, Robert L. Mills, former writer for Bob Hope, has created another fresh script that brings all those characters  -- including Frankie Remley, Julius, brother Willie, your friendly Rexall druggist and others --  back to life. 

Project Audion's talented voice actors came together live with a virtual studio audience to create a delightful - and del...

Project Audion invites you to some light summer fare: the Audion Original "Matinee with Bob & Ray." This is Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding like you've never heard before, because it's made of fresh sketches in tribute to "The Two and Only."

For those who are NOT intimately familiar with Biff Burns, Komodo dragons, or the Slow Talkers of America, the comedic duo of Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding was formed (legend has it) by accident, in the mid-1940s when a  baseball game broadcast was rained out and these two young men were thrown together to ad-lib o...

In the long lineup of fictional hard-boiled detectives, Philip Marlowe stands out as one of the earliest and best. Raymond Chandler's creation first reached print in the early 1930s, then went on to memorable adaptations in film, television, and of course radio. "The Adventures of Philip Marlowe" had a solid four-year run of well over 100 episodes on CBS. Still, a handful of recordings are lost today. 

Now Project Audion recreates one of these missing episodes - "The Quiet Number" - directly from the original script, exactly seventy-five years after it was broadcast. "The Quiet Number" wasn't penned b...

Project Audion once again brings you laughs, with an all-new original episode of the Jack Benny Program sponsored by Lucky Strike cigarettes.  This Audion Original was written for us by former Bob Hope staff writer Robert L. Mills. Jack Benny was his childhood comedy inspiration, and once again Mr. Mills has recreated that classic Benny style and humor so faithfully it's like discovering a lost episode!

This week, Jack has snagged Jimmy Stewart as his guest star, so the Benny gang (Mary Livingston, Dennis Day, Phil Harris, Mel Blanc, and the rest) can stage their send-up of t...

Suspense is one of classic radio's most highly-regarded dramas -- with good reason. It sustained a remarkably high quality level of dramatic tension for 20 years, as the many surviving recordings attest. But a handful of episodes are lost - and Project Audion now recreates one of them. "The Life of Nellie James" was intended as Suspense's premiere, but circumstances pushed it back to the third episode. It was performed once, live, on July 1, 1942, but never heard again. Until now -- as Project Audion, kicking off its fifth season, brings together a transcontinental cast in a live transcription of "The...

A spy caper always makes for a good show. Start with a suave man of mystery, sprinkle in some far-off exotic locales, and stir in some evil enemies of democracy and beautiful women. The result: James Bond? No, "The Man Called X" -- which broadcast several hundred episodes on network radio from 1944 through 1952. Unflappable British actor Herbert Marshall originally played American agent Ken Thurston, AKA the man called X. 
Project Audion now recreates the very first episode of "The Man Called X," from a script which has not been heard since its premiere in July 1944! The action of "T...

The "Damon Runyon Theatre," a syndicated radio series from 1949 relating stories of New York's "guys and dolls" -- mobsters and dames, gamblers and frails, saints and sinners -- which newspaperman and sportswriter Damon Runyon colorfully brought to life in decades of short stories. They may have been gangsters, but they often had hearts of gold underneath - plus a unique present-tense way of speaking which has come to be known as "Runyonesque." 

The Damon Runyon Theatre recorded 52 charming half-hour versions of his stories, and those got writer Casey Keller (Beakman's World, The Love Boat) wanting more. So h...

Just premiered for the International Jack Benny Society annual convention, and now available to all: a "new" episode of the classic Jack Benny radio show newly penned exclusively for Project Audion by Bob Hope comedy writer Robert L. Mills. Here, Jack and the gang do a send up of the movie "Witness for the Prosecution" - with W. C. Fields in a guest-starring role. 

Here's what Mr Mills said after hearing the final product: "This as near perfection as any living humans could possibly recreate a 75-year-old radio show. You performed miracles producing this and the program w...

Premiering tonight (2/9) at 9 PM Eastern, Project Audion recreates a shocking tale of love, hate, conspiracy, and murder - all the more so for being a true story that took place in 1778.
"The Crime of Bathsheba Spooner" tells the story of the first woman executed for murder in the United States. It was the audition script for a new CBS radio drama series - "Crime Classics" --  a sort of mid-century predecessor to today's true-crime podcasts, created by some of radio's finest actors, writers, directors, and musicians.

Audion's rendition of "The Crime of Bathsheba Spooner" works f...

Peter Lorre is an actor with such a distinctive voice and presence that even now, 60 years after his death, he's still instantly identifiable. It's surprising he didn't do more radio dramas, but he did host and star in "Mystery In The Air" in 1947. As a summer replacement show, there were only 17 episodes, and only 8 or so recordings exist -- so Project Audion asked Pete Lutz to create a NEW Mystery in the Air script. The result is both light-hearted and supernaturally spooky, and thanks to our transcontinental cast of talented voice actors, sounds just like an unheard episode from...

EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it! Big Story radio drama recreated by Project Audion!

Newspaper reporters were once heroic figures - exposing rackets and corruption, taking down the powerful and giving voice to the powerless. The "Big Story" series from audio drama's original classic era (the mid 20th century) celebrated the newspaper reporter - selecting true headlines and converting them into gripping dramas, much like Dragnet did with police. 

Audion's December offering is a story set during the Christmas holiday, and while there IS an appearance by Santa Claus and a happy ending - this i...

In the late 1940s and early 1950s the Phil Harris-Alice Faye radio series was a masterclass in radio comedy. Harris (charming, egotistical, smooth, Southern) and Faye ( grounded, smart, and only occasionally the movie star) were surrounded by eccentric regulars like Elliot Lewis as Phil’s band buddy Frank Remley, and Walter Tetley as the little kid Julius - and each week the happy result could be heard in the gales of laughter from the live studio audience. Today, Harris is best remembered as the voice of Ballou the Bear in Walt Disney's Jungle Book, but former Bob Hope comedy wr...

Who was it who made that phone call to the emergency room -- the one that set off the horrible chain of events that took place in The Dark? Project Audion recreates the episode "The Dark" from LIGHTS OUT - one of classic radio's most imaginatively gruesome shows. It's an episode show that hasn't been heard in its complete form since January 1938! "Lights Out" was the work of  master radio dramatist Arch Oboler, and he memorably redid "The Dark" 25 years later as a highly abridged adaptation for an LP called "Drop Dead" - the only recording you could hear u...

The Lone Ranger has got to be the most famous fictional character to come out of old time radio...every generation knows him, even if they don't know his radio origins. And those radio origins go WAY back - the Masked Man has been around 90 years, since 1933! But  the radio version of the Lone Ranger has hundreds of episodes we'll never hear - because the show wasn't recorded from 1933-1937. A shame, because these earliest years would let us listen to the series and characters evolving into the forms everyone knows. A 1934 episode simply wasn't the same as a 1954 e...

The short-lived noirish radio detective series "Pat Novak for Hire" is probably better loved now than it was in the late 1940s, thanks to its darkly-comic quips and the dry-as-dust performance of Jack Webb in the title role, just before his breakout turn on "Dragnet." Pat Novak - the man, like the show - was one of those "hard-boiled" types - he may bounce or crack, but he doesn't break easily. Pat Novak shows are famed for their Raymond Chandler-esque plots and style, where the lead character never met a crook or a lady he couldn't describe with a...

It's the year 2090. There are signs that a pandemic is coming - a pandemic which will kill millions of innocent people - again. Because it's happened before. But this time, just maybe, we know what - or who - is causing it...and a chance to stop it.

That's the setup for "Syndrome Johnny," a lost episode from a nearly-forgotten science-fiction anthology radio drama from 1953 called "Tales of Tomorrow." The television version of "Tales of Tomorrow," which actually came before the radio edition, is considered one of the first serious scifi video series. The TV edition spawned...

Project Audion revisits one of the funniest, most beloved radio comedies of the 20th century. Fibber McGee and Molly tickled the radio audience for so long - more than a quarter of a century - that it spawned the very first-ever spinoff shows... and recurring gags like Fibber's hopelessly overstuffed closet and quips like Molly's "t'ain't funny, McGee" remained part of shared American pop culture long after the series left the airwaves. Part vaudeville act, part sitcom, the series stared real-life couple Jim and Marion Jordan who were indeed former vaudeville comics. Don Quinn's scripts and a large cast...

Project Audion recreates an extraordinarily rare, early lost episode of the classic audio drama "Suspense." When CBS premiered the the show in June 1942, it wasn't immediately evident that it would become one of the all-time great radio dramas, running for 20 years and nearly 1000 stories. Indeed, in this (just Suspense's fifth-ever episode, from July 15, 1942), while all the typical ingredients are in place (in this instance, a murder aboard a moving train) the show hadn't quite yet settled into the style that would soon define classics like 1943's "Sorry, Wrong Number." 

Heard for t...