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The Howling Man - C. B. Lovehill (Audio CD)
by Jake Speed
The Howling Man is a 2009 Twilight Zone radio adaption featuring Fred Willard and Stacey Keach. It was written by Charles Beaumont (I think this was the first episode not to be written by Rod Serling) and first broadcast as a television episode in 1960. The Howling Man is highly regarded and makes for a suitably atmospheric spooky radio ... drama. The story revolves around David Ellington, an American on a walking tour through Europe. One night he becomes lost and a terrible storm breaks out, lashing him with rain and wind. He stumbles across a remote Gothic castle that (we soon learn) serves as a hermitage for a strange religious order living there who all wear robes like monks. The drenched, cold, hungry and exhausted Ellington wanders inside looking for shelter from the storm and some grub but hears a howling noise coming from somewhere. When he investigates he finds a man locked in a cell down below. The man seems perfectly ordinary and harmless though, cultured even, and tells Ellington he is being held prisoner against his will just because he kissed someone in public and that the sect who run the castle are all insane. Before he can think about releasing the man though, Ellington is shepherded away by the order to meet their boss Brother Jerome.
Jerome doesn't seem very keen at all for Ellington to stay. "Why in such a hurry for me to leave?" demands the rain sodden visitor. "What are you afraid I'll find out? It's the man you have locked up in the cell, isn't it, Brother? Well, that isn't a secret anymore. I know about him. I don't know much about this cult of yours, what's permitted, what isn't permitted, but I seriously doubt if you have the authority to imprison a man against his will!" When Ellington threatens to contact the Police, Brother Jerome tells him that he doesn't understand. This is no ordinary prisoner. "What you saw is not a man..." According to Jerome, the prisoner is the Devil himself!
I've always wanted to get lost in a storm and stumble across an old castle with some lights on. Wonder if it ever happens in real life! The Howling Man is not quite at my top table of Twilight Zone episodes but it's good and works very well as an audio drama with the echoes of the stone walled castle and heavy footsteps on the cobbled floors. The rain and winds battering the windows as the storm rages outside and the creaks of the wooden doors and distant howls of the prisoner. You generally can't beat an old castle as a setting for this type of story and it's great fun in an audio medium and really allows your imagination to picture Wolfring Castle in vivid fashion with flickering lights, lingering shadows and huge windows. There are a couple of nice twists in the last third of the story and they don't lose too much in this audio format. Some Twilight Zone twists are purely visual but The Howling Man doesn't quite fall into this category so isn't too bad on this front. There is a wonderful spooky coda too (which of course I can't discuss).
The main intrigue and appeal of the story derives from the quandary of Ellington in whether or not to trust Brother Jerome or the man being held prisoner. His inclination (of course) is to believe Jerome because no one really believes in the Devil. However, the prisoner is only kept in his cell by 'The Staff of Truth' - basically a piece of wood which looks easy enough for him to remove. So why hasn't he done so? Brother Jerome maintains that they've kept the world peaceful for 5 years by holding the prisoner there and it would be a disaster for everyone if he escaped. There is some good confrontational dialogue for Keach and Willard (both are good) as the prisoner and Jerome both try to convince Ellington that they are telling the truth and that the other one is insane. The character of Ellington is pitched quite nicely here I think. He's intelligent and rational but ends up not knowing quite what to think. In the end though he must make a choice. Does he put his trust in Jerome or the mystery man?
Charles Beaumont was great at coming up with these strange tales full of otherworldly charm. He died very young but his stories still remain weird and wonderful fun. This particular drama is 40 minutes long and full of atmosphere and enjoyable sound effects. The music is good too but pleasantly spare and not too distracting. I like the mournful voice of Stacey Keach here and in these dramas generally and he also handles the narration and intro monologue duties that Rod Serling of course used to do in the original television series. You have to watch the telly episodes first of course but this is one of the better radio adaptions primarily because the story is rather Gothic and mysterious, very old fashioned really and much more about atmosphere and things you imagine rather than always have to see.
I found this one good fun in the audio format and it's certainly worth a listen late at night with the lights dimmed. At the time of writing you can buy this as part of an audio cd collection or download it individually for £1.19.
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Dick Barton and the Cabatolin Diamonds - Geoffrey Webb (Audio CD)
by shroud
~~~~~What is this?~~~~~
Well, here is the official description provided by Amazon:
Douglas Kelly stars as 'Dick Barton - Special Agent' in another thrilling adventure for radio's greatest hero. Heralded by an instantly memorable signature tune, the adventures of special agent Dick Barton and his friends Jock and ... Snowey, were essential listening for an entire generation. Originally starring Noel Johnson, Duncan Carse and Gordon Davies, in an exciting world of criminal masterminds, espionage and adventure, it ran on the BBC Light Programme between 1946 and 1951. Sadly very few original recordings still survive. However, in 1949 a number of early Barton tales were re-recorded for transmission overseas. Starring Douglas Kelly, these re-stagings found new audiences in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. These recordings were rediscovered in the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia in 2009 and allow listeners to finally relive the escapades of the great Dick Barton. In this recording from Spring 1949, Dick's plans for a Mediterranean cruise are cancelled, when the Home Office ask him to help them crack a gang of international diamond smugglers. Can Dick thwart the evil Henri De Flambeau, before it's too late? Find out in "Dick Barton - Special Agent!" Guidance: as this contains archive material the sound quality may vary. The language reflects the era of the first broadcast.
~~~~Ohhhhhhhhh! So how was it?!~~~~~
I love old radio dramas, and this one certainly did not disappoint. It was filled with plenty of action, intrigue, and snappy dialogue rendered by more than competent voice actors. Being recorded in the 1940's, this is no slick production affair: we hear faint echoes from a sound stage being used instead of of a state of the art soundproofed booth, and the special effects can sound a bit off to modern audiences used to sound bites from the real thing (for example, the gun shots sound more like balloons popping). it's not a criticism, just something to be aware of, and it certainly does not detract.
Story wise, what we have is rather simple. There is a terrible plot afoot! Someone is manufacturing synthetic diamonds! OH NO! To save us from tacky jewelry and a floundering world market due to fake diamonds being passed off as genuine, Special Agent Dick Barton and his cohorts must discover who the dastardly mastermind is and stop them! This is no safe venture; the villains have guns, crossbows, and great cunning, so our boys better have their wits about them or it's curtains for them and tacky bling for the rest of us!
The sound quality was quite good; I played this on my PC using Media Player and wearing a set of Philip's wireless headphones and it was crystal clear. Due to age and the variables with the quality of the remaining recordings used as masters for this set, there was a faint hissing and faint crackle to be heard from time to time, but this added to the sense that I was listening to a broadcast on an actual vacuum tube radio, which just added to the fun. Hubby then took this to work with him, and played it over his lorry's sound system. He too was able to hear just fine. In fact, he said it made his long journey rather exciting, delivering him from tedium and making him look forward to what came next.
Some of the comments made by various characters do date this a bit, in particular when speaking about foreigners, but then, it WAS the 40's, and that's the way it was. I would not hesitate to let my children listen to the programme because of it, believing that discussions on changing attitudes and differences between how people thought about things in the past vs. now to be a valuable lesson to be taught. It's more than a pleasant enough way to spend several evenings, listening to the individual episodes in manageable bites; an easy enough task as the episodes are left intact with beginning and ending theme music so one knows where one epsiode starts and ends without any trouble. With plenty of excitement, intrigue and derring do, Dick Barton is sure to please fans of the detective and spy thriller genre.
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