Radio Drama Stars

I was lucky to begin my career when the radio drama stars were ending theirs.

Radio was on its way out, while TV was coming in. As a result, the radio stars got some major and minor TV parts, such as Marvin Miller’s lead role on The Millionaire and Hal Smith’s Otis on The Andy Griffith Show. Mostly, though, they did voice work, which was where I came in.   

At that point I produced audio, mostly for children’s education and entertainment, and the early radio stars were the best at it. They could walk into a studio, glance at a script, and read it flawlesslessy, as they did week after week on my projects.  

Among them were Jane Webb, heard on the Lux Radio Theater; Michael Rye on Jack Armstrong, All American Boy; Olan Soule on Mr. First Nighter; and Virginia Gregg on Dragnet. There was the remarkable Vic Perrin, who started out on the radio version of Gunsmoke and, in the years following, became the top voice man in Hollywood.

My favorite projects were audio plays that I wrote for classroom use, then hired a cast, most of them radio drama actors. One play was especially memorable because during the break that day, the actors gathered and told stories about their times in radio drama.   

At the center of the group was radio’s biggest star, Marvin Miller (shown here), who during his heyday had headed up ten or more shows each season. That day, Miller described the early shows, which were broadcast live from Chicago in order to reach both east and west coasts at reasonable hours.

In the early days, Miller would be picked up by limousine each morning and driven from studio to studio, where he would receive an unfamiliar script and read it perfectly, often using special accents, then would climb back into the limousine and make his way to the next show. If he was late, Chicago River traffic provided a good excuse: the bridge was up.  

During the special recording session that day, the other stars traded memories, and the break was capped off by Hal Smith, always full of jokes. The group enjoyed seeing each other again; mostly, though, I was the happy recipient of their stories and talents.