Fifty-five years ago the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) broadcast the controversial radio play The Investigator.`
Written by suspected Canadian communist Reuben Ship after the Immigration and Naturalization Service threw him out of the United States in 1953, this satire on McCarthyism sent shockwaves south of the border, where recordings gained an "underground" following and the admiration of Dwight Eisenhower and The New York Times in addition to the condemnation of Ed Sullivan.
John Drainie, a radio actor greatly admired by Orson Welles, is perfect in the title role. Star Trek's James Doohan and The Fugitive's Barry Morse are also in the cast.
I encourage you to listen to (and read about) The Investigator via The Journal for MultiMedia History. Stick with it—I think it gets better as it goes along.
Please spread the word about this Internet treasure! I am grateful to a wonderful Long Islander named Connie for bringing the recording to my attention.
Showing posts with label Orson Welles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Orson Welles. Show all posts
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Sunday, April 05, 2009
Happy Joi Lansing Day!
Joi Lansing Day starts one day early this year—April 6 is Lansing's birthday, but I want to give you plenty of time to see this year's sample of Joi: the quirky Orson Welles 1958 TV pilot "The Fountain of Youth." Produced around the same time that Rod Serling pitched The Twilight Zone and Welles made his movie Touch of Evil, "The Fountain of Youth" constituted a leading role for Lansing, who played a bit part in the opening of Touch of Evil. Also appearing in "The Fountain of Youth" is Nancy Kulp, best known for her role in The Beverly Hillbillies, in which Lansing would make five appearances as Lester Flatt's wife.
Previous Joi Lansing Day coverage featured Lansing's Scopitones: "The Web of Love," "The Silencer," and "The One I Love Belongs to Somebody Else."
And now, without further ado, "The Fountain of Youth."
Source (9:19)
Source (10:00)
Source (8:16)
Previous Joi Lansing Day coverage featured Lansing's Scopitones: "The Web of Love," "The Silencer," and "The One I Love Belongs to Somebody Else."
And now, without further ado, "The Fountain of Youth."
Source (9:19)
Source (10:00)
Source (8:16)
Saturday, April 04, 2009
Power, by Arthur Arent
A Living Newspaper Revived in Alphabet City
Recently I was shocked to see a column likening Barack Obama to Mussolini. The comparison turns out to be mostly (but not entirely) in terms of economic policies, but I suspect that it is part of a political smear campaign that is desperate to erode Obama's popularity and protect the United States from real or imagined threats to the wonderful life the citizenry enjoyed during the preceding years of corporate malfeasance.
This sort of attack is not unprecedented. Look back to the Depression years in the United States, where FDR's political opponents also tried to undermine his proposals by labeling him a socialist as well as a fascist.
These days one can learn much from the lessons of the Depression—and the current Metropolitan Playhouse revival of Arthur Arent's 1937 play Power is very much like an urgent message from that part of the past.
Power was a Living Newspaper production of the WPA's Federal Theatre Project (FTP), a government program that put theater people (including Marc Blitzstein, Susan Glaspell, John Houseman, Elia Kazan, Arthur Miller, and Orson Welles) to work amidst assorted political controversies from 1935 until its disbandment in 1939. A period promotional photo for Power can be seen on the right.
A play that backs up its script with citations to books, journals, newspapers, and other sources, Power offers a series of scenes that skim over the development of the electrical power industry and then zero in on tensions regarding the development of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the FDR-era public power project that put citizens to work bringing economic development in the Southern Appalachian region. The TVA plans brought hope to the impoverished people of the region, but power companies that had neglected the area resisted the TVA as a threat to their business.
As presented by a cast of nine under the direction of Mark Harborth, Power offers us a rare opportunity to see a staging of a topical Depression-era play that its own creators might have thought would only be of ephemeral interest. As it turns out, the play's depiction of the relationship of technology, business, government, and the citizenry is especially of interest today, as Barack Obama tries to navigate the nation away from economic hard times while many of his opponents maneuver to interfere with any possible successes that might boost his political standing. The production's didacticism sometimes gets the upper hand over its entertainment value, but for the most part it still retains much of the relevance and energy that the play must have had when it was originally produced. I only wish Metropolitan Playhouse had offered more detailed program notes, but at least today we have the Internet to help us answer questions that the production raises.
Get there soon (it runs through April 12) and get there early (to have your pick of the seats) to take a journey into the past that may inform your appreciation of the present and future.
Promotional photograph by Harry Shaw for the Seattle FTP production of Power. Courtesy, Library of Congress.
Recently I was shocked to see a column likening Barack Obama to Mussolini. The comparison turns out to be mostly (but not entirely) in terms of economic policies, but I suspect that it is part of a political smear campaign that is desperate to erode Obama's popularity and protect the United States from real or imagined threats to the wonderful life the citizenry enjoyed during the preceding years of corporate malfeasance.
This sort of attack is not unprecedented. Look back to the Depression years in the United States, where FDR's political opponents also tried to undermine his proposals by labeling him a socialist as well as a fascist.
These days one can learn much from the lessons of the Depression—and the current Metropolitan Playhouse revival of Arthur Arent's 1937 play Power is very much like an urgent message from that part of the past.Power was a Living Newspaper production of the WPA's Federal Theatre Project (FTP), a government program that put theater people (including Marc Blitzstein, Susan Glaspell, John Houseman, Elia Kazan, Arthur Miller, and Orson Welles) to work amidst assorted political controversies from 1935 until its disbandment in 1939. A period promotional photo for Power can be seen on the right.
A play that backs up its script with citations to books, journals, newspapers, and other sources, Power offers a series of scenes that skim over the development of the electrical power industry and then zero in on tensions regarding the development of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the FDR-era public power project that put citizens to work bringing economic development in the Southern Appalachian region. The TVA plans brought hope to the impoverished people of the region, but power companies that had neglected the area resisted the TVA as a threat to their business.
As presented by a cast of nine under the direction of Mark Harborth, Power offers us a rare opportunity to see a staging of a topical Depression-era play that its own creators might have thought would only be of ephemeral interest. As it turns out, the play's depiction of the relationship of technology, business, government, and the citizenry is especially of interest today, as Barack Obama tries to navigate the nation away from economic hard times while many of his opponents maneuver to interfere with any possible successes that might boost his political standing. The production's didacticism sometimes gets the upper hand over its entertainment value, but for the most part it still retains much of the relevance and energy that the play must have had when it was originally produced. I only wish Metropolitan Playhouse had offered more detailed program notes, but at least today we have the Internet to help us answer questions that the production raises.
Get there soon (it runs through April 12) and get there early (to have your pick of the seats) to take a journey into the past that may inform your appreciation of the present and future.
Promotional photograph by Harry Shaw for the Seattle FTP production of Power. Courtesy, Library of Congress.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
THE GENIUS OF ORSON WELLES
It's a weekend of Welles at The Loew's Jersey, the grand movie house (with a recently restored organ) at 54 Journal Square in Jersey City. It's a great chance to appreciate details in Citizen Kane, which opens the weekend. Admission is $6; $4 for seniors, students with ID, and pre-teens.
Here's the schedule.
Source (5:06)
It's a weekend of Welles at The Loew's Jersey, the grand movie house (with a recently restored organ) at 54 Journal Square in Jersey City. It's a great chance to appreciate details in Citizen Kane, which opens the weekend. Admission is $6; $4 for seniors, students with ID, and pre-teens.
Here's the schedule.
Fri Feb 1 8:00 pm Citizen KaneHere's a recent video tour of the landmark theater. I still haven't been there myself!
Sat Feb 2 3:00 pm The Lady from Shanghai
Sat Feb 2 6:30 pm The Magnificent Ambersons
Sat Feb 2 8:40 pm Touch of Evil (new print)
Source (5:06)
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