I’m reading Danse Macabre, Stephen King’s overview of horror fiction in various forms of media and I found the chapter on radio interesting. I like old time radio, but it’s been a while since I listened to anything. I’ve mostly listened to episodes of The Shadow, but also a few westerns like Gunsmoke with Robert Conrad, The Lone Ranger, and Have Gun Will Travel.
The shows that King discusses sounded pretty interesting, so I decided to give them a listen. I was able to find them included in various Old Time Radio podcasts as well as on YouTube. The length varied from thirty minutes to just a few minutes.
“You Died Last Night” from Suspense April 1, 1962
The narrator has to convince an alien not to destroy the Earth. Not bad. It reminded me of an old Jack Kirby story from one of Marvel’s monster reprint comics that I read like crazy as a kid.
When King mentions this episode, he says, “...or the scream at the end of that classic Suspense episode, “You Died Last Night.” But when I listened to the episode, I discovered that it doesn't end with a scream. I believe he got that episode mixed up with one of the Lights Out episodes he mentions later in the chapter (discussed below) because one of those does end in a scream.
“Mars is Heaven” from Dimension X January 7, 1951
King said that he listened to this around age four and that it was his first experience with horror. When men from Earth land on Mars they are surprised to find a town from Earth inhabited by friends and family members who have passed away. Of course, things are not as they seem. It’s a well-done adaptation of the short story by Ray Bradbury.
King spends the last part of the chapter discussing the work of Arch Oboler who took over the Lights Out radio show in 1936. He has this to say about Oboler:
“...but no discussion of the phenomenon of radio terror, no matter how brief, would be complete without some mention of the genre’s prime auteur — not Orson Welles, but Arch Oboler, the first playwright to have his own national radio series, the chilling Lights Out.
I listened to the two episodes King reviews, “Chicken Heart” and “A Day at the Dentist” as well as two other episodes that I read were popular at the time. Wow.
“Cat Wife” from Lights Out June 17, 1936
This episode stars Boris Karloff as a man with a cruel wife. After she tells him that she only married him for his money he accuses her of being a cat. A transformation occurs and he has to deal with the consequences. At thirty minutes it felt a little long (the others below are all much shorter) but it was so bizarre that it held my interest. From what I could find online it was voted as one of the most popular episodes and was often rebroadcast.
"Chicken Heart” from Lights Out March 10, 1937
A chicken heart in a lab begins to grow with no end in sight. It’s like The Blob but done in about eight minutes with a darker ending.
“A Day at the Dentist” from Lights Out March 10, 1937
A man with a toothache arrives at a dentist’s office but something isn’t as it seems. A dark story with some dark humor. This one was like a E.C horror comic
“The Dark” from Lights Out December 29, 1937
A policeman and a doctor are called to a house and find something horrific. This one was the spookiest and had a strong H. P. Lovecraft vibe to it.
Final Thoughts
I enjoyed the heck out of Oboler’s Lights Out episodes. I think that the shorter episodes are stronger but all of them are a step up from other old radio programs. King points out:
“Because he rarely overdid the dialogue-as-description device (as did the creators of The Shadow and Inner Sanctum), Oboler was able to use the natural turn of the mind toward the morbid and the pessimistic to create some of the most outrageous effects ever paraded before the quaking ears of a mass audience.”
The show and the way it’s written and presented is still a product of its time but it's at a different level from that of the other shows. Also, the stories are so original and hold up pretty well (so far) considering that they were written in the late 1930s. Oboler comes across as the Rod Serling of radio to me. I’m looking forward to listening to more episodes of Lights Out and anything else he’s written.
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