The Lost Radio Adventures of "THE GREEN HORNET"

It was not until May of 1938 that The Green Hornet radio program was recorded on a regular basis. Prior, the radio broadcasts originating from WXYZ in Detroit, Michigan, were never heard again after the initial broadcast. No sooner did the broadcast conclude, the actors tossed their scripts into a box in the corner of the room and began rehearsals for the next drama (usually The Lone Ranger). As a result, the first two years of the program does not exist in recorded form. Thankfully we have the radio scripts to consult. Enclosed are plot summaries based on the script pages, "lost" adventures of the masked man and his faithful valet, Kato.

Episode #181 [NO TITLE LISTED] Broadcast Tuesday, November 2, 1937

Copyright Registration D-2-#53101, script received at Registration Office Nov. 10, 1937.

Plot: Jack Preston, a junior member of his father’s investment firm, runs up a $5,000 debt in Gangloff’s Plaza Club, an underworld gambling joint. In order to pay off the liability he prefers his father not know about, young Preston is forced into making investments for Gangloff, using someone else’s collateral against his account. Mike Axford and The Daily Sentinel staff have been investigating Gangloff’s illegal and rigged roulette wheels and slot machines, but his indebted victims don’t care to talk. When Reid meets up with young Preston and learns he went into debt, The Green Hornet goes to steal the I.O.U.s that would incriminate the guilty parties — and get back Jack’s I.O.U.

 

Episode #182 [NO TITLE LISTED] Broadcast Thursday, November 4, 1937

Copyright Registration D-2-#53102, script received at Registration Office Nov. 10, 1937.

Plot: Police Commissioner Langdon is frustrated that an organization is forcing bums to pay a percentage for rights to panhandle in specific territories. The organization belongs to Ogden Jenks, whose goal is to have Langdon out of office so a new commissioner, one of Ogden’s type, will overlook larger rackets. When Britt Reid learns about a private entrance to Jenks’ office suite, he becomes The Green Hornet and overhears some of Jenks’ conferences. When Jenks tries to murder the commissioner in his secret office, having learned the newspapers won’t run a story against Langdon, The Hornet arranges for reporters and police to find the secret entrance to the private office.

 

Episode #183 [NO TITLE LISTED] Broadcast Tuesday, November 9, 1937

Copyright Registration D-2-#53321, script received at Registration Office Nov. 19, 1937.

Plot: John Baldwin, an insurance racketeer, employs Jim Jaundell, former boss of a hi-jacking ring. Jaundell supposedly lives a respectable life, and try as they might, police can find nothing to criticize his conduct. Meanwhile, accidents involving trucks of Five State Corp. continue, but there’s no evidence leading to Jaundell. But Jaundell makes a mistake in attempting a shakedown of Baldwin by committing a murder, and The Green Hornet and Kato set out to stir things up, suggesting a double-cross between the crooks and exposing Baldwin’s insurance racket and Jaundell’s gang-land approach to murder.

 

Episode #184 [NO TITLE LISTED] Broadcast Thursday, November 11, 1937

Copyright Registration D-2-#53322, script received at Registration Office Nov. 19, 1937.

Plot: Ormand Weeks operates Ancestors Inc., which charges a fee to prepare a genealogical table for his customers. Weeks profits by “unearthing” material that his high-priced clients do not want public, offering to withhold the information for a price. For those desperate to prove they are legal heirs of a deceased millionaire, he charges a hefty sum for the fake documents. The Green Hornet tries muscling into the racket and when Weeks attempts to trick the masked man into capture by the police, The Green Hornet seeks vengeance by taking letters Weeks wrote that establish his guilt and mailing them. Being merciful, the masked man orders Weeks to get out of town and go honest — or else.

 

Episode #185 [NO TITLE LISTED] Broadcast Tuesday, November 16, 1937

Copyright Registration D-2-#53455, script received at Registration Office Nov. 26, 1937.

Plot: The Arnold and Gordon Corp. handles stock sales for Dr. Adrian, who developed an automobile headlight made with polarized glass. Through misrepresentation, crooked stockbrokers cheat investors, and when Britt Reid learns of it from Adrian, he and Kato set out to make Arnold and Gordon pay back every cent they’ve taken, with interest. The Green Hornet tricks the stockbrokers into buying all the stock they can with their own money, and the next day, they learn of its worthless value. Reid, however, plays the stock accordingly and profits enough to make a substantial contribution to a worthy charity.

 

Episode #186 [NO TITLE LISTED] Broadcast Thursday, November 18, 1937

Copyright Registration D-2-#53456, script received at Registration Office Nov. 26, 1937.

Plot: Politician Max Miller is trying to profit from the state’s new flood control measure, even though the federal government is taking care of the project. Police Chief Higgens is against Miller’s attempts, so Miller goes public against Higgens. Meanwhile, Damon Pitcairn, head of a concrete construction business, who has profited from graft with previous state projects, gets involved because of what Miller has on Pitcairn. When Britt Reid learns of the ruse, by way of Mike Axford’s disappearance, he sets out as The Green Hornet to steal and extort in order to smash Max Miller’s game and save taxpayers money.

 

NOTES: These plot summaries were reprinted from The Green Hornet: A History of Radio, Motion Pictures, Comics and Television, by Terry Salomonson and Martin Grams, Jr.

 

William Moulton Marston and The Secret History of Wonder Woman

Wonder Woman, created in 1941, is the most popular female superhero of all time. Aside from Superman and Batman, no superhero has lasted as long or commanded so vast and wildly passionate a following. Like every other superhero, Wonder Woman has a secret identity. Unlike every other superhero, she also has a secret history. Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore has uncovered an astonishing trove of documents, including the never-before-seen private papers of William Moulton Marston, the creator of Wonder Woman. She published her findings in 2014 in The Secret History of Wonder Woman, a book I highly recommend if you want to gain an appreciation for the fictional crime fighter.

Beginning in his undergraduate years of Harvard, William Moulton Marston was influenced by early suffragists and feminists, starting with Emmeline Pankhurst, who was banned from speaking on campus in 1911, when Marston was a freshman. In the 1920s, Marston and his wife, Sadie Elizabeth Holloway, brought into their home Olive Byrne, the niece of Margaret Sanger, one of the most influential feminists of the twentieth century. When his wife disapproved of Olive's residence in their home, he confessed they were lovers and drew a line in the sand. Ultimately, all three of them lived together under the same roof in extraordinary nonconformity. As an expert on truth, he invented the lie detector test. Do these fact surprise you? 

Cathy Lee Crosby as Wonder Woman

Jill Lepore traveled to numerous depositories, both private and public. From the archives of Columbia University, Mount Holyoke College, the University of Minnesota, Saint Louis University, the Smithsonian, the University of Virginia, and the Library of Congress, among others, the author did the legwork and her finished product is top-notch as a result. While most people in this day and age believe in writing a book based on standard web browsing, in what academics refer to as "cut and paste," Lepore compiled what is the most comprehensive biography of William Moulton Marston, and a deeper understanding of the various elements that make up Wonder Woman. To understand the formation of the character is to understand the creator.

If you want to read the vintage 1944-1945 newspaper strip, which was short-lived, you have a chance to buy a copy of a hardcover compilation here:

http://www.amazon.com/Wonder-Woman-Complete-Newspaper-Comics/dp/1631400282/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458956791&sr=1-1&keywords=wonder+woman+newspaper

One of the more amusing entries in the legend and lore of Wonder Woman is the 1974 made-for-TV movie which is now available commercially on DVD through Warner. A review from Variety magazine is reprinted for your amusement. And they hit the nail right on the head.

The Secret History of Wonder Woman will be consulted in years to come by historians and with the addition of two other books focusing on the comic adventures of the Amazon goddess, make up the essentials for your bookshelves. This is the kind of book that needed the treatment Lepore provided and regardless of the fact that some fans of Wonder Woman may not find this book as entertaining as an encyclopedia documenting every facet of the comic adventures, required a wide distribution from Alfred Knopf. Not only can the untold story be brought to light, but through her efforts the details of Marston and the influence that became Wonder Woman is now preserved.  

PLAYHOUSE 90: A SOUND OF DIFFERENT DRUMMERS

Essay written by Robert E. Tevis and Martin Grams, Jr. 

Henry David Thoreau wrote that: “If a man loses pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured, or far away.”

 

Writer Robert Alan Aurthur applied that concept to a 90-minute teleplay he wrote entitled “A Sound of Different Drummers,” which aired on the evening of October 3, 1957 on the weekly CBS anthology series, Playhouse 90. The title seemed appropriate as it told the story of a man, Gordon Miller, who loses step with his compatriots when he hears the music of the world he has been persecuting and learns of the error of his ways. The concept may also apply in this case to the writer, however, who may have also been waylaid by what he saw or heard “however measured, or far away.”

 

In the teleplay, Gordon Miller (played by Sterling Hayden) lives in a totalitarian future world in which society controls all messages, and where it is forbidden to possess or read books – under the penalty of death. Miller is an enforcer who is tasked with suppressing the illegal intellectual activity. He is a member of a corps of stormtrooper-like “book men” who use electronic devices to find books, execute “readers,” and confiscate their books for eventual destruction. Miller takes the confiscated books to the “library,” where the books are destroyed. He is smitten when he meets the new librarian, Susan Ward (played by Diana Lynn). He becomes conflicted when he sees her save a book. Will he turn her in or will he hear the sounds of her different drum and follow a new path?

Original and memorable teleplays made Playhouse 90 the most respected anthology series during the “Golden Age of Television.” The series would deservedly dominate the majority of television awards (both wins and nominations) and leave behind a legacy that has never been forgotten. For four television seasons, the curtain rose for Playhouse 90 every week with a different production. The goal, which it regularly achieved, was to establish prestige for the network and develop a following among both critics and the everyman who met to discuss the most recent presentation at the watercooler at work. Some of the original Playhouse 90 productions would later go on to become established stage plays and motion pictures including The Miracle Worker, Days of Wine and Roses, Requiem for a Heavyweight and Judgement at Nuremberg.

 

But was Aurthur’s teleplay original, or was he influenced by the sounds of another drummer?

 

Four years prior to Aurthur’s production, Ray Bradbury had written a novel, Fahrenheit 451, which told the story of a nightmare future in which “firemen” were issued orders by the government to seek out books and burn them. The title derived from the temperature at which books burn. Aurthur insisted that his story for Playhouse 90 was original. But Ray Bradbury was not convinced and filed a lawsuit against CBS.

 

Columnist Hal Humphrey of The Los Angeles Mirror News was among the first to break the news – weeks after the initial telecast: “Author Ray Bradbury doesn’t believe TV writer Robert Alan Aurthur when he says he never read Bradbury’s novel, Fahrenheit 451. Bradbury has turned the matter over to his attorneys, who will decide if Aurthur borrowed too liberally from Fahrenheit 451 when writing ‘A Sound of Different Drummers’ which was produced on the CBS Playhouse 90 drama series recently. Bradbury says his agents were approached by Aurthur in the spring of 1955 and that he wanted to negotiate for a telecast of Fahrenheit 451 for The Philco-Goodyear Playhouse, for which Aurthur was then story editor.”

Aurthur went on the defensive by speaking to columnist Hal Humphrey, whose syndicated column ran in numerous papers across the country. “I never read Mr. Bradbury’s book,” Aurthur claimed, “but I understand that there were some similarities with my story. For example, in both, reading was against the law. But that is like saying that no two Western stories with a dishonest sheriff should be written.”

Indeed, in April of 1955, Bernard Wolfe, who wrote a few teleplays for The Philco Television Playhouse, approached Robert Alan Aurthur with a proposal to write an adaptation of Fahrenheit 451 for television, believing there was material in the novel for a superb television drama. During story discussions, Aurthur insisted that there were technical problems involved which prevented the program from producing such a story. There was, therefore, no reason to secure the television rights. Producer Gordon Duff, however, read the novel and disagreed with Aurthur. As a result, Aurthur addressed a letter to Don Congdon, Bradbury’s agent, with a proposal and an offer to adapt Fahrenheit 451 for television. An exchange of communications between Duff, Aurthur, and Congdon took place in May of 1955 for potential licensing of television rights.

 

According to Aurthur, when giving testimony in court, his story arose out of an incident told him of a member of one of Hitler’s elite SS, who suddenly discovered that he was married to a non-Aryan, and was therefore confronted with the conflict between his duty to her and to that of his elite corps. Bradbury, however, offered a list of 22 claimed similarities including book burners called “firemen” in Bradbury’s novel, although, Aurthur referred to his enforcers as “book men.”

 

Ray Bradbury’s suit sought $50,000 in damages for the perceived plagiarism. The court heard from both sides and then had to decide whether there was too much similarity between the Ray Bradbury novel and the Playhouse 90 telecast. Thrown into evidence was Aurthur’s seven-page plot synopsis for Playhouse 90 titled “Plague of Darkness,” dated March 27, 1957, and the second draft of the teleplay dated September 5, 1957. 

 

On the afternoon of June 15, 1959, Federal Judge Leon R. Yankwich found that Aurthur’s play did not infringe, in whole or in part, on Bradbury’s works and that no plagiarism was shown. The case was subsequently brought for hearing before an appeals court.

 

On January 20, 1961, the appeals court reversed Judge Yankwich’s decision, holding CBS and Aurthur guilty of copyright infringement on Bradbury’s novel. CBS attorneys then petitioned for a re-hearing. On March 22, 1961, the San Francisco Court of Appeals denied CBS’ petition for a re-hearing of the January 20 ruling. After litigating through three courts to the highest tribunal, writer Ray Bradbury won his case. According to a court of law, Aurthur had indeed been unduly influenced by the Bradbury novel.

 

In early August 1961, the matter was settled for an undisclosed amount in an out of court agreement. 

NOTE: It should be noted that an out-of-court settlement is an agreement between two parties that resolves a dispute and does not include the court’s involvement, except to ratify the agreement and end the proceedings. Out-of-court settlements can have no merit of innocence or guilt, based on the written agreement, but are merely financial transactions to resolve a dispute.

 

BEFORE LYNDA CARTER: WHO’S AFRAID OF DIANA PRINCE?

Following the splashy premiere of 20th Century Fox TV’s Batman on ABC-TV, many Hollywood producers began hunting for comic book vehicles which might be converted to weekly programs. However, a degree of uncertainty was apparent at the top echelon of studios also, with some biding their time on comic books for series, and a few flatly closing the door on them, in the belief that Batman would not develop a trend. 

 

At Fox, which with Bill Dozier’s Greenway Productions initiated the most talked about show of the time, production chief William Self commissioned Dozier to commence negotiations for other comics properties such as Wonder Woman and Dick Tracy. ABC-TV quickly optioned Wonder Woman for a potential series for and a television pilot was made. To keep the budget down, however, a full 25-minute episode was not filmed. Instead, only a five-minute preview of what the series would look like was produced… with Ellie Wood Walker in the lead.

 

Walker grew up in Kentucky, attended Maysville High School, played clarinet in the MHS band and was crowned prom queen her senior year in 1953. Ironically, this would not be the last time we would see her in a tiara. After graduating, Walker left Maysville to attend Northwestern University in Chicago. She went on to leap tall dreams in a single bound and landed a career in show business as one of the June Taylor dancers.

 

In 1962, she married actor, Robert Walker, Jr., who is perhaps best remembered for his role as Charles Evans in the original Star Trek series episode, “Charlie X.”

 

Along with her work as a dancer, Walker acted in summer stock productions and would eventually land roles in films such as the cult classics, Targets and Easy Rider.

 

Meanwhile, beneath stately Wayne Manor, Batman producer William Dozier decided it was time to bring another comic book hero to the small screen. This looks like a job for… Ellie Wood Walker! And history was in the making. Even though the pilot was never televised, she won the coveted role of the world’s first Wonder Woman for the screen!

 

“At the time, I thought it was an audition, but we ended up filming immediately,” Walker recalled. “My step-father-in-law, David Selznick, promoted me, having seen me in an off-Broadway show. He was a fan and friend of William Dozier, the producer of Wonder Woman.” On a casting trivia note: the scene in which Wonder Woman admires herself in the mirror is not a mirror. A double was used for that shot: Linda Harrison, also dressed as Wonder Woman, who would soon go on to play the iconic role of Nova in Planet of the Apes (1968).

 

Filming of the five-minute TV pilot took place at Greenway Studios in 1967. Unlike the sophisticated camp of the successful Batman series, the tone of the Wonder Woman pilot was downright goofy. Despite the brief film, a 14-page story was written by Mad magazine writers Stan Hart and Larry Siegel, to ensure the proposed series would be different from other television programs. Stanley Ralph Ross then wrote a 45-page teleplay, “Who’s Afraid of Diana Prince?” Had executives at ABC-TV given a green light, this teleplay would have become a two-part adventure to serve as the premiere episodes of the weekly series.

 

A second attempt to bring Wonder Woman to television was through an animation studio, Filmation, where executives considered making an animated series based on Wonder Woman. They licensed the rights in 1968 but, sadly, the only thing to come of it was an appearance by Wonder Woman – voiced by Jane Webb – in a 1972 episode of the animated series, The Brady Kids. 

 

Proving the third time was the charm, an animated version of Wonder Woman finally made it in a regular television series as a founding member of Super Friends, in 1973, produced by Hanna-Barbera. Shannon Farnon voiced the female superhero not just in this incarnation, but all other animated renditions from this point until 1983. Farnon got her television break (uncredited) in an episode of Burke’s Law in 1965, followed by roles as a stewardess, a nurse, an island girl, and a neighbor girl on such programs as My Favorite Martian, I Dream of Jeannie, and Bonanza.  

 

A second live-action pilot, simply called Wonder Woman, was filmed in late 1973 and televised as a made-for-TV movie in March of 1974. Actress and tennis pro Cathy Lee Crosby played the title role. The movie served as a proposed pilot but executives at ABC-TV would not agree to a weekly series. The movie does contain a pop-cultural oddity in that it’s based partly on the brief five-year period of the comic book when Diana Prince temporarily lost her super powers, as well as her classic costume, and she was re-imagined as a non-super-powered, mod-dressing Emma Peel-esque adventurer. This pilot is also partly a precursor of the direction that the later TV series would eventually take during seasons two and three: Diana Prince being revamped into a James Bond-like ace operative of a top-secret spy organization.

 

A year and a half after the Cathy Lee Crosby movie aired on television, ABC-TV televised another made-for-TV movie, aptly titled The New Original Wonder Woman. While the title might appear an oxymoron, the movie lived up to the title with a new rendition… based on the original concept. After a dogfight with a Nazi plane, U.S. Air Force Steve Trevor crash lands on an uncharted island in the Bermuda Triangle. Paradise Island is inhabited only by women, and their existence has been kept a secret for thousands of years. Learning of the Nazi threat to humanity, the Amazon princess, Diana, is chosen to accompany Trevor back to the United States to battle the Third Reich. Garbed in a skimpy red, white & blue costume and armed with a magic lasso that forces anyone within its grasp to tell the truth, Diana uses her powers as Wonder Woman to battle the forces of evil. Lynda Carter played the role and this time the pilot movie sold and the resulting series would ultimately bring Wonder Woman to the small screen for three consecutive seasons.