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So, why old detective radio shows? What about them draws you to them?
When I was a teenager, and didn't have my trusty laptop, but still had my patented insomnia, there used to be a radio station that would play these old radio shows for most of the night and I got caught up by mostly the style of dialogue. I love that old-timey, slightly noir style of dialogue. It has a nice rhythm to it.
And then there's also the sort of "formula" they write their shows by. I see it in a lot of old tv too. I guess this was before me, you, and everyone else just became so highly media literate, and able to pick out things like getting conked on the head all the time...which, I used to get a big chuckle over.
The old impressions on the scratch pad thing always worked for me, because when I write, I'm rather heavy handed and practically emboss the sheet of paper I write on. Perhaps you have a more delicate hand. I used to love spy tech and detective tech when I was a kid. I used to run around dusting for prints with scotch tape and an old blush brush and talcum powder and ground up pencil lead. Probably made my mother insane. And then I learned to write in code. Lemon juice messages and backwards handwriting and substitution ciphers. Weird huh?
When I was a teenager, and didn't have my trusty laptop, but still had my patented insomnia, there used to be a radio station that would play these old radio shows for most of the night and I got caught up by mostly the style of dialogue. I love that old-timey, slightly noir style of dialogue. It has a nice rhythm to it.
And then there's also the sort of "formula" they write their shows by. I see it in a lot of old tv too. I guess this was before me, you, and everyone else just became so highly media literate, and able to pick out things like getting conked on the head all the time...which, I used to get a big chuckle over.
The old impressions on the scratch pad thing always worked for me, because when I write, I'm rather heavy handed and practically emboss the sheet of paper I write on. Perhaps you have a more delicate hand. I used to love spy tech and detective tech when I was a kid. I used to run around dusting for prints with scotch tape and an old blush brush and talcum powder and ground up pencil lead. Probably made my mother insane. And then I learned to write in code. Lemon juice messages and backwards handwriting and substitution ciphers. Weird huh?
I think the draw for me with the detective shows is that I am a concrete sequential thinker so they satisfy my need to put things in order and to deal with physical evidence. The old shows are fun to listen to because since everything is aural, much attention is paid to dialog and so you get a lot of clever puns, snappy comebacks, etc. It's also interesting to me to go back and hear about the world my parents grew up in. It helps me fix my place in history in my mind when I hear what was going on in the world right before I came into it. It sort of extends my consciousness, I guess.
And it's the formulaic thing, too, definitely. After all, if I didn't enjoy formulaic storytelling, soaps would hold no appeal for me, would they? I'm the world's biggest sucker for a running gag. No doubt. That's why I loved The Red Green Show, for example. You KNEW Ed Frid was going to be terrified of whatever animal he was bringing on to show Red for the week, and you KNEW that eventually the animal would attack him. That should have made it boring. But the thing was that every week they would find a new way for Ed to end up in harm's way, and so to me, it was hilarious. Red Green was one thing I did miss when I tossed the TV. Our PBS station used to run all the Brit Coms on Saturday night, and I loved the ones with running gags the most. The best show ever made, IMO, was "Are You Being Served?" All the characters had their foibles, but they all had their strengths as well. They were balanced and they always acted in character. Kinda like what you'd wish for in a soap, huh? instead of the WTH (milder form of WTF... I sorry, I just try to watch my mental language as well as my spoken one) moments that we get now.
You were a regular Nancy Drew as a kid, weren't you? I wish I'd had an adventuresome friend like you around. Who knows what we might've uncovered.
And it's the formulaic thing, too, definitely. After all, if I didn't enjoy formulaic storytelling, soaps would hold no appeal for me, would they? I'm the world's biggest sucker for a running gag. No doubt. That's why I loved The Red Green Show, for example. You KNEW Ed Frid was going to be terrified of whatever animal he was bringing on to show Red for the week, and you KNEW that eventually the animal would attack him. That should have made it boring. But the thing was that every week they would find a new way for Ed to end up in harm's way, and so to me, it was hilarious. Red Green was one thing I did miss when I tossed the TV. Our PBS station used to run all the Brit Coms on Saturday night, and I loved the ones with running gags the most. The best show ever made, IMO, was "Are You Being Served?" All the characters had their foibles, but they all had their strengths as well. They were balanced and they always acted in character. Kinda like what you'd wish for in a soap, huh? instead of the WTH (milder form of WTF... I sorry, I just try to watch my mental language as well as my spoken one) moments that we get now.
You were a regular Nancy Drew as a kid, weren't you? I wish I'd had an adventuresome friend like you around. Who knows what we might've uncovered.
Interesting...because there are so many procedural drama shows on now, but you listen to detective radio. That's very counterculture of you.
You're right about the formulaic writing and running gags thing. Soaps came from radio shows, you know, but it's not really the predictable plots that are comforting...although there is something very comforting (or should I say THERE WAS something very comforting) about knowing that true love would win out in the end and that your couple would be reunited. There's that old timey radio show/old sitcom/old movie rhythm to scenes that I like...well 'liked' really...that's going sort of out the door too. People don't really write that way anymore, and I'm not sure how long the style of acting that accompanies it will survive either. Like Q scenes for example sound like an old sitcom, or a radio show, and Luke and Laura sound(ed) like an old romantic movie, but say, Sonny and Jason in a scene together? On the radio? So much dead air while they stare at each other. It wouldn't have worked. It doesn't have that rhythm, but such is modern acting. Brit coms have a nice rhythm too, but it's different. It's based on that one long awkward pause when someone realizes that something fishy is going on. But I enjoy them too....not Red Green so much, because as a Canadian, I have to look down upon Canadian television (it's our thing here). No one Canadian is caught dead watching Canadian tv, unless it's a hockey game. I love a good running gag though. LOVE.
I was very much a Nancy Drew as a kid...probably because starting when I was about nine I read every single one of them. My bookshelf was yellow. My mom would ask "Okay, who left their glass on the table?" And I'd say, "Oooh! I can figure that out! Let me get my fingerprint kit, and then I'll do everyone's prints!" I think she thought I was being sarcastic. LOL. I caused my mother a lot of stress.
You're right about the formulaic writing and running gags thing. Soaps came from radio shows, you know, but it's not really the predictable plots that are comforting...although there is something very comforting (or should I say THERE WAS something very comforting) about knowing that true love would win out in the end and that your couple would be reunited. There's that old timey radio show/old sitcom/old movie rhythm to scenes that I like...well 'liked' really...that's going sort of out the door too. People don't really write that way anymore, and I'm not sure how long the style of acting that accompanies it will survive either. Like Q scenes for example sound like an old sitcom, or a radio show, and Luke and Laura sound(ed) like an old romantic movie, but say, Sonny and Jason in a scene together? On the radio? So much dead air while they stare at each other. It wouldn't have worked. It doesn't have that rhythm, but such is modern acting. Brit coms have a nice rhythm too, but it's different. It's based on that one long awkward pause when someone realizes that something fishy is going on. But I enjoy them too....not Red Green so much, because as a Canadian, I have to look down upon Canadian television (it's our thing here). No one Canadian is caught dead watching Canadian tv, unless it's a hockey game. I love a good running gag though. LOVE.
I was very much a Nancy Drew as a kid...probably because starting when I was about nine I read every single one of them. My bookshelf was yellow. My mom would ask "Okay, who left their glass on the table?" And I'd say, "Oooh! I can figure that out! Let me get my fingerprint kit, and then I'll do everyone's prints!" I think she thought I was being sarcastic. LOL. I caused my mother a lot of stress.
I was more of a Trixie Belden gal myself, but I still love a mystery. As long as the solution is logical. I got really tired of the "Murder She Wrote" series because half the time it seemed like they just pulled the culprit out of a hat when it was time to shoot the last scene.
My freshman year in college, I actually did a term paper on the origins of soaps. It was fascinating to read about the early soaps on radio; I've never heard any of them on OTR on the net, though. Probably not much to listen to unless you heard them everyday. I remember that the queen of the soaps was one affectionately referred to as "Elsie BeeBee" which stood for "Life Can Be Beautiful" (LCBB.) I know that Guiding Light was one that made the jump to TV from radio. I think there were others that have since met their demise.
LOL about Red Green. I've only been to Canada once and I was pretty surprised to see that the shows were mostly "Law and Order" and so forth. Although there was a show on skiing with dogs that was interesting. I was in Edmonton, not on the border, so I thought it would be more different than it was.
With TV, I just found myself vegetating too much. The last straw for me was when I saw the "reality" show "Who wants to be a Hilton?" being advertised. I thought, "this box is an idiot magnet and it's sucking up my brain." But I have to admit I'm starting to vegetate to the OTR shows now. Sigh. I just must be prone to vegetation.
My freshman year in college, I actually did a term paper on the origins of soaps. It was fascinating to read about the early soaps on radio; I've never heard any of them on OTR on the net, though. Probably not much to listen to unless you heard them everyday. I remember that the queen of the soaps was one affectionately referred to as "Elsie BeeBee" which stood for "Life Can Be Beautiful" (LCBB.) I know that Guiding Light was one that made the jump to TV from radio. I think there were others that have since met their demise.
LOL about Red Green. I've only been to Canada once and I was pretty surprised to see that the shows were mostly "Law and Order" and so forth. Although there was a show on skiing with dogs that was interesting. I was in Edmonton, not on the border, so I thought it would be more different than it was.
With TV, I just found myself vegetating too much. The last straw for me was when I saw the "reality" show "Who wants to be a Hilton?" being advertised. I thought, "this box is an idiot magnet and it's sucking up my brain." But I have to admit I'm starting to vegetate to the OTR shows now. Sigh. I just must be prone to vegetation.
What you are describing reminds me of the detective novels by Raymond Chandler written mostly in the 1940's. The character he wrote about most was a private eye named Philip Marlowe. Have you read any of them? They are really good. They seem to have an innocence or lack the callousness of today, even though bad things do happen to the people in them, it's just different than today. I'm sure by today's standards they would be very tame reading.
Philip Marlowe was the other detective I was trying to think of instead of George Valentine. I actually think that the head conkings in "Let George Do It" were kept to a minimum. And Chandler created other detectives, too. I believe "The Fat Man" was one of his, and I really like that one as well. My favorite of all is George Valentine, followed a close second by Richard Diamond.
I haven't read any of the noir novels, but you hit the nail on the head about the innocence they seem to have. It was just a different time. There was crime, but there was less of the idea that there was nothing we could do about it. And crimes of torture and gratuitous violence weren't emphasized. There was always a clear motive: money, power, the love of another person. These days many of the shows have to do with criminals who were sexually molested as children, etc. Not that we should just hide our heads in the sand when it comes to the victims of child abuse. But I got uneasy watching shows about it for entertainment.
I haven't read any of the noir novels, but you hit the nail on the head about the innocence they seem to have. It was just a different time. There was crime, but there was less of the idea that there was nothing we could do about it. And crimes of torture and gratuitous violence weren't emphasized. There was always a clear motive: money, power, the love of another person. These days many of the shows have to do with criminals who were sexually molested as children, etc. Not that we should just hide our heads in the sand when it comes to the victims of child abuse. But I got uneasy watching shows about it for entertainment.
LOL, that's true, how could they take so many head-conkings??? 
TV is known for going against science laws. But whenever stuff likes that bothers me, I just say, "it's just a show...I should really just relax".
TV is known for going against science laws. But whenever stuff likes that bothers me, I just say, "it's just a show...I should really just relax".
Was Shirlock Homes around in your day? Did you ever watch that? I love mysteries. I'm reading a mystery book right now called "Holes" by Louis Sachar. You ever read that or seen the movie?
When you were a kid, did you ever watch the Mary Tyler Moore Show? That was around in the 70s and it took place in Minneapolis. I watch re-runs of that. It's hilarious!!!!!!
Ah, Connor, you have me pegged, no doubt. My whole career in analytical chemistry has been guided by a principle stated by the great Sherlock Holmes: "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth." That concept has helped me troubleshoot countless instrument and method failures over my years in the lab.
I knew Sherlock first from the original Sir Arthur Conan Doyle novels and short stories. When I was in fifth grade, I had to go to a podiatrist for some minor surgery on a toe and I spent some days laid up in bed. I had found a copy of "The Return of Sherlock Holmes" somewhere... maybe I had rescued it from the dump when my dad hauled off some junk, or maybe it had been on cheap sale at a library used book day. I don't remember where I got it, but I do remember that it was missing the cover and the last couple of pages. I was enthralled by Sherlock Holmes and as soon as I got back to school I started scouring the library for more. Soon I had almost every Sherlock Holmes story out there memorized. When I moved out on my own, I bought a book with all of Doyle's Holmes stories in a single volume and periodically I go back and re-read them all.
As for watching them, I have seen a couple of the old b/w movies with Basil Rathbone as the detective. Rathbone was a great Holmes portrayer, though I think sometimes dramatic license was taken with the plots. More recently PBS showed some Holmes stories that stayed true to the original plots. They were good, too, but somehow I didn't catch many of them. Perhaps they were on at the same time as the X-Files and by that time I was more interested in Mulder and Scully. On the old-time radio station I listen to "The NEW Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" which also star Basil Rathbone as Holmes and I enjoy them a lot because basically what they are is original scripts which are based on characters or events mentioned in the Doyle writings. I enjoy figuring out which original story suggested the plot of the radio script even more than I would enjoy hearing the actual original story being acted out.
I don't know the "Holes" book personally but it has been highly recommended to many by several young acquaintances. I should get around to it someday.
As for Mary, ya know, at the time I wasn't cognizant of Mpls. I was only about your age and I had never been there. We used to watch the show, but Mary wasn't my favorite because I agreed with Mr. Grant's famous assessment of her; the quintessential scene where she's in his office and they've been arguing and he says "You know what, kid? You got SPUNK." And Mary does this "Aw shucks" kind of thing that was like nails on the chalk board to me and then Mr. Grant goes "I HATE spunk." Uh-huh. Me, too. I thought Murphy Brown was a funnier show than Mary's show. But to be fair, Mary had to pave the way for Murphy, I think. Funny, I like Mary Tyler Moore herself, and I adored her in The Dick Van Dyke show. It was the character she played, not the actress.
I should go back and watch some MTM re-runs sometimes now that I get the whole Minnesota nice thing... I'd probably enjoy them a lot more.
I knew Sherlock first from the original Sir Arthur Conan Doyle novels and short stories. When I was in fifth grade, I had to go to a podiatrist for some minor surgery on a toe and I spent some days laid up in bed. I had found a copy of "The Return of Sherlock Holmes" somewhere... maybe I had rescued it from the dump when my dad hauled off some junk, or maybe it had been on cheap sale at a library used book day. I don't remember where I got it, but I do remember that it was missing the cover and the last couple of pages. I was enthralled by Sherlock Holmes and as soon as I got back to school I started scouring the library for more. Soon I had almost every Sherlock Holmes story out there memorized. When I moved out on my own, I bought a book with all of Doyle's Holmes stories in a single volume and periodically I go back and re-read them all.
As for watching them, I have seen a couple of the old b/w movies with Basil Rathbone as the detective. Rathbone was a great Holmes portrayer, though I think sometimes dramatic license was taken with the plots. More recently PBS showed some Holmes stories that stayed true to the original plots. They were good, too, but somehow I didn't catch many of them. Perhaps they were on at the same time as the X-Files and by that time I was more interested in Mulder and Scully. On the old-time radio station I listen to "The NEW Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" which also star Basil Rathbone as Holmes and I enjoy them a lot because basically what they are is original scripts which are based on characters or events mentioned in the Doyle writings. I enjoy figuring out which original story suggested the plot of the radio script even more than I would enjoy hearing the actual original story being acted out.
I don't know the "Holes" book personally but it has been highly recommended to many by several young acquaintances. I should get around to it someday.
As for Mary, ya know, at the time I wasn't cognizant of Mpls. I was only about your age and I had never been there. We used to watch the show, but Mary wasn't my favorite because I agreed with Mr. Grant's famous assessment of her; the quintessential scene where she's in his office and they've been arguing and he says "You know what, kid? You got SPUNK." And Mary does this "Aw shucks" kind of thing that was like nails on the chalk board to me and then Mr. Grant goes "I HATE spunk." Uh-huh. Me, too. I thought Murphy Brown was a funnier show than Mary's show. But to be fair, Mary had to pave the way for Murphy, I think. Funny, I like Mary Tyler Moore herself, and I adored her in The Dick Van Dyke show. It was the character she played, not the actress.
I should go back and watch some MTM re-runs sometimes now that I get the whole Minnesota nice thing... I'd probably enjoy them a lot more.
Ah yes, the famous "You got SPUNK" line! That was classic! 
Wow, no TV????? You're probably the only person in America without one, lol.
I'm not sure about the TV, but I'm positive I'm the last person left without a cell phone. And still shooting film in my camera, LOL.
The young-uns here at work claim I'm practically Amish. But frankly, a lot of Amish have cell phones anymore (they almost have to have in order to run their businesses; farming isn't an option for a lot of the kids since land is scarce.)
I feel sure that in a couple of years all TV shows will be available online anyway.
The young-uns here at work claim I'm practically Amish. But frankly, a lot of Amish have cell phones anymore (they almost have to have in order to run their businesses; farming isn't an option for a lot of the kids since land is scarce.)
I feel sure that in a couple of years all TV shows will be available online anyway.
True. The funniest thing is to see a sign advertising Amish furniture with a website on it, lol. I do now have a TV card and DVD player on my PC.
and soapcentral.com
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