Tuesday, November 5, 2019

Old Time Radio: The Adventures of Sam Spade (1946)

Dashiell Hammett's Sam Spade made his debut on radio in 1946 on ABC Radio, then shifted over to CBS for a couple of years, then, finally, to NBC.

Growing suspicions of Communist activities, however, resulted in Hammett's name being removed from the show, and star Howard Duff being replaced in the final NBC season by Steve Dunne. Lurene Tuttle played Effie, Sam's secretary. As we know, both Duff & Tuttle would find plenty of work on television in later years.

The radio show took a lighter tone than Hammett's novels. Still, if you're only familiar with Spade from "The Maltese Falcon" and Humphrey Bogart, give a listen to Duff's interpretation of the detective in "The Wheel of Life Caper", from July 1948, during its CBS run.



Yes, there was also a Sam Spade comic strip back then.

Rating: A.

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