Episode 615 - Curtain Call for Crime (Sherlock Holmes, Philo Vance, The Saint, Rocky Fortune, & Johnny Dollar)
Down These Mean Streets (Old Time Radio Detectives)
Jack Mooney
4.6 • 982 Ratings
🗓️ 23 February 2025
⏱️ 148 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
All the world’s a stage, but as our radio detectives discover this week the theatre offers no respite from mysteries to solve. Each of our stories involves the theatre, with crimes taking place onstage, backstage, and sometimes in the aisles. First, as Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce investigate when an actor takes his role as a murderer a bit too seriously in “The Case of Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber” (originally aired on Mutual on January 28, 1946). Super sleuth Philo Vance is called in when an actress is threatened and her understudy is killed in the syndicated mystery “The Backstage Murder Case.” The Saint tries to prevent a play’s climactic murder scene from being played for real. Vincent Price stars in “Simon Takes a Curtain Call” (originally aired on NBC on January 14, 1951). Frank Sinatra has to solve a drama critic’s murder - a crime that was committed during intermission of a new play - in “Murder on the Aisle” from Rocky Fortune (originally aired on NBC on November 24, 1953). Finally, Bob Bailey stars as Johnny Dollar in “The Heatherstone Players Matter” (AFRS rebroadcast from July 14, 1957), where a hated ham actor meets his maker and Johnny has to find out whodunnit.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Get this and get it straight. |
| 0:02.1 | Crime is a sucker's road. |
| 0:03.9 | And those who travel |
| 0:04.6 | it wind up in the gut of the prison of the grave. |
| 0:12.3 | The story you were about to hear is true. |
| 0:15.2 | Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent. |
| 0:18.6 | The Adventures of Sam Spade, Detective. |
| 0:21.7 | The Adventures of the Saints, |
| 0:23.5 | starring Vincent Price. |
| 0:25.5 | Bob Bailey, in the exciting adventures |
| 0:27.7 | of the man with the action-packed expense account. |
| 0:30.6 | America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator... |
| 0:33.4 | Yours truly, Johnny Dollar. |
| 1:03.0 | ... Yours truly, Johnny Dollar. Hello and welcome to Down These Mean Streets and more old-time radio detectives and crime solvers. The classic radio mysteries we listen to each week were performed by amazing actors, but in our stories this week, actors are also central characters. |
| 1:13.6 | Each of the cases tackled by our heroes today concerns the theater, |
| 1:19.6 | with crimes taking place onstage, backstage, and sometimes in the aisles. |
| 1:25.6 | First up is Basil Rathbone as Sherlock Holmes, with Nigel Bruce as Dr. Watson in the case of Sweeney |
| 1:33.0 | Todd, the Demon Barber, originally aired on Mutual on January 28, 1946. |
| 1:40.7 | In this original radio mystery, our heroes are taking in a play depicting the life and crimes of the notorious Sweeney Todd, and this was long before Stephen Sondheim turned his tale into a hit musical. |
| 1:54.3 | It seems the actor playing Sweeney has been leaning into his part a bit too much, and his comrades in the theater want Holmes to make |
| 2:02.6 | sure he doesn't go full method in attacking the role. Another actor is in jeopardy in the |
| 2:08.6 | backstage murder case, a syndicated mystery starring Jackson Beck as super-slooth Philo Vance. |
... |
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