The Second Best Matter

When a role is played by multiple actors, there's typically spirited debate among fans about who did it best. Whether the debate is about Sean Connery vs. Roger Moore (or, perhaps, Daniel Craig) or Tom Baker vs. David Tennant (personally, I prefer Christopher Eccleston), the only consensus is that each actor's partisans are confident that the others' are wrong. Johnny Dollar is different, because there is virtually no dissent that Bob Bailey played him best. Where things get interesting is the conversation about who was second best. As you can see from the clip below, three different interviewees each offered different opinions on the matter.

Putting It Together (Step One)

There are still some interviews to be shot and lots of research to be done, but that's no reason not to start putting pieces together to get a sense of what the final shape of this effort will be. I enjoyed putting this together, rough though it is, and hope you will as well.

...There Is a Season...

This is obviously a little off-topic, but the passing of Pete Seeger seems significant enough to warrant a bit of digression. As much as I respected him and his contributions to popular music. the late Pete Seeger was never one of my favorite musicians. He was, however, a hero to me for the ways he stood up for his beliefs throughout his life. 

When called before the House Un-American Activities Committee, Seeger didn't use the 5th Amendment - constitutional though it may have been to invoke his right to avoid self-incrimination. Rather, he honed in on a more pertinent point by referring to the 1st Amendment and the principle of freedom of association. Simply put, Seeger told the committee that it was none of their business what groups he belonged to, communist or otherwise. For his trouble, he was indicted for contempt of Congress and would spend several years dealing with the fall-out of that exceptionally principle decision.

Seeger told me about this in a phone call a little over five years ago. The ostensible purpose of the call was to clarify some rights questions about the release of one of his old concerts, but that took up maybe three minutes of the 20 minute call. For the rest of it, Seeger (I can't pretend a sufficient level of familiarity to call him Pete) gave me an unsolicited history lesson.

He told me about the world tour he and his family undertook once the HUAC situation had finally been put to rest. He talked about the Soviet Union and his belief that the post-revolution circumstances had made the emergence of someone like Stalin almost inevitable. Most memorably, he related an anecdote about Eleanor Roosevelt and the eminently graceful way in which she engaged one of her husband's mistresses after his death.

It's hard to recall another instance where such a brief slice of time left me feeling so much more enlightened and just as much in awe of someone. There's a school of thought that one should never meet their heroes, because of the seeming inevitability of disappointment, and perhaps Pete Seeger was the exception that proves the rule. He was never talking down to me - at least I never felt he was. Instead, he gave me lots to ponder and, now that he's gone, a very personal story to tell. I can only imagine how many lives he touched through music or conversation and will always be grateful that I was one of them.

The 12 Month Matter

It's been about a year since I started researching and interviewing for this project. Though the production hasn't progressed as fast as I'd like ("life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans" as a famous songwriter once opined), I'm still pleased with what's been done so far. This includes my interview with broadcasting legend Ed Walker, who remains the host of WAMU-FM's weekly old-time radio showcase The Big Broadcast (Sunday nights at 7:00 and available to listen online). Here are Ed's thoughts on some of the elements that made Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar a success.

The Merry Christmas Matter

One of the most striking differences between British and American television is that, while British broadcasters tend to show their most popular programs around Christmas, American networks seem to act as though no one actually watches television between Christmas and New Year's. it wasn't always like this. During the golden age of radio, Christmas-themed installments of shows actually actually aired close to Christmas. 

Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar was no exception. Some of its most memorable, which is to say emotionally affecting stories, had late December air dates. The Rasmussen Matter, a favorite of Johnny Dollar biographer John Abbott that I've written about previously, is a key example, but it's not the only one.

Currently, WAMU's old-time radio showcase The Big Broadcast is presenting The Nick Shurn Matter, a five-part serial that originally aired between the 19th and 23rd of December in 1955. Though it was early in Bob Bailey's time as Johnny Dollar, it typified the qualities that placed that period of the show among of the best loved in the history of radio. Not only does it offer a winding plot and colorful characters but also a central character who was equal parts urbane and humane. 

That second quality always seemed especially prevalent in the Christmas stories during Bailey's run. No matter how many troubling turns a case  might take, his version of Johnny Dollar never gave in to cynicism. He may have been hard on the outside but there was no doubt that his heart was in the right place. And in that way, the Christmas stories exemplify Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar - especially in the Bob Bailey/Jack Johnstone era - hard on the outside but with their heart absolutely in the right place. Merry Christmas!

Conventional Speaking

This past week I spent some time at the Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention. While I enjoyed browsing the dealer room and was tempted to spend some money getting my picture taken in a replica of the TARDIS from Doctor Who, my main purpose for coming was to interview radio historian Jim Widner. Though we had a hard time finding a quiet(-ish) place to talk, we ultimately had a great chat not just about Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar but also the later years of network radio. Not surprisingly, Bob Bailey's portrayal of the title character was a central topic as seen in this brief clip.

Voices from the Past

One of the challenges in making a film about a program that ended over 50 years ago is that the key participants are for the most part no longer with us. In the case of Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, that list includes Jack Johnstone, Virginia Gregg and Bob Bailey to name just a few. Thankfully, as befits key players of the radio medium, many of these individuals can still offer their insights thanks to the generation of old-time radio enthusiasts who were able to interview them before they passed away. In particular, researcher John Dunning's interview with Jack Johnstone gives a fascinating glimpse into the process of making radio drama, especially in the period when the distance between the potential of the medium and the networks' apparent regard for it could hardly have been wider. Sadly, there don't appear to be any interviews with Bob Bailey, doubtless because of the stroke he suffered in the 1970s, but Dunning's conversation with Bailey's daughter, Roberta Goodwin, is equal parts fascinating and heartbreaking as she recounts both good times and bad with her father. In a way, these interviews are themselves a vindication of the radio medium - unforgettable stories brought to life in your mind thanks to the power of the human voice.