Rethinking a Golden Age

Like many fans of old-time radio, I always tended to think of the golden age of radio as a single era. As I've been researching a film project about the end of that period, an intriguing book by radio historian Jim Cox entitled Say Goodnight Gracie: The Last Years of Network Radio has made me realize how important seeing radio's heyday as a series of eras within the larger era is to understanding the development of old-time radio. More specifically, it helped me appreciate how various external factors impacted the development of some of its best loved programs, especially in the 1950s.

Though radio was still the dominant medium at the start of the decade,  television was starting to erode the mass audience for whom radio had been the primary form of entertainment. As the 1950s went on, many long-running radio shows ended, including icons like The Shadow. Some programs found second lives on television. Some programs, like the soap opera The Guiding Light, co-existed in both TV and radio for a time. The majority of shows simply vanished. Much of this was driven by the sponsors, who once supported the lion's share of radio programming, deciding that television was where they wanted to put their resources. And though many classic shows suffered as a result, there was also a curious, and in some ways beneficial, flip-side to that shift.

Though both audience sizes and sponsor support for radio programming were declining, there was still a substantial audience for the networks to serve. More to the point, there was airtime that these networks needed to fill and, as much as possible, fill cheaply. Those factors turned out to be a genuine boon for radio drama. Unlike the star-driven music and variety programs which required large (i.e. expensive) casts and orchestras, dramas could be made for a fraction of the cost. Cox cites the average weekly production cost of a variety program as $40,000, whereas a detective series might only cost $4000-$7000. In contrast to the reality/competition driven network line-ups of today, the economics of broadcasting in the 1950s actually favored scripted drama.

It wasn't just economics, though, that benefited radio drama. By the middle of the decade, the audience that was still loyal to radio drama was also a more discerning audience that desired more substantive story-telling of the kind offered by writer-driven programs like Gunsmoke and X Minus One. This was the environment into which actor Bob Bailey and writer/director/producer Jack Johnstone stepped in 1955 when the mystery series Yours Truly Johnny Dollar began its year-long run of character-driven long-form narratives that ultimately led to it becoming the very last continuing drama of radio's golden age. That the same factors that ultimately doomed radio-drama in America were also a factor in some of its greatest shows is the sort of irony that would have been very much appreciated by Matt Dillon, Johnny Dollar and the other well-drawn characters that made old-time radio's final decade in many ways its finest decade.

Anger As a Renewable Resource

Last night, I commented online that the capture of the Boston bombing suspect was a good thing, because it meant we could forget about the actual victims. This prompted a friend to take me to task for what they felt was an ugly display of pessimism. Rather than offending me, this made me consider why I write what I do. While I don't generally set out to offend friends (or any sensible person), the truth is that there are times when saying things that border on indecency feels like the only humanly decent reaction. I once wrote that the reason I'm always trying to be funny is because the alternative is to be angry all the time. Recent events have led me to concede that I'm not as funny as I'd like to think I am and I'm usually angrier than I should be. Now, if only that energy could be harnessed, dependency on crude oil and coal would plummet.

Linguistic Boners

Like many who've had an embarrassing moment in junior high-school when asked to do a math problem at the front of the classroom, I understand why the word "boner" is often used to refer to a mistake. Many other pejorative terms, though, leave me scratching my head (hello nurse). For instance, why do people insist on using the expression "jerk off" as an insult? We're talking about something that gives a great many people a great deal of pleasure. For that matter, the same question should be asked of the word "cocksucker". Let's face it, anyone who doesn't equate that word with pleasure has never had direct experience with anyone who fits that description (a description I mean as anything but a negative). Surely, that's their loss, but it needn't be anyone else's.

It Was a Little Hot to Have Cheese with My Whine

Let me preface this by acknowledging that what I'm about to write falls squarely under the heading of first-world problems. With that said, I am a big believer that, if one holds a job that has a very clear-cut description but can't fulfill key elements of that description, you might be in the wrong line of work.

My understanding of the term "professional driver" is that it refers to an individual who is paid not only to get me from point A to point B but also to know how to get to said point B or at least its general vicinity given the address. While I appreciate that they may need some guidance within my neighborhood, said "professional driver" should not need me to tell them which exits/roads to take to get to my neighborhood, especially when I just got off the plane from a transatlantic flight.

This sentiment - bordering on resentment - was very deeply felt the other day due to the combination of starting that day at the equivalent of 10 pm, spending virtually all of the subsequent 16 hours in either an airport or an airplane. Going from that to Washington DC traffic in a car whose air-conditioning was blowing hot air while the outside temperature was around 80 degrees was sufficient to curdle any vestiges of the milk of human kindness within me.

I'm confident the air-conditioning will be fixed. As far as the driver's more fundamental issue, that's anyone's guess.

Occam's Bowie

I felt compelled to wait before writing about the latest David Bowie album not because I didn't think it was good but rather because I think it may be among his great ones and that's a claim you don't make without taking some time to ponder it. Depending on what denomination of Bowie-ism you practice, The Next Day is his best since either Let's Dance or Scary Monsters. What's most intriguing, though, is the reason why.

Part of it is the songs, which are some of the most consistently good of Bowie's whole career. However, what ultimately makes The Next Day so good is that it's a true return to Bowie's approach of remaking pop music genres in his own image. In this case he's embraced the fact that "Bowie" has become a genre in its right.

To some extent this was true of his other post-millennium albums, Heathen and Reality, both of which had some great moments. With a decade's hindsight - and The Next Day as a point of comparison - they seem to have been so focused on proving that the "Bowie" genre was worth embracing that they couldn't transcend it. The difference with The Next Day is that, having proven the Bowie genre's worth, the 21st century model of David Bowie has opted to run with it as far and as fast as he can. Your mileage may vary but I think this is one for the long run.