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Academy Award Theater

March 30, 1946 – December 18, 1946 · 39 broadcasts

Academy Award Theater was CBS's prestige film-adaptation anthology of 1946, sponsored by the E.R. Squibb pharmaceutical house, which paid the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the right to use its name. The premise was simple and expensive: each week a great motion picture was restaged as a half-hour radio play, and every cast had to include at least one Oscar-winning or Oscar-nominated performer. Where the studios would allow it, the film's own star reprised the screen role -- Bette Davis in Jezebel, Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon, Henry Fonda in Young Mr. Lincoln, Ronald Colman in Lost Horizon, Paul Muni in The Story of Louis Pasteur -- but many weeks recast the part for radio, and one broadcast, Portrait of Jennie, adapted a novel whose film had not yet been made. Produced and directed by Dee Englebach, scripted by Frank Wilson, scored by Leith Stevens and announced by Hugh Brundage, the series ran 39 weeks, from Jezebel on March 30 to Lost Angel on December 18, 1946. It was lavish and short-lived: with stars costing about $4,000 a week plus the Academy's fee, and a crowded field of look-alike movie-adaptation shows draining the supply of scripts, Squibb pulled the plug after a single season. What survives is a near-complete run of Hollywood's biggest names condensing their finest pictures into thirty minutes.

Collection status: 39 of 39 held (100% complete)
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Episode Spine

1946

March 30, 1946 Jezebel Listen (FLAC)
Bette Davis reprises her Oscar-winning role as Julie Marsden, the willful antebellum New Orleans belle whose pride and temper drive away the man she loves. The series' first broadcast, with Academy president Jean Hersholt welcoming sponsor Squibb.
April 6, 1946 Kitty Foyle Listen (FLAC)
A working-class Philadelphia secretary is caught between a wealthy Main Line married man and a plain-living young doctor. Ginger Rogers plays the role that won her the Academy Award.
April 13, 1946 The Story of Louis Pasteur Listen (FLAC)
Paul Muni reprises his Oscar-winning role as the French scientist who battles the medical establishment's ignorance to prove his theories, develop pasteurization and create the first rabies vaccine.
April 20, 1946 The Great McGinty Listen (FLAC)
A drifter rises from a bought repeat-voter to reform governor on a corrupt political machine, then ruins himself the one time he decides to go straight. Brian Donlevy plays his 1940 film role in Preston Sturges's satire.
April 27, 1946 Snow White Listen (FLAC)
A radio staging of the Disney fairy tale of the fugitive princess sheltered by seven dwarfs while she hides from her murderous stepmother, carrying over the film's songs.
May 4, 1946 Stagecoach Listen (FLAC)
Strangers thrown together on a perilous stage journey across Apache country reveal their true selves, among them an escaped outlaw and a dance-hall girl who fall in love. Claire Trevor and Randolph Scott star.
May 11, 1946 If I Were King Listen (FLAC)
In the starving, besieged Paris of Louis XI, the poet and rogue Francois Villon is plucked from the gutter and raised overnight to high office. Ronald Colman stars.
May 18, 1946 My Sister Eileen Listen (FLAC)
Two sisters newly arrived from Ohio -- aspiring writer Ruth and would-be actress Eileen -- chase their ambitions from a chaotic Greenwich Village basement apartment. Rosalind Russell (in her Oscar-nominated role) and Janet Blair reprise their screen parts.
May 25, 1946 The Informer Listen (FLAC)
In Dublin during the Irish revolt, a slow-witted man betrays a comrade to the occupying authorities for a fistful of money, then is hunted by his own people and his own conscience. Victor McLaglen plays his Oscar-winning role.
June 1, 1946 Arise, My Love Listen (FLAC)
An American flier and a girl reporter fall in love in Europe as the Spanish Civil War ends and a second world war begins. Ray Milland stars in the comedy-drama.
June 8, 1946 Ruggles Of Red Gap Listen (FLAC)
A very correct English valet, lost in a poker game to a rough Washington-state couple, is carried off to the American frontier where he discovers a country with no masters. Charles Laughton and Charlie Ruggles reprise their film roles.
June 15, 1946 The Pride of The Marines Listen (FLAC)
A Marine blinded in combat at Guadalcanal struggles against bitterness to accept his wound and return to the woman waiting for him. John Garfield stars.
June 22, 1946 Front Page Listen (FLAC)
Star reporter Hildy Johnson wants to quit the paper and marry, but his scheming editor Walter Burns and a sensational jailbreak keep dragging him back to the newsroom. Pat O'Brien and Adolphe Menjou play the roles they took in the 1931 film.
June 29, 1946 A Star Is Born Listen (FLAC)
A young woman climbs to Hollywood stardom just as her husband, a once-great star, drinks his way to ruin. Fredric March stars in the famous story of the studio system versus love.
July 3, 1946 The Maltese Falcon Listen (FLAC)
Private detective Sam Spade is drawn into a treacherous hunt for a priceless jeweled statuette that everyone will lie and kill for. Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor and Sydney Greenstreet reprise their screen roles.
July 10, 1946 Young Mr. Lincoln Listen (FLAC)
A raw frontier lawyer named Abraham Lincoln takes on his first great case, defending two brothers accused of murder when a mob wants them hanged. Henry Fonda plays his original film role.
July 17, 1946 Prisoner of Zenda Listen (FLAC)
An English gentleman who is the near-exact double of a kidnapped king is persuaded to impersonate him at the coronation and save the throne of Ruritania. Douglas Fairbanks Jr. and Virginia Bruce star.
July 24, 1946 Foreign Correspondent Listen (FLAC)
An American reporter sent to pre-war Europe stumbles onto a Nazi spy ring and a staged political assassination. Joseph Cotten stars in the Hitchcock thriller.
July 31, 1946 Hold Back The Dawn Listen (FLAC)
A stranded European charmer marries an American schoolteacher to slip past the immigration quota, then finds he has genuinely fallen in love with her. Olivia de Havilland reprises her film role, with Jean-Pierre Aumont.
August 7, 1946 Watch On The Rhine Listen (FLAC)
A German anti-Nazi resistance leader and his American-born wife bring the war home to her comfortable Washington family. Paul Lukas plays his Oscar-winning role.
August 14, 1946 Vivacious Lady Listen (FLAC)
A staid botany professor secretly marries a nightclub singer and cannot summon the nerve to tell his university-president father. Lana Turner stars in a radio recast; the 1938 film had starred Ginger Rogers.
August 21, 1946 Keys To The Kingdom Listen (FLAC)
A humble, unorthodox priest gives a long and difficult life to a struggling mission in China, earning little worldly reward but deep faith. Gregory Peck plays his film role.
August 28, 1946 One Sunday Afternoon Listen (MP3)
A small-town dentist looks back on the youthful rivalry and lost love that shaped his ordinary, not-so-small life. James Stewart stars.
September 4, 1946 Pinocchio Listen (FLAC)
The Disney tale of a wooden puppet who must prove himself brave, truthful and unselfish -- and resist every temptation to stray -- before he can become a real boy.
September 11, 1946 Shadow Of A Doubt Listen (FLAC)
A young woman adores her charming visiting Uncle Charlie until small clues convince her he is a wanted murderer. From Hitchcock's film; Joseph Cotten is credited as the star in the Haendiges log.
September 18, 1946 White Cliffs Of Dover Listen (MP3)
An American woman marries an English aristocrat during the First World War and gives her heart to a country that will one day claim their son in the next war. Irene Dunne reprises her screen role.
September 25, 1946 Guest in the House Listen (MP3)
A disturbed young woman taken in by her doctor's family quietly poisons their happy household with her manipulations. Anita Louise and Kirk Douglas star.
October 2, 1946 My Man Godfrey Listen (FLAC)
A society family's new butler, hired off a Depression-era city dump as a joke, proves to be far more than the tramp he appears. William Powell plays his 1936 film role. (Documented broadcast; no recording is held.)
October 9, 1946 It Happened Tomorrow Listen (FLAC)
An ambitious reporter is somehow handed tomorrow's newspaper a day early, a gift that turns to dread when it prints the story of his own death. Eddie Bracken and Ann Blyth star.
October 16, 1946 Blood On The Sun Listen (FLAC)
A crusading American newspaper editor in pre-war Tokyo uncovers a secret plan for world conquest and becomes a marked man. John Garfield stars in a radio recast; the 1945 film had starred James Cagney.
October 23, 1946 The Devil & Miss Jones Listen (FLAC)
A tyrannical department-store magnate goes undercover as a lowly clerk in his own store to root out union talk, and gets an education in being human. Charles Coburn reprises his film role, with Virginia Mayo.
October 30, 1946 Suspicion Listen (FLAC)
A shy heiress marries a charming, feckless gambler and slowly becomes convinced her husband intends to murder her. Cary Grant reprises his film role, with Ann Todd.
November 6, 1946 Cheers For Miss Bishop Listen (FLAC)
A devoted Midwestern schoolteacher gives up her own chances at love and family to shape generations of her students. Olivia de Havilland stars.
November 13, 1946 Night Train Listen (FLAC)
A British agent races to spirit a kidnapped scientist and his daughter out of Gestapo hands on the eve of war. Rex Harrison reprises his role from the film Night Train to Munich.
November 20, 1946 Brief Encounter Listen (FLAC)
A married suburban woman and a doctor meet by chance at a railway refreshment room and fall into a quiet, doomed love. Greer Garson stars in a radio version of the acclaimed British film.
November 27, 1946 Lost Horizon Listen (FLAC)
A British diplomat whose plane crashes in the mountains of Tibet is led to Shangri-La, a hidden valley of peace and near-endless life, and must decide whether to stay. Ronald Colman plays his film role.
December 4, 1946 Portrait Of Jenny Listen (FLAC)
A struggling New York painter meets a mysterious girl in the park who seems to age years between each encounter, becoming the subject of his masterwork. Adapted from Robert Nathan's novel with Oscar-winner Joan Fontaine and John Lund; the film would not appear until 1949. (Documented broadcast; no recording is held.)
December 11, 1946 Enchanted Cottage Listen (FLAC)
A disfigured war veteran and a plain, overlooked young woman marry and discover that within the walls of an old honeymoon cottage love makes each of them beautiful. Peter Lawford and Joan Lorring star.
December 18, 1946 Lost Angel Listen (FLAC)
A little girl raised from infancy as a scientific experiment by a team of scholars discovers ordinary wonder, magic and love when a hard-boiled reporter takes her under his wing. Margaret O'Brien stars, with frequent supporting player Jeff Chandler; the series' final broadcast.
The Story

Academy Award Theater was CBS's prestige film-adaptation anthology of 1946, sponsored by the E.R. Squibb pharmaceutical house, which paid the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for the right to use its name. The premise was simple and expensive: each week a great motion picture was restaged as a half-hour radio play, and every cast had to include at least one Oscar-winning or Oscar-nominated performer. Where the studios would allow it, the film's own star reprised the screen role -- Bette Davis in Jezebel, Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon, Henry Fonda in Young Mr. Lincoln, Ronald Colman in Lost Horizon, Paul Muni in The Story of Louis Pasteur -- but many weeks recast the part for radio, and one broadcast, Portrait of Jennie, adapted a novel whose film had not yet been made. Produced and directed by Dee Englebach, scripted by Frank Wilson, scored by Leith Stevens and announced by Hugh Brundage, the series ran 39 weeks, from Jezebel on March 30 to Lost Angel on December 18, 1946. It was lavish and short-lived: with stars costing about $4,000 a week plus the Academy's fee, and a crowded field of look-alike movie-adaptation shows draining the supply of scripts, Squibb pulled the plug after a single season. What survives is a near-complete run of Hollywood's biggest names condensing their finest pictures into thirty minutes.

Full story — coming soon while it's being curated.
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