Detective drama · NBC / CBS
The Adventures of Philip Marlowe
June 12, 1947 – September 15, 1951 · 124 broadcasts
Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe -- the cynical, incorruptible private eye of the Los Angeles night -- came to radio twice. In the summer of 1947, NBC tried him out with film star Van Heflin in a short Tuesday run filling in for Bob Hope; Chandler judged the scripts flat, and the experiment ended that September. The show found its voice a year later on CBS, where Gerald Mohr's gravelly, sardonic delivery made Marlowe one of radio's definitive tough guys. From September 1948 into 1950 -- with a final summer season in 1951 -- Mohr walked the mean streets through a weekly parade of blackmailers, gold-diggers, missing heirs and beautiful liars, narrating each half-hour case in the first person with a wisecrack always ready and a beating never far off. Produced and directed by Norman Macdonnell (soon to make his name on Gunsmoke), with music by Richard Aurandt and announcer Roy Rowan, the series leaned on the CBS stock company -- Jeff Corey, Howard McNear, Parley Baer, Virginia Gregg, Lawrence Dobkin and more -- and, remarkably for a program that ran largely without a sponsor, by 1949 was said to have the largest audience in radio. Harder-boiled than most of its detective-drama rivals, it remains the benchmark for Marlowe on the air.
Collection status:
107 of 124 held (86% complete)
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Episode Spine
Grouped by year. Jump to the full list below, or open a season on its own page.
1947
The series premiere -- Van Heflin's NBC debut as Marlowe, drawn from Chandler's 'Red Wind' -- turns a string of forty-one matched pearls with a diamond clasp into a motive for murder on a hot, wind-blown L.A. night.
June 24, 1947
Pitt 13
A trumpet player billed as 'King Leopoldi' is murdered, and Marlowe wades through a run of further killings to learn who wanted the bandleader dead.
July 15, 1947
The Sandman
July 22, 1947
Gold Fish
July 29, 1947
Pulled into a tangle of threats and blackmail, Marlowe traces the death of a shabby fellow investigator and a $50,000 shakedown back to a scheming gold-digger.
1948
Gerald Mohr takes over as Marlowe for the CBS premiere -- a fresh staging of the 'Red Wind' story, thick with dames, gunplay and an old double-cross.
Marlowe searches for a woman who has vanished rather than face a decision about leaving her husband.
A paid weekend in Malibu curdles into danger as Marlowe is drawn among betting debts, a red-headed 'Dragon Lady,' and a baffling man in a Panama hat.
Three heirs, a $300,000 estate and a map maroon Marlowe on a bizarre island -- livestock, a killing and all -- to untangle an eccentric's will.
A $50 retainer and a heart-shaped locket lead Marlowe from an apparent suicide to a buried secret worth killing over.
November 7, 1948
The Flaming Angel
November 14, 1948
The Silent Partner
November 21, 1948
The Perfect Secretary
An embezzlement case at a construction firm -- and $60,000 gone -- slides into murder when Marlowe's client would rather not involve the police.
December 5, 1948
The Unhappy Medium
December 12, 1948
The Jade Teardrop
December 19, 1948
The Three Wiseguys
Six hours before a New Year's Eve wedding, Marlowe collides with an escaped convict, a slot-machine racketeer and the two women in the fugitive's life.
1949
An inventor dies in an explosion aboard his own yacht, and Marlowe sets out to put a name to the killer.
Driving through a coastal storm to a new client, Marlowe takes on the search for the missing Julia Perry -- and runs headlong into a murder, a suicide and a twist ending.
A dying man's cryptic scrawl, a jade figurine and a string of killings put Marlowe on the trail of a counterfeiting ring.
Sent to catch a blackmailer, Marlowe turns up a badly beaten pretty boy, a sultry con-woman and a man who proved an easy mark for murder.
A weak-hearted man, a phone number jotted on a register receipt and a body clear across town seem unrelated -- until Marlowe finds the thread that binds them.
On the trail of the proceeds of a bank job, Marlowe lands in tiny Lonesome, Arizona, where a corpse won't stay dead and a silenced pistol dooms a pair of big-city crooks.
February 19, 1949
The Flying Trapeze
February 26, 1949
The Big Mistake
A missing woman, a gambler shot dead and a vanished $25,000 trust fund draw Marlowe into a night of secrets and shadows.
A woman hires Marlowe for her scavenger hunt and is shot dead, turning a party game into a lethal chase through the city streets.
Identical twin pianists, $30,000 and a corpse leave Marlowe to sort the deadly sister from the harmless one.
A simple damage suit over a Hollywood gossip escalates into blackmail and murder, with a red-headed woman and an ambitious ghost-writer at the heart of it.
Summoned to a storm-lashed island to hear a supposedly dead man read out his own will, six heirs become the mark of a killer's cruel prank.
Marlowe is hired to learn why a muscle-bound goon is shadowing Eddie Mallet -- too late to keep Eddie off a concrete floor.
Marlowe is hired to find out why a burlesque dancer known as 'The Heat Wave' performs behind a golden mask, and murder crashes the act.
The hunt for a fabled Hawaiian relic draws Marlowe into intrigue and murder -- and to a dead man bearing his own name in a Honolulu lily pond.
Through heavy L.A. fog, Marlowe searches for a suicidal young woman and her strange sister, stumbling onto two killings along the way.
A daredevil motorcycle 'wall of death' act and a nervous millionaire's daughter put Marlowe in the path of murder at seventy miles an hour.
A single gambler's IOU means fortune, freedom or death to three men, and Marlowe is hired to find it before the girl in the cottage is killed.
On the San Pedro waterfront, a hot-tempered ex-con's grudge against a boat owner rises to murder as surely as the tide.
A gray sedan and a single black cuff link lead Marlowe from a blackmail scheme straight into a killing.
Marlowe is hired to run down a thief working a Mexican diamond mine.
Thirty missing rubies -- and a soft-eyed woman with an accent and a job to do -- draw Marlowe toward murder.
A routine hunt for a rich girl's fiance leads Marlowe to a silent, haunted house and a corpse that refuses to stay put.
Hired to keep a man alive, Marlowe fails badly and takes a bullet himself when a chuckling gunman called 'The Hippo' walks in.
A dude-ranch holiday turns to Western-style murder -- by horseshoe -- amid blackmail, silks and stolen emeralds.
July 9, 1949
The Quiet Number
An odd piece of jewelry tied to the local racetrack sends Marlowe past a burglar, a bookie and a big shot to a body.
A woman who hates the water takes a boat trip in old Mexico, and Marlowe absorbs a beating as an unseen victim is murdered.
A reformed forger dumps a beautiful corpse on Marlowe's bed and pleads for help, launching a case of lies and pistol-whippings.
The theft of a prized Indian bowl and the murder of Jimmy Brown Bear send Marlowe on the warpath, with a glamorous Apache woman in the mix.
A composer's death puts Marlowe on the scent of a blackmailer, with only a velvet matchbook to guide him.
A trial witness seems a shade too eager to testify, and Marlowe digs out the real murderer.
Hired to find a missing old-timer, Marlowe follows a two-named drifter from Montana into a Los Angeles murder.
A Nebraska schoolteacher chasing Hollywood glamour lands in serious trouble, and a single photograph helps Marlowe set things right.
A 15th-century tapestry and a half-faced stranger pull Marlowe into a deadly contest among rival collectors.
The murder of a cartoonist is no laughing matter, as two violent deaths clear the way for a third person's killing.
A traffic wreck outside his office pulls Marlowe into a double murder over $75,000 in gems and a waterfront 'mermaid.'
A beautiful amnesiac comes to Marlowe for help and is pushed to her death from his office window.
A washed-up wrestler, an alley quick-change artist and a scheming girl are all caught in a strangle hold over $100,000.
A search for a woman in black leads Marlowe through a roadside-inn murder, a warehouse gunfight and a girl already in the morgue.
A beautiful woman with cold green eyes and a laugh that never moves her lips lures Marlowe into danger.
A shattered body, a midnight shooting on a carousel and two young lovers in flight all trace back to one man's scheming.
November 19, 1949
The Sweet Thing
A parachute act's stunt turns fatal when a chute fails -- in the celebrated episode where Gracie Allen drops by to ask Marlowe to find George Burns a singing spot on the air.
A newsboy's plea to find his missing uncle takes Marlowe from a Hollywood street corner into a household seething with hate and murder.
A morning quarrel over a chicken grows into a case that ends on a gray dawn with a little wishbone snapped in two.
December 17, 1949
The Lowest Bid
December 24, 1949
Carol's Christmas
As the New Year's clock strikes twelve, Marlowe recounts two murders to a kindly, white-haired old lady.
1950
A loan-shark hunt introduces Marlowe to three men, each carrying a torch for a woman who has been dead two days.
Kidnapped and driven toward Mexico, Marlowe crosses paths with an escaped convict holed up in a deserted farmhouse.
An asylum escapee draws Marlowe down a murderous path that dead-ends in a storeroom.
A champion woman pistol shot, and a victim killed with one precise round, await Marlowe on this case.
Marlowe returns, distinctly unwelcome, to Bay City to clear a friend framed for murder.
Stranded by a blizzard, Marlowe shelters at an inn whose owners turn out to be kin to a man he had lately gunned down.
Ladies' night at a Turkish bath draws Marlowe into blackmail and a body in a bedroom.
A downtown traffic accident and a woman chemist's deathbed confession lead Marlowe to an industrial theft.
A murderous 'British butler' who is really a killer chimpanzee snarls a case of a phony English lord and a blonde corpse -- in the broadcast that saw Mohr named radio's best actor.
A silk dealer is found strangled, and Marlowe's suspicions settle on a hard-boiled woman in slacks.
Hours before his wedding, a groom hires Marlowe to trace his vanished bride, opening onto a nightclub killing, big money and a double-cross.
A missing sword turns up through a man's back, and an albino Siamese cat hints at the blade's true worth.
With police closing in on a young man trapped on a roof, Marlowe recounts in flashback the murder and robbery that put him there.
A valuable platinum watch becomes a deadly commission -- in the lone episode where William Conrad, not Gerald Mohr, plays Marlowe.
Murder at a boxer's training camp centers on a solid-gold eagle lying near the beaten body.
A ballerina begs Marlowe for help and dances straight into murder, with a high-collared cape and a sliver of glass among the clues.
A stolen $50,000 brooch and two murders send Marlowe hunting for guilt along the waterfront.
Chip O'Brien proves an elusive quarry, and Marlowe's search turns up $110,000 in stolen jewels and a racketeer called the 'Big Wheel.'
The chase for a priceless historic cloak in Honolulu produces two men each claiming to be Marlowe, one of them knifed to death in an ornamental pond.
A lawsuit over a stolen chemical formula turns deadly when a key witness against a gangster never lives to testify.
Laid up with a broken leg, Marlowe works a $50,000 swindle without ever leaving his hospital bed.
Slipped a mickey while hunting a second-story man, Marlowe chases a stolen jeweled tiara and a lasting double-cross.
Shadowing a man aboard a San Francisco-bound train, Marlowe acquires a corpse and is forced to leap from the moving car.
Hired to carry a golden cobra to Chicago, Marlowe finds a real snake -- and real danger -- packed into the job.
A woman who looks every inch a killer hires Marlowe, and an ice-pick corpse leads him to the truth.
Hired to see a man safely to his destination, Marlowe is left with a dead client and a lovesick Kansas girl muddying the case.
At a Spanish castle in northern California, Marlowe squares off against the legend of 'Peter the Cruel' and his eight-foot iron coffin.
A dying old man asks Marlowe to find his son, Jack Schiller -- a search that proves anything but simple.
A police sergeant's tip about a brunette named Helen Lawton -- an old flame of Marlowe's -- draws the detective into a fresh case.
A man stands trial for a father's murder he did not commit, and Marlowe unravels a web of blackmail to clear him.
As Vincent Calloway is tried for murdering his hated father, Marlowe pushes past the obvious to the real killer.
An alley beating, a lovely young woman and the scars of a terrible fire draw a tired Marlowe into a murky case.
The murdered coin collector who hired Marlowe leaves a single lead behind -- a rare 1864 Confederate half-dollar valued at $37,000.
A dead old man in a flophouse, a wood-carving drunk and a gold-digging woman lead Marlowe to a killer's one soft spot.
Five masks conceal greed, cowardice, cruelty and deceit -- but it is the fifth that finally unmasks a murderer.
A would-be hit-and-run, a warehouse giant and a treacherous blonde nearly finish Marlowe -- all for a client who cannot pay a cent.
A florist-shop killing, a self-deluding fortune-teller and a deadly scuffle beside a busy merry-go-round all hinge on one white carnation.
A skid-row 'suicide' proves to be murder, tied to a frightened cobbler, a hard-boiled agent's tears and a woman's secret leather-bound book.
1951
Marlowe heads to Long Beach and finds a shooting gallery -- and murder -- along the rainbow pier.
Marlowe's plan for a lazy Saturday collapses when an elderly woman is swindled by a suspiciously helpful driver -- and a gun ends up in his ribs.
A redhead named Marney Carr approaches Marlowe in a bar and then disappears, plunging him into a murder case.
A tangle on his shared telephone line pulls Marlowe from home into a case of murder, a burglar and the city library.
An elderly man hires Marlowe to find his missing wife, Amy Harper -- the woman who was his whole life.
August 11, 1951
Friday's Child
A burlesque house and skid row set the stage as Marlowe works a case of wine, women and murder.
Already engaged elsewhere, Marlowe agrees to help a lovely young woman whose flock of sheep comes with a flock of trouble.
A woman deep in gambling debt schemes to pawn her insured jewelry behind her husband's back, and Marlowe is drawn into the plan.
In the series finale, a strange tapping sound leads Marlowe to a shooting and a houseful of people all searching for something.
The Story
Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe -- the cynical, incorruptible private eye of the Los Angeles night -- came to radio twice. In the summer of 1947, NBC tried him out with film star Van Heflin in a short Tuesday run filling in for Bob Hope; Chandler judged the scripts flat, and the experiment ended that September. The show found its voice a year later on CBS, where Gerald Mohr's gravelly, sardonic delivery made Marlowe one of radio's definitive tough guys. From September 1948 into 1950 -- with a final summer season in 1951 -- Mohr walked the mean streets through a weekly parade of blackmailers, gold-diggers, missing heirs and beautiful liars, narrating each half-hour case in the first person with a wisecrack always ready and a beating never far off. Produced and directed by Norman Macdonnell (soon to make his name on Gunsmoke), with music by Richard Aurandt and announcer Roy Rowan, the series leaned on the CBS stock company -- Jeff Corey, Howard McNear, Parley Baer, Virginia Gregg, Lawrence Dobkin and more -- and, remarkably for a program that ran largely without a sponsor, by 1949 was said to have the largest audience in radio. Harder-boiled than most of its detective-drama rivals, it remains the benchmark for Marlowe on the air.
Full story — coming soon while it's being curated.
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