[rollei_list] Re: ADMIN: I'm Out of the Loop
----- Original Message ----- From: "Marc James Small" <marcsmall@xxxxxxxxxxx> 
To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, November 06, 2009 11:07 AM
Subject: [rollei_list] ADMIN: I'm Out of the Loop


I'll be on duty at Fort Pickett for 48
hours.  Back Sunday PM sometime.  You all
behave!  Eric and Richard can handle things in my
absence, if we can peel Richard away from
listening to "The Whistler" reruns <he grins> .

And who played Doc on the radio "Gunsmoke"?

Marc James Small
Rollei List Owner
Howard McNear, who was a prolific radio actor. The radio cast was: 
Matt Dillon; William Conrad
Chester Proudfoot; Parley Baer
Kitty: Georgia Ellis
Announcer for most of the series was George Walsh. Walsh continued as a staffer at KNX (CBS O&O in Los Angeles) when it became mostly all-news, being the overnight news reader. What a come down and I suspect he did it to get his retirement. Walsh was also the spokesman for the Forrest Service in its Smokey Bear commercials. All of the principles had long and varied radio careers, but like so many radio actors, did not fare well in TV or movies. William Conrad did have some movie roles but mostly as greasy heavies, parts which did not exploit his fine acting ability. There is a pretty large file of Gunsmoke programs on http://www.archive.org including a couple of rehearsal shows. In programs which featured John Dehner Conrad can often be heard calling out Hi John in street scenes. Dehner was English and a very fine actor who mostly played demented heavies in Gunsmoke. His ability is made explicit is the programs Frontier Gentleman and the famous Have Gun Will Travel. He had the looks to play it on TV but Richard Boone (also a radio actor) was chosen instead. The CBS radio studio at 6121 Sunset, where these programs originated, is still standing but CBS moved both radio and TV out some time ago. The radio studios were renovated and converted to recording studios for Columbia Records about 1961, the large auditorium studios were converted to TV use for the local CBS O&O. I have no idea of what is there, if anything, now. I have been in this building many times including a couple of times when I was a kid and we went to radio shows, but was never in the studios used for Gunsmoke, etc. They had been converted into a computer center at the time and the chief engineer of KNX could not get into them. There are pictures of the studio on the Los Angeles Public Library web site. http://www.lapl.org Most of these were taken at the time the studio was first built. There are also pictures of the "Lux Radio Theater" a couple of blocks away on Vine street. This was originally, and is once again, the Vine Street Theater, a legit house. 

--
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx


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