Danger on the Air *** (1938, Nan Grey, Donald Woods, Jed Prouty, Berton Churchill, William Lundigan) – Classic Movie Review 12,161

Nan Grey stars as radio advertising executive Steenie MacCorkle, suspected of murdering her client, in the 1938 American mystery film Danger on the Air.

Director Otis Garrett’s 1938 black and white thriller Danger on the Air is based on The Crime Club novel Death Catches Up with Mr Kluck by Xantippe, and stars Nan Grey, Donald Woods, Jed Prouty, Berton Churchill and William Lundigan.

Members of the wireless audience are the witnesses when the much-disliked womanising show sponsor Caesar Kluck (Berton Churchill) is murdered, in this amusing little Crime Club mystery thriller with a good cast of energetic actors to pump it across.

Danger on the Air is one of the best of the Universal Pictures studios Crime Club series, with an impressive list of suspects and a nice star in Nan Grey as radio advertising executive Steenie MacCorkle, suspected of murdering her soda magnate client Caesar Kluck.

The cast are Nan Grey as Steenie MacCorkle, Donald Woods as Benjamin Franklin Butts, Jed Prouty as Radio Company Boss Harry Jones, Berton Churchill as Caesar Kluck, William Lundigan as Radio Announcer Dave Chapman, Richard ‘Skeets’ Gallagher as Ad Company Man Finney Fish, Edward Van Sloan as Charlatan Dr. Leonard Sylvester, George Meeker as Undercover FCC Man Tuttle, Frank Milan as Alexander MacCorkle, Lee J. Cobb as Tony Lisotti, Johnny Arthur as Aiken, Peter Lind Hayes as Call Boy and Aspiring Performer Harry Lake, Louise Stanley as Maria Lisotti, Eloise Rawitzer as Miss Mildred Bello, Joe Downing as Gangster Joe Carney, Don Brodie, Tom Kennedy, Harry Strang, Dick Rich, and Jack Richardson.

How is this for a quick turnaround? Production began in mid May 1938 and it was released on 1 July 1938.

In 1937, Universal Pictures made a deal with the Crime Club, publishers of whodunits, allowing it to select up to four of its books annually for production as B-pictures. The Lady in the Morgue is the third in Universal’s Crime Club mystery series of 11 films between 1937 and 1939. The first is The Westland Case, based on the Jonathan Latimer novel Headed for a Hearse (1937), followed by The Black Doll (1938), The Lady in the Morgue (1938), Danger on the Air (1938), The Last Express (1938), The Last Warning (1938), Mystery of the White Room (1939), and The Witness Vanishes (1939).

The Crime Club series was made at a unit headed by producer Irving Starr, with former film editor Otis Garrett often directing.

A new management has taken over troubled studio Universal Pictures after the costly production of Show Boat (1936) and the Crime Club deal is an example of its willingness to make creative marketing tie-ins.

Danger on the Air is directed by Otis Garrett, runs 70 minutes, is made by Crime Club Productions Inc, is released by Universal Pictures, is written by Betty Laidlaw and Robert Lively, is shot in black and white by Stanley Cortez, is produced by Irving Starr, is scored by Hans J Salter, and is designed by Jack Otterson.

© Derek Winnert 2022 Classic Movie Review 12,161

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