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Title: The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas CD Collection 1 by Rod Serling, Dennis Etchison, Stacy Keach, Tim Kazurinsky, Lou Diamond Phillips, Jane Seymour, James Keach, Jim Caviezel ISBN: 1-59171-058-8 Publisher: Falcon Picture Group Pub. Date: 26 August, 2002 Format: Audio CD Volumes: 4 List Price(USD): $27.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 2.67 (3 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: "The Ads Kill It"
Comment: The stories are done well enough but the frequent, repetative commercials just kill the experience of the audio tapes. I turely resented having to sit through them and, as much as I love the Twilight Zione, I will not buy any more from this series beause of them.
Rating: 1
Summary: A Complete Waste
Comment: When word got out that "The Twilight Zone" would make its move to radio with Stacy Keach filling in for Rod Serling as
host, the response was generally on the order of, 'Uh,
how can you go from TV back to radio? And why
Twilight Zone to make the regression?' Well, the producers
of the series obviously saw no problem with it...they
pay CBS their fees, get the product on the shelves,
and collect the cash from the sales.
This is, unfortunately, another example of an
over-commercialised, slapdash attempt to revive
and sequelize a classic masterwork....sort of like
taking Shakespeare and cutting out all the middle-English
so everyone on the planet can understand it in "plain"
English. Bad example...and call me a mindless dolt
for using it. But that's exactly what's happening
with these Twilight Zone radio dramas.
The producers hooked Dennis Etchison, an excellent
writer, to expand and water-down the great old stories
of Rod Serling (and yes, the stories of Richard Matheson,
Chuck Beaumont, and other writers are going to be
adapted for radio as well, sans a few segments
that don't work well on radio including Matheson's
near-silent "The Invaders" and Serling's highly visual
"Eye of the Beholder"). Sadly, it is all too apparent
that Etchison knows, deep down, that the work of
the old writers can't be topped. For a show like
"The Twilight Zone", whose domain was almost like
a world parallel to our own, with the entire universe
as its breeding ground,
to take its stories and bring them back to the mundane and the reality-grounded
as radio programs is pointless. These first two sets
really come off as no more than bland recitations of
old stories that fans know inside and out from the
original TV versions.
The actors for the first series of eight dramas
include Jim Caviezel, Lou Diamond Phillips, Tim
Kazurinsky, Jane Seymour, James Keach, Blair Underwood,
Kim Fields, Chris MacDonald, and Ed Begley Jr.
Of these, only Jane Seymour does a credible job
as star of Serling's episode "The Lateness of the Hour"
(which originally starred the late Inger Stevens).
Tim Kazurinsky and Lou Diamond Phillips do earn
their paychecks with fairly humorous performances
in episodes "Mr. Dingle the Strong" (originally
starring Burgess Meredith) and "A Kind of Stopwatch",
respectively. The rest of the actors quite obviously
have no clue as to what they were doing, reciting
all their lines as if read directly from a cue card
(which in fact is probably what they did!)
In the role of ersatz-Rod Serling, the narrator,
Stacy Keach pretty much mails in his performance.
His readings of the intro/closings are but
lacking the gripping sincerity and meaning that
Rod always imparted to each and every narration.
Further hampering the dramas is the inclusion
of sponsor commercials, which pop up several
times. The CD versions are all one continuous
42-minute track with no option of fast-forwarding
through the commercials unless done manually.
In short, this new radio series does not yet offer
anything that the original series didn't. The
days of good ol' radio are gone, never to return.
But there are many more of these dramas still yet to
be released. Collections 3 and 4 have already
been released and do offer some nice sound
effects and a fabulous performance by Morgan
Brittany in episode "The Passersby". So perhaps
there's hope. Brittany is the first actor who
appeared in the TV series, to star in these dramas,
and more celebrities are reportedly going to
appear in future installments. Stay tuned...but
keep the volume on low until the producers come
full circle and prove their worthiness to carry
Rod Serling's gauntlet.
Rating: 4
Summary: You have to give these guys an "E" for effort!
Comment: Okay, So I was all geared to be disappointed with this whole package. And, unfortunately, the producers picked the weakest of the four stories to begin the set. The actor in "A Hundred Yards Over the Rim" sounds like he just walked out of some ivy league acting school and not like a hardened pioneer who has been wandering through the desert for months on end.
The next story, "The Lateness of the Hour," is ruined by a too-long explanation of the "daughter" being a robot at the end. Does it take that much explanation for today's "dumbed-down" society? I hope not.
But the next two shows blew me out of the water. Lou Diamond Phillips is superb in "A Kind of Stopwatch." His over-the-top performance is one of the greatest I've ever heard in any radio drama. Then "Mr. Dingle, the Strong" followed and it was wonderful, too.
Another plus is the original Twilight Zone soundtrack music which is used and other pains that are taken to maintain the flavor of the original classic TV series. I would suggest buying one collection and seeing if you like it before buying the second.
This is not everyone's cup of tea, but the people who put these dramas together did the best they could and it's well worth a listen.
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Title: The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas CD Collection 2 by Rod Serling, Dennis Etchison, Stacy Keach, Blair Underwood, Ed Begley Jr., Kim Fields, Chris McDonald ISBN: 159171060X Publisher: Falcon Picture Group Pub. Date: 26 August, 2002 List Price(USD): $27.99 |
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Title: The best of Old-Time Radio Starring Orson Welles by Radio Spirits ISBN: 1570193576 Publisher: Radio Spirits, Inc. Pub. Date: 01 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $39.98 |
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Title: Alfred Hitchcock by Radio Spirits ISBN: 1570192847 Publisher: Radio Spirits, Inc. Pub. Date: 01 September, 2000 List Price(USD): $39.98 |
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Title:Terminator 3 - Rise of the Machines (Widescreen Edition) ASIN: B00005JM0B Publisher: Warner Home Video Pub. Date: 11 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $29.95 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $17.97 |
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Title:Pirates of the Caribbean - The Curse of the Black Pearl ASIN: B00005JM5E Publisher: Buena Vista Home Vid Pub. Date: 02 December, 2003 List Price(USD): $29.99 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $17.99 |
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