Flights of Fantasy: The Unauthorized but True Story of Radio & TVs Adventures of Superman
2013 Michael J. Hayde. All Rights Reserved.
Superman and all related indicia are trademarks of and copyright DC Entertainment, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopying or recording, except for the inclusion in a review, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This version of the book may be slightly abridged from the print version.
Published in the USA by:
BearManor Media
PO Box 1129
Duncan, Oklahoma 73534-1129
www.bearmanormedia.com
ISBN 978-1-59393-344-9
Edited by Lon Davis.
Cover Design by Randy Garrett.
eBook construction by
Table of Contents
Introduction and Acknowledgments
So, when are you going to write a book about Superman?
As a writer and long-time fan of televisions original Adventures of Superman, I have had this question asked of me by family, friends and associates for twenty years. And, for most of those years, my answer was, Im not. Few fictional characters, after all, have received as much attention in print as Superman, including the very first book to focus on an old television series: Gary Grossmans Superman: Serial to Cereal in 1975.
As a child, I thrilled to TVs Superman. Having grown up during the 1960s, my visits with the Man of Steel were daily, Monday through Friday at 4:30 p.m. Our family acquired a color set when I was eight years old; Superman aired that way on Tuesdays and Thursdays the rest of the week he was in black & white. I would sit on the edge of my chair waiting for that moment when he would head to the Storeroom (whatever that was), removing either his hat or his glasses, then leap out of the window to rescue Lois, Jimmy or both, or to capture some nefarious criminals who were dumb enough to set up shop in Metropolis. Even as a child, I noticed that sometimes Clark Kent would leave his or Perry Whites office without his hat, yet somehow itd magically appear on the way to the Storeroom. Or, hed leave with a hat, but not have it during that dash down the hallway. I noticed that, whether he was coming or going, Superman nearly always flew in the same direction. And I noticed that, once in awhile, that other Lois Lane would be there, the one with the sarcastic disposition and piercing scream.
That Lois was in the older, scarier episodes, where Superman mostly scowled and threw punches that hurt. Where innocent people were tortured, women were slapped around and blackmailers were left to die on snow-capped mountains. Fortunately, those episodes didnt appear too often in the rotation. As a child, my favorite Superman was the one who smiled and seemed to enjoy himself. The one who tricked the Wrecker and Caesars ghost into confessing; who subdued a boatload of pirates single-handed; who outwitted evildoers by splitting in two or becoming invisible; who helped little children regain something theyd lost, whether it be an animal, an old coat, or eyesight; who occasionally thought about revealing his secret identity in order to save his friends, and in one glorious moment actually did it.
By the time Grossmans book had come out, Id reevaluated those scarier episodes, which now held tremendous appeal to a teenager whod recently discovered Dragnet and The Untouchables. Superman: Serial to Cereal answered a lot of questions, yet as I read and re-read it, I sensed there was more information to be uncovered. For all the (admittedly wonderful) anecdotes by cast and crew, the book contained very little in the way of production details, or even how the series moved over from radio. Indeed, there was almost nothing about Superman on radio, except that it had existed, was sponsored by Kelloggs Pep and produced by the same man who brought the Man of Steel to TV. By my late twenties, I was living in Hollywood and found previously undiscovered information at local libraries: original airdates, production dates, even hiring dates. All this led to my earliest endeavors to chronicle Superman history.
Two decades later, after having contributed several articles to a George Reeves fanzine titled The Adventures Continue, as well as single pieces for Radio Recall, Filmfax and Remember, I was certain there was nothing left for me to say until September 2007, when I made a presentation about Superman on Radio and Television for the Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention in Aberdeen, Maryland. The research I did leading up to that presentation convinced me that the one aspect of the TV series that had been almost completely overlooked its ties to the Superman radio show of 1940-51 was due for appraisal. Indeed, apart from an excellent series of booklets accompanying the official release of various episode collections, the radio show itself had been almost completely ignored by historians. What little that existed was rife with misinformation.
Its even misleading to say that there was one Superman radio series. There were, in fact, five:
A syndicated transcribed (recorded in advance), 15-minute childrens serial that was produced from February 1940 to February 1942, and sold to various markets (both domestically and internationally) during that timeframe. In its earliest broadcasts, it aired thrice weekly until May 1941, then resumed in August 1941 at five episodes per week.
A live, 15-minute childrens serial that aired Monday through Friday from August 1942 to February 1949 over the Mutual Broadcasting System (MBS).
A transcribed, 30-minute childrens series that aired over MBS thrice weekly for 20 weeks from February to June 1949.
A transcribed, 30-minute series, targeted to adults, which aired for 13 weeks on Saturday evenings from October 1949 to January 1950 over the American Broadcasting Company (ABC).
A transcribed, 30-minute childrens series that aired over ABC twice-weekly for 39 weeks from June 1950 to March 1951. This version mainly re-used scripts from #3 and #4, above.
All of these were produced by a company headed by Robert Maxwell, who co-produced the first season of the television series, and all but #5 starred Clayton Bud Collyer as Clark Kent/Superman.
So I had ample reason to document Supermans radio history, but I also wanted to cover the TV series in depth, hopefully without being redundant. At first, I figured Id just adapt and expand the articles Id written over the years, but while perusing a Superman internet message board, I learned something remarkable: nearly every script for the television series had been submitted to the U.S. Copyright Office for registration, separate from the registrations of the actual filmed episodes. Moreover, there were two script titles that did not correspond to any known episodes. In following up at the Library of Congress, I learned that these scripts were still there, in storage, and available for review.
Copies of approximately a dozen original scripts had circulated among collectors; Id used one of them, The Defeat of Superman, for a from-script-to-screen comparison article for The Adventures Continue. With the Library of Congress find, I could take a similar perspective for a majority of episodes, and devote particular attention to those that seemed more compelling on paper than on screen. The scripts could also help me better evaluate each writers work prior to modification by producers and/or directors. Finally, Id have at my fingertips dozens of scenes and dialogue exchanges that were written but either never filmed or cut for time. Since most unused Superman footage was presumably destroyed none was included in the DVD season sets released by Warner Home Video you hold in your hands the only source for deleted scenes. Most importantly, two scripts were written, but never filmed: one for the first season and one for the second. In youll find the complete synopses for these two lost episodes.
