Well, last week the geniuses at Cerny sent me the TZ episode "The Shelter" starring Ernie Hudson and it came out great! It will be airing on the network this week so listen for it. Ernie is a great actor and does a brilliant job as a man who has the foresight to build a bomb shelter in his basement before it's ever needed. The supporting cast has many of our TZ regulars including: Kurt Naebig, JoBe Cerny, Tom McElroy, Jamie Baron, Ana Sferruzza, Linda Reiter, Norm Woodel, Doug James, Jeff Lupetin and Ric Vargas. It features newcomers April Williams and her son Damon Williams and also first time Zoner Renee Domenz. It also has a few lines by my 10-year old son C.J. who you can hear as the young boy who receives phone calls from his dead Grandma in "Long Distance Call" starring Hal Sparks. FYI: "Long Distance Call" is one of the three shows we offer for free download on our TZ home page.

The next show that Cerny is working on is "Young Man's Fancy" by Richard Matheson and adapted for radio by Dennis Etchison. It's the story of a woman who is in competition with her new husband's dead mother, whose spirit does not want to let go of him. Tony Plana (the dad from "Ugly Betty"), who was magnificent in "The Mirror" for us, plays Alex, the husband and Franette Liebow plays Virginia his new wife. Nydia Rodriguez plays Alex's dead mother (she can be seen as the woman judge who gets blown up in her car in "The Dark Knight").

Barry Richter, who has written some amazing TZ radio scripts for us, including a brilliant adaptation of "The Encounter" has tackled the one show that so many people thought would be impossible to present on radio -- "The Invaders." That's the show where Agnes Moorehead plays a woman who does not utter any dialog as she is being invaded by tiny spacemen. It's one of the most famous TZ shows of all time. Well, I have to say that Barry figured out an angle on how to present it on radio and I can't wait for you to hear it. Way to go Barry! With this script Barry just proved that Stan Freberg was right when he said "anything can be done on radio!"

By the way, here's just some of the stars you'll soon hear in upcoming episodes of TZ:

Ed Begley, Jr.
Bruno Kirby
John Schneider
Jason Alexander
Stan Freberg
Marshall Allman
Kim Fields
Blair Underwood
Hal Sparks
Lou Gossett, Jr.
Don Johnson
John Heard
Barry Bostwick
Lou Diamond Phillips
Robert Knepper
Karen Black
Shelley Berman
Henry Rollins
John Rhys-Davies

Well that's all for now my friends. See you next time for MORE NEWS FROM THE ZONE!

Happy New Year everyone! I look forward to an exciting 2009! We have a lot in store for fans of TZ and MYSTERY THEATER. MYSTERY THEATER with host Christopher Lee launches this March 2nd, 2009. A mass-mailing of MYSTERY THEATER demo kits went out this week. Stations should start receiving them next week. We have a follow-up mailing scheduled for the first week of February so my hope is to launch with 50 or so stations and build on that throughout the year and on-going. My goal for the show is 150 stations by the end of 2010.

The website is coming along quite nicely; it will be up and running by mid February and will be at www.mysterytheater.com MYSTERY THEATER is set up to run Monday through Friday. At the official website, listeners will be able to listen to that night's MYSTERY THEATER show at 10 pm Eastern each night Monday through Friday. The 5 shows airing the current week will be available for download the following week for only 99 cents each. Fans will have one week to download the prior week's shows for only 99 cents each. Then, after one week, the 5 shows will be replaced with 5 new shows (which aired the previous week) and they too will be available for download for only 99 cents each and so on. If you miss downloading any MYSTERY THEATER shows, they will be permanently available in the Radio Vault for a download price of $2.99 -- so I encourage fans to download them when they are available for only 99 cents each.

The website will also have a "Radio Vault" feature that will house thousands of other top-quality radio episodes from the mystery, detective and sci-fi categories. Each episode (whether 30-minutes of 60-minutes) will be only 99 cents each to download. When you buy 5 shows, you get 1 additional show for free. When you buy 10 shows, you get an additional 3 shows for free. There will be many other fun features at the MYSTERY THEATER website and I can't wait to have it up and running.

Last week we received in the TZ episode of "The Mirror" starring Tony Plana and it came out great! Listen for it on a station near you. Next to be mixed is "The Shelter" by Rod Serling and adapted for radio by Dennis Etchison. George Clayton Johnson calls it the best of the Serling episodes. This one stars the amazing Ernie Hudson. It's the one about the man who builds a bomb shelter in his backyard. When it looks like the Big One is going to hit, his neighbors panic, turn into a mob and try to break into his shelter. By the time it's over all have learned something about themselves -- some of it ugly. It's similar in feel to "Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" which is one of the best-remembered TZ shows. I look forward to hearing what the geniuses at Cerny do with "The Encounter."

Well, that's all for now friends, check back with me soon for MORE NEWS FROM THE ZONE!