Well, yesterday I received in a rough draft of the TZ radio drama “A Piano in the House” starring Michael York. I was completely blown away by it, and by Michael’s performance, and I can’t wait for all of you to hear it. I had only minor tweaks to it and those have already been made so I will get the finished show on Monday. Michael York plays an evil character, which is so completely different from his real identity. I was with Michael two weeks ago in Los Angeles, interviewing him for the “behind the scenes” DVD for The Word of Promise Old Testament audio Bible I am producing. As with the New Testament, Michael is the Narrator and he is absolutely amazing. In “A Piano in the House” he plays a sinister theater critic who suspects his young wife is cheating on him and finds out for sure when an old player piano is a sort of truth serum to those who hear it play. I believe “A Piano in the House” is scheduled to air the week of October 20th so please listen for it.

I’ve been working night and day on the Youth edition of The Word of Promise New Testament Audio Bible. It hits store shelves mid October and I hope you’ll pick up a copy. It will be available in a 20-CD set (with a behind the scenes DVD) or in an MP3 version. All of the Word of Promise products are available at www.thewordofpromise.com or at Amazon and at major retail chains and all Christian bookstores.

We’re hard at work on a radio station marketing kit for Mystery Theater, the series that we’re going to launch next year. This kit will be mailed out to about 3,500 radio stations in the hope that they’ll want to carry the series. If you missed my previous log, Mystery Theater will be a 2-hour per night showcase for the best in radio: mystery, detective and science-fiction programming. The series will be aired on most stations Monday through Friday and within each 2-hour show, we’ll present 3 half-hour radio dramas. I’m negotiating with a major Hollywood personality right now to star in the series – I hope to be able to announce who that star is, very soon.

Last week I received the first two Mike Hammer radio dramas “Oil & Water” and "Dangerous Days” in from Cerny American Creative. Each episode runs approximately 90 minutes. Stacy Keach reprises his role as the hard-boiled detective created by Mickey Spillane and he doesn’t miss a beat. I had a few more tweaks for the geniuses at Cerny but what I’ve heard is outstanding. Both episodes will be sold in a 3-CD set called “The New Adventures of Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer.” It will be released by Blackstone audio in stores this November. They won’t be broadcast on radio anytime soon and the retail price for both shows on 3-CDs is only $19.99 so I hope you’ll give this a try. The future of the series will depend on how well this first double-feature set sells, so I’m giving a shout out to the Hammer fans for some help : )

Well, that’s all for this time, see you next week for more NEWS FROM THE ZONE!

Well, I mentioned last week in my blog that I would have a very special announcement this week -- so here it is: I will be launching a new, nationally syndicated radio series beginning January 5th, 2009 called “The Mystery Theater.” It will be two hours each night, Monday through Friday (10 hours per week) of mystery, detective and science—fiction radio programming originally broadcast from the 1940s through today. It will be hosted by a very well known Hollywood celebrity. The scripts for the host will be written by acclaimed mystery writer Dennis Etchison, who also is the script supervisor for the TZ series. "The Mystery Theater" will have a dedicated website at mysterytheater.com (which will also launch in January 2009). The website will offer thousands of radio shows for sale and/or download. Each offering will be 2 half-hour radio episodes. The download price will be 99 cents or you can buy the 2 shows on CD for $1.99.

A top priority with this new series will be “sound quality” – we will only be broadcasting and selling radio episodes of the very highest sound quality – no radio episodes will be broadcast or sold on our site that are not absolutely top quality sound. For example, there is a terrific mystery series from radio’s golden age titled “Quiet Please.” It was written and produced by Wyllis Cooper, the man who originated “Lights Out!” There were more than 100 episodes produced but I’ve only found a handful of episodes from the series that would meet the sound quality standards to be aired on “The Mystery Theater” or sold at its site.

What you will hear each night on “The Mystery Theater” will be radio episodes of mystery, detective and sci-fi that are “direct from the master recordings” (or episodes very close to the source material) and then digitally remastered. Show's that are not excellent sound quality simply won’t make the cut.

Over my 30-year career in the radio business, I have made wonderful and long-lasting relationships with individuals and companies that not only own rights to the radio episodes, but have the master recordings. Each night you’ll hear 3 half-hour episodes on “The Mystery Theater.” Radio episodes like: I Love a Mystery, Boston Blackie, Dragnet, The Hermit’s Cave, Dangerous Assignment, Adventures By Morse, Inner Sanctum Mysteries, The Adventures of Sam Spade, Nightbeat, X Minus One, The Adventures of Nero Wolfe, Sherlock Holmes, The Weird Circle, Dimension X, Philo Vance, Detective, The Fat Man, The Weird Circle, Mystery Is My Hobby, Mr. District Attorney, Mystery In the Air, I Love Adventure, The Thin Man, Casey, Crime Photographer, Zero Hour (hosted by Rod Serling), The Mutual Radio Theatre (hosted by Vincent Price), The Adventures of the Falcon, Murder At Midnight, Ellery Queen, Mike Hammer, Detective, Bold Venture, The Clock, The Hall of Fantasy, True Detective Mysteries, Molle’ Mystery Theater, Michael Shayne, Detective, Mr. & Mrs. North, and many others.

I expect to launch the series on 100 stations by Monday January 5th, 2009 and by year three to have it placed on as many as 300 stations. You will be able to find a local station by checking the “tune-in” section of the mysterytheater.com website. And I can’t wait to share with you who the host will be! Hopefully I’ll be able to reveal that to you very soon.

Thanks for checking in, I’ll be back with you with more news on this series; "The New Adventures of Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer" and of course TZ, next week.

So sorry about not writing a blog in almost a month. A project that I've been working on for the past year has a deadline of next week and I' ve been completely fixated on finalizing it. It's The Word of Promise Next Generation New Testament audio Bible.

About a year ago I was having dinner with Wayne Hastings, Senior VP of Thomas Nelson, Inc. and he shared with me a startling statistic about how young people are moving away from the Bible more and more each year. An idea hatched during that dinner of creating a youth-oriented audio Bible with teen and young adult stars playing the major roles. The hope is that if youths of today had access to an audio Bible with stars they look up to, it might help get them back to the Bible. Wayne liked the idea and so I collaborated with Dan Lynch of the family division of Thomas Nelson, Inc. to set out to making it a reality. Like the current New Testament that I produced with Jim Caviezel as "Jesus" www.wordofpromise.com this youth New Testament audio has over 100 actors, music and sound effects to create a "you are there" feel.

Now a year later, we've just about completed production on it and I'm very pleased and proud of it. The stars include: Cody Linley as Jesus, AnnaSophia Robb as Mary Magdalene, Corbin Bleu as Peter, Marshall Allman as Paul, Luke Benward as Mark, Tahj Mowry as John, Charlie Stewart as Luke, Emily Osment as Mary, Mother of Jesus, Andrew Lawrence as Matthew, Alyson Stoner as Martha, Jordin Sparks as Elizabeth, Sean Astin as our Narrator, with Martin Jarvis as the Voice of God.

It's 25 hours on 20 CDs as well as an MP3 version. I'm very excited about this project and its impact I pray it will have on today's teens and tweens. It releases this coming October in stores everywhere.

On the TZ front, I've received several new scripts in from our very talented pool of writers. I'm looking forward to reading them once I get past my deadline of September 10th to turn in the Next Generation audio Bible. I'm looking forward to receiving a rough draft of the TZ episode "A Piano In the House" which stars the great Michael York. That should be here any day. Then after that will be "The Four of Us Are Dying" with my good friend Eric Bogosian. Next week I'm going to have a very special announcement (I promise not to be late with my next blog) so be sure to log on for it.

Thanks everyone. Talk to you next week.

Last week I received the final version of The Twilight Zone Radio Drama “Third From the Sun” and I think listeners are going to be really pleased. Fred Willard is awesome as William Sturka and the rest of the cast is great too. Fred is such a talented actor and he’s so much fun to work with. He’s starred in four Zones now and is great in all of them. Listen for “Third From the Sun” to air on stations this month.

I also just received in a rough edit on “The Trouble With Templeton” starring Michael York in the role of Booth Templeton, portrayed in the televised version by Brian Aherne. Booth is an aging Broadway star who has lost his zest for life. Now cuckolded by a younger wife, all he has is a loyal valet and memories. Once he was married to the beautiful and vivacious Laura, who died long ago, as did his best friend, a playwright named Barney Flueger. Only their memories seem real. When he walks out on the rehearsal of a new play, he finds himself transported back to the 1920s. But he doesn’t fit in at all and therein lies the tale.

In the original TV episode, Sydney Pollack portrayed the “boy wonder” director of the Broadway play that Booth is to star in. He affected a faint Southern accent and spoke slowly and methodically with an air of humorless self-importance. I cast one of my best Zoners, Mike Starr, in this role and he plays it to perfection. What can I say about Michael York’s performance other than he absolutely and totally nails this part. He has the bulk of the dialog and at all times keeps the listener totally and completely on the edge of his words. Michael is a close friend and the Narrator of my Word of Promise audio Bible. Somehow Michael is able to make the difficult-to-pronounce names and places of the Bible sound effortless. I’m absolutely thrilled that he’s agreed to star in Zones for me. In this one he plays a good guy but in “A Piano in the House” he gets to switch gears to play a bad guy.

By the way, our Word of Promise New Testament audio Bible just won the 2008 Christian Book of the Year award. In the 30-year history of the award, neither a Bible OR an audio has ever won it. Click here for more info on the win. JoBe Cerny, who is President of Cerny American Creative is the amazing Director of The Word of Promise so kudos to JoBe! On the “Mike Hammer” front, we’ve recorded the first two shows and are now in the editing stages and bringing actors in for pick-ups. What I’ve heard so far is excellent – more on that later.

Well, that’s all for now, check back with me next week for more NEWS FROM THE ZONE!

Well, I just got a rough edit in today of "Third From the Sun" starring Fred Willard and it's very good. I've started writing my notes on it and will send them over to Cerny American for tweaking. Fred Willard does an awesome job in the lead role of William Sturka, played in the TV version by Fritz Weaver. Zoner Tom McElroy plays Sturka's friend Jerry Riden and Doug James (who is also our TZ announcer) plays the ominously gregarious Mr. Carling. "Third From the Sun" was from the Twilight Zone's first TV season and is a remarkable episode. It was written by Rod Serling based on a short story by the great Richard Matheson. It's the story of two men and their families who discover the world is going to be annihilated by nuclear war within 48 hours. One of the men is an experimental aircraft pilot who can fly their families to safety in a rocket ship to a distant world similar to their own. But their escape is almost foiled by a man who learns of their plan to rocket off to another world. This one will air in August so I hope you'll be able to tune it in.

I received two terrific TZ scripts in this week ­ both of which are brand new story ideas, not based on original TZ episodes. One is by writer Chris Canniff. It's based on the John Collier story "Back For Christmas." I'm hoping to produce this one later this year. The other is by Dennis Etchison; it's called "The 25th Hour." It's the story of a busy man for whom there are not enough hours in the day. He meets a mysterious stranger, an older, retired fellow who has more time on his hands than he knows what to do with. Soon, as you might imagine, they strike a deal and therein lies the tale.

Well, that's all for this week, see you next week for more NEWS FROM THE ZONE!

This week we completed the final mix of the TZ episode “The Prime Mover” starring David Eigenberg in the Dane Clark role of “Ace Larsen” the pushy but ingratiating owner of a roadside diner. David is fabulous in the role. One of my top Zoners, Kurt Naebig, gives a stellar performance in the Buddy Ebsen role of “Jimbo Cobb” Ace’s cook and right-hand man – who has a talent he’s kept hidden all these years: the ability to move objects with his mind. Once Ace discovers what Jimbo can do, it’s off to Vegas to try their luck at the tables. This TZ radio drama came together a little easier than most – probably because the star of the show (David Eigenberg) was here in Chicago with the rest of the cast when we recorded it. When we have the star record their performance in LA, NY, etc. it takes longer - and more tender loving care - to fuse it together properly. The geniuses at Cerny American Creative are true masters at this technique though and if I didn’t know it myself, I’d think the star was with the supporting cast on them all.

Today I have the supporting casts for MIKE HAMMER episode 2 “Oil & Water” coming in as well as the TZ episode “Who Am I?” It will be a long day of rehearsing and then recording both shows. We’ll do a table read of the TZ show first, and then record it, then break for lunch and do a table read of the HAMMER show and then record it. During the table reads the actors take direction from me; we all take notes; make tweaks; all get on the same page with name pronunciation, etc. I’ll have a great crew in here today including Franette Liebow, Ric Peeples, D.J. Howard, Meg Thalken, Oksana Fedunyszyn, Norm Woodel, Ilyssa Fraden, Nick Sandys, Tom McElroy, Kurt Naebig, Ric Vargas, Heidi Klefstad, Jamie Baron, Sara Court, Tracy Hernandez, Brandon Beard Reed and Maestro Harrell. I’m looking forward to a productive day – then when it’s all over – collapse from exhaustion : )

Next week, I should be hearing the first rough mix of MIKE HAMMER episode 1 “Dangerous Days” so I’m excited about that. Well, that’s it for now, join me next week for more NEWS FROM THE ZONE!

Last Wednesday I had the pleasure of directing Sean Astin in two TZs ­ "Who Am I?" and "The Amazing Dr. Kyle Powers." Sean was a blast to work with and a real pro. He wanted to voice the lines over and over to give me different shades of color. Sean is also narrating the Youth Bible I'm producing and portraying the role of "Joshua" in my Old Testament. Our New Testament is available now in stores or at www.thewordofpromise.com. I'm excited about mixing these shows that will star Sean Astin, which will run later this year.

Last Friday we recorded the first episode of THE NEW ADVENTURES OF MICKEY SPILLANE'S MIKE HAMMER titled "Dangerous Days" at Cerny American Creative. I had 18 actors in to record the supporting characters to Stacy Keach's Mike Hammer. It was a lot of fun but A LOT of work. It took much longer than I expected as the HAMMER shows are a full hour in length where the TZs are only 40 minutes. That additional 20 minutes added hours of prep and recording time. I had all the actors do a table read ­ which just means all the actors sit around a table and perform the script in a leisurely setting. Then we took a break and went into the sound booth and recorded all the dialog ­ often times I had the actors perform their lines multiple times to have a safety. It took us about 5 hours just to record the dialog. Afterward, all of the sound files were separated and the sound design began being built. All of the music is composed and performed by Stacy Keach. M. J. Elliott who is writing the MIKE HAMMER scripts recently sent me episode two "Oil & Water" and Stacy Keach is recording that today in Hollywood. His wife Malgosia Tomossi, who played the role of "Maya" on the TV series is reprising her role for the radio series, so she's recording today too. I'm really stoked about this HAMMER series and I can't wait to hear it mixed by the geniuses at Cerny, headed up by JoBe Cerny who also portrays a regular character on HAMMER by the name of "Ozzie the Answer." Ric Vargas, one of my Zoners is stepping up as my assistant director.

Yesterday I received a rough mix in on the TZ episode "The Prime Mover" starring David Eigenberg. It's a lot of fun but it needs some tender loving care. I listened to it 5 or 6 times and took copious notes and faxed them over to Bob Benson at Cerny. He'll make these changes and then send me another copy. Then it will go into finer and finer tweaks until it's complete. Well, that's all for this week, see you next time for more NEWS FROM THE ZONE!