A huge nerd about history, one of the many reasons I love these old time radio shows is I see them as a window into the past. Hearing the figures of speech, the landscape of daily life, and the technology they used (OMG, poor Sergeant Joe Friday. He has to borrow the phone wherever he goes or have his calls forwarded to him. He needs a cellphone!) And as I go through and adapt these scripts, getting to know them very intimately, I run across many things from this era I straight up am unfamiliar with. I always jump onto Google and search them. Sometimes for the adaptation and Madison, but sometimes purely because I’m curious! That’s when I started to think, hey, maybe other people would be interested in knowing this stuff, too.
The first episode of “Madison’s Mad Facts” was about showgirls. I realized as I wrote the episode for “Let George Do It,” that what modern day audiences think of as showgirls,
and who they were in the 1940s, is very, very different. Truly, the face of entertainment back then vastly differed from today because, well, TV. Before television, people went out to live shows on a regular basis. Be it theater, orchestras or clubs with a “floor show.” Have you ever watched “I Love Lucy” and wondered about Ricky’s job at the Tropicana? There were places like that in towns big and small. So I decided Madison should look more closely at this topic.
Now as I write the new episodes, I think about what really stands out to me as unusual from modern day? Sam Spade being repulsed by a tattoo on a woman. Why does Sir Arthur Conan Doyle use Hansom cabs so much? When the writers of “The Shadow” had Lamont and Margo participating in a Scavenger Hunt, it was them being cutting edge to the time! And although I’ve grown up with lots of references to “Honeymoon Suites,” why don’t married couples use them anymore? It’s fun to do deep dives into these subjects and learn about things that were once commonplace, but are now all but extinct. You MUST listen to the “Rocky Jordan” one about sanitariums. As a background actor in Hollywood, I frequently film at an abandoned sanitarium. And now that I know the history behind them… extra creepy! (The photo of the carousel was from there)
I do all of the research myself, write the script, and pass it on to the actor who is playing our “expert.” They’ll take the script and make it their own, then I adapt Madison to respond accordingly. I’m hoping these are short and fun and interesting and a nice companion piece to the full episode. Hey, you might even learn something! I know I do as I write them.
Have YOU listened to one of our episodes and wanted to learn more about something featured? I’m totally up for creating a Madison’s Mad Facts around listener suggestions! Go ahead and leave a comment below.
-Chrisi (aka Madison)
