[The Australian Panther]

I didn't realize it was William Shatner until I glanced down at the comments. Though once you know it's him, the voice is obvious. I guess I just didn't recognize him without his skivvy 

His acting here is so good I wish YouTube had the entire episode.

I watched only about 5 minutes of the Thorn Birds. All I could take!

Was this the movie where Rachel Ward and Bryan Brown met?
She relates, ( in a memoir, I think) that when she took him home to meet her mother, mum said, by way of conversation, ' I had Rachel when I was thirty, you know.' Bryan replied, ' So did I.' Ouch! 

[Quirky Quokka]

I didn't realize it was William Shatner until I glanced down at the comments. Though once you know it's him, the voice is obvious. I guess I just didn't recognize him without his skivvy 

His acting here is so good I wish YouTube had the entire episode.

I watched only about 5 minutes of the Thorn Birds. All I could take!

Was this the movie where Rachel Ward and Bryan Brown met?
She relates, ( in a memoir, I think) that when she took him home to meet her mother, mum said, by way of conversation, ' I had Rachel when I was thirty, you know.' Bryan replied, ' So did I.' Ouch!

Well done for lasting 5 minutes, Panther. Yes, I believe this is when Rachel Ward and Bryan Brown first met. And they've been married 40 years.

https://www.womensweekly.com.au/royals/bryan-brown-rachel-ward/

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

Hi everyone

Thanks for your comments and rabbit trails on these selections.  Here are my comments.


Dr Kildare Comic Strip – 1962

I really enjoyed this one. The story is pretty good, though a bit repetitive due to the fact it’s compiled from daily strips. It also had a good message, with the workaholic father eventually seeing the light. I’m not sure if I missed it, but it wasn’t clear where the mother was. I assume she had died, otherwise why wouldn’t she have been there? Also as others have said, there was an easy ‘fix’ of Parkinson’s disease. I don’t know enough about the medical history to know whether they thought a cure was imminent back then. Also interesting that they chose a young person to have it, though that of course happens. I had a friend who was diagnosed with it when he was 30. But aside from all of that, I still think it was a good story overall.

However, I especially like the art by Ken Bald. I had never heard of him before, but I think he did an excellent job. That was probably the best thing about the strip. I did a search and his work is represented in many comic books on CB+. I’ll have to check him out in more detail sometime.

And thanks to those of you who gave extra links to other work such as Ben Casey.


Dr Kildare #7 - Dell – 1963

This one was obviously a tie-in to the TV series with Richard Chamberlain, though I’m not sure if any of the stories in the comic books were taken from stories that appeared in the TV show.

The main story was okay and showed how perky an intern can be with a packed schedule and no sleep. Should the good doctor have gone to Mrs Henderson’s house for dinner? Why is there confusion over which part of the ship holds the cargo when there are crew who could answer that question? Why did the firefighters assume the ship would have cooled down so quickly? And did the good doctor ever get that vacation? A little cheesy, but lots of drama and probably would have inspired kids to become doctors or firefighters. The art was also good.

The ‘Little Medics’ one-pager was possibly the best advice at the time, though some things have also changed. I assume they had a medical consultant onboard for the comic book as a whole, though I couldn’t see an acknowledgement of that.

The one-page short story on ‘Lady Doctor’ seems very patronising now, but I guess women were still thought of as nurses rather than doctors back then. I went to the funeral of a friend’s mother not long ago. The mother was about 92 when she died, but had been a doctor. A few stories were told about how she had to work in remote areas when she was a young doctor in the 1960s because it was hard for women to get the more sought-after jobs. So she worked in the Northern Territory (one of the ‘Outback’ areas of Australia) and covered pretty much everything, including some surgery. So maybe that one-pager would have encouraged some girls to follow their dreams.

The jungle doctor shows the white guys as heroes and had some drama. Though why would the white guys be more likely to know about the rapids than the African man? And as SuperScrounge said, we have to assume the woman was cured of her appendicitis. The story seems more concerned with telling us about the heroics of the doctors than with the medical aspects. I guess they’re trying to make medicine exciting.

All in all, not a bad comic for those who enjoyed the TV Show. And thanks to Panther for alerting us to the fact that the first issue of this comic book series is available under Dell’s Four Color series.


Radio Show – Episode #50 – Eddie Lazetti Kidnaps Nurse – 1951

I thought this was a well-made show and would have been popular family listening. The voice actors were particularly good, though I would have liked to hear a few more sound effects. I’m glad CB+ has preserved so many of the old radio shows. There are some crackers in there.

Overall

It's interesting to see how the same character is conveyed across different media. I especially like the comic strip with the art by Ken Ball.

Thanks for your participation everyone. I'll look forward to next fortnight's selections.

Cheers

QQ

[Robb_K]

I don't consider watching medical-themed films and TV shows, listen to similarly-themed radio shows, or reading similarly-themed comic books enjoyable entertainment, having had so many family members and friends being treated for serious illnesses or injuries and spending long periods in hospital, often preceding their passing on.   My siblings and cousins all thought it very strange that many of the elderly people in our family, most of whom having had long periods, or many instances of spending to=ime in medical facilities and being treated by lots of doctors and regularly taking lots of medicine, would enjoy watching medical-themed TV dramas and TV or radio "Soap Operas". 

Even so, I've seen all the 1940s Dr. Kildare films with Lew Ayres and Lionel Barrymore.  They were okay, but lower than average 1940s films to my personal taste. 


I've seen only the first Dr. Kildare TV show, and thought it was a bit boring.  I've never purposely listened to the radio show.  Although I heard it in the background when my grandmother was listening.

Dr Kildare 7

Trial By Fire
I've seen the Dell comic books, but never looked inside.  The artwork is good.  Kildare looks almost exactly like Richard Chamberlain did at that time.  So, I'm guessing that the drawings were copied from stills from the TV series, or else, the artist made models of him for a guide, or used 4 or 5 different angle shots of him from the stills, and just changed the angles as needed for his desired poses.
Interesting that there is a public service information page showing teenagers giving first aid, saving a life, and keeping a broken leg from getting more severely damaged.

This is a type of Superhero story.  Kildare spends 40+ straight hours in surgery and dodging flames and breathing smoke, trying to help fire victims, only to find out he's denied a week off to rest, because his constantly undermanned hospital emergency room can't get along without him.  What a guy!  A Saint!

Once he reaches the burning ship, the action is non-stop.  I'll have to admit that the story held my interest.  I assume that the author just tossed in the vignette showing Kildare's bedside manner and catering to the lonely elderly woman's desire to mother him, to help develop his saintly character for the series, despite it slowing down the story's momentum.  But, it seems likely to me this must have been the order of events in the TV script and actual filmed version. All in all, surprisingly worth reading.

Lady Doctor - Text Story

Yes, this story would have brought some hope and encouragement to girls and young women who had dreams of becoming a doctor.  There weren't many female doctors around when I was young.

Jungle Doctor
This "throw-in"/filler had too few pages to develop its plot and show a result.  Proving the theory discussed above, that it was just thrown in to back-up the theme that many doctors are very saintly, risking their lives to save others.  Yes it's very interesting that two foreign doctors know more about the local river currents than a local man.  It is clear that asDr. Kildare is the big star in this series, the publisher's goal is to prop him up even more by showing that Doctors are underappreciated Saints, who are willing to go without sleep for extended periods, sacrifice their offwork lives, and risk their own lives over and over, to help humanity.  And so, we should buy and read books bout them (even floppy cartoon-filled books).

Dr Kildare Comic Strip – 1962 Drawn by Ken Bald

This is terrific artwork, and an even better story! Wow!  I've never enjoyed any medical story, including The Dr. Kildare comic book story we've just read, or the 1940s Lew Ayres and Lionel Barrymore films, even remotely close to this Ken Bald comic strip.  The story has a terrific plot, perfect pacing, suspense in all the right spots.  No overlap dead weight panels repeating what happened at the end of the previous day's strip line, because the connector's were all limited to one tiny narrative box with only a handful of words.  I've never seen a drama story this tight in any comic book.  The facial expressions are all perfect to read the emotions perfectly.  The camera angles are excellent to direct the reader's eyes to what is most important.  There is no dead, wasted space.  It moves along like a film with every cell (camera shot) shown.  It's like reading a perfectly written short story, with no "fluff", but everything that should be there, is there.  Usually I'm complaining that the page counts are too short to pace a comic book story plot, and provide room for an adequate setting and proper character development adequately.  I guess that is because a comic strip story writer is very often not restricted to a given number of pages and panels for any given story.  He or she often can use an unlimited number of pages that is the perfect number for to pace the story's plot and add in the setting and character development (also paced properly to provide the perfect amount of suspense in the proper places, and get the emotional response from the reader that he or she wants without adding extra dead weight that ruins the timing to get the best effects). 

I've never worked on a comic strip.  But I can see that I'd rather have that assignment as it pertains to my abilities to be proud of the result; But I might not like the pressure of having to write the entire 36-Page story first, then chop it up into hundreds of daily line strips, each with perfect suspenseful endings (some of which needing to be cliffhangers), and still come up with a tight story from start to finish.  That would be an awesome assignment (not in the modern young-people's meaning of the word), but more good AND bad, as being in awe of the massive responsibility and risk of it not working out in the end because of "guessing wrong" about how it would work as a whole.  The "risk" could be lessened a lot by putting in hundreds of hours on researching, thinking about story ideas, working out a solid plot, pacing and drawing up scribbled storyboards for the entire 36-week story before even starting to draw the first week's strip.  But who has time to do all that upfront, IF they are both the writer and artist?  At my age, it's a moot point.  All I can say is that this is the tightest newspaper strip story I've ever read, and probably better in that regard than any comic book dramatic story I can remember.  At least that must be true about stories read with my Editor's Eyes, rather than my Entertainment Reader's Eye.  However, as I love comedy, I have enjoyed reading a few comic book stories more. 

Dr. Kildare Radio Program 50 - Eddie Mazetti Kidnaps Nurse

I like the Old Time late 1930s style of Hammy introductions, and the hammy stage-play style of acting in this radio show episode.  It's weird hearing one without it being interrupted by commercial announcements.  In my opinion, Lew Ayres wouldn't have made a good candidate to be the "Superhero" type Richard Chamberlain played in the Dell comic book story we just read, given his comedic-sounding voice and funny sidekick looks. This show didn't have ANY hospital sounds.  No patients in surgery screaming.  Not even a Desk Nurse answering a telephone, no patients calling for a nurse.  Why would I think they're in a hospital?  I can't "Live in this story as I can in a good comic book or comic strip story or a good novel or short story, or a good film.  I guess the sound effects man was out to lunch during the recording.  I must say that Lionel Barrymore sounded EXACTLY the same in films, TV, radio shows, stage plays, filmed interviews, and real life.  That wouldn't be true if said about many, and probably most, actors.

This radio show episode was boring to my taste.  NOTHING like The Lone Ranger, Hopalong Cassidy, Fibber McGhee & Molly, or The Goldbergs  or Mercury Theatre.  Those all had big differences in voice level to show emotion door slamming, rain hitting the roof, horses hooves clattering -SOME sound effects.   They had people displaying strong emotions in their voices.  I didn't feel at all like they were in a hospital.  I usually don't like hammy stage acting style, but the nurse that was scared to go out into the other hospital areas because the murderer might leave his bed and room didn't have enough fear in her voice to get even remotely close for me to believe she was deathly afraid of that man and what he might do to her.

Glad I didn't pay to hear that show!       Comic Strip wins the award for best medium version! 

[The Australian Panther]

Robb said,

  I don't consider watching medical-themed films and TV shows, listen to similarly-themed radio shows, or reading similarly-themed comic books enjoyable entertainment, having had so many family members and friends being treated for serious illnesses or injuries and spending long periods in hospital, often preceding their passing on.   My siblings and cousins all thought it very strange that many of the elderly people in our family, most of whom having had long periods, or many instances of spending time in medical facilities and being treated by lots of doctors and regularly taking lots of medicine, would enjoy watching medical-themed TV dramas and TV or radio "Soap Operas".  

 
I'm not surprised. And it's not unusual.
I worked 3 years in a hospital, in a non-medical capacity. Bizarrely, the non-medical staff were obsessed with medical matters to the extent that they would talk about it at lunch and morning or afternoon teas.
One guy, who cleaned the surgical ward, idolized the head surgeon. To the extend that on his holidays he booked himself in for surgery with the gentleman concerned. The surgery was not a success and he died in the ward where he had worked for several decades.
That was when I knew I had to get out of there.   

[The Australian Panther]

Dr Kildare #7 - Dell - 1963
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=34275

The art on the Kildare stories is by John Tartaglione and Frank McLaughlin
Other artists on the series included Vince Colletta and Dick Giordano.
These all all Charlton regulars, which makes me think that the work was the product of the studio or contract of one of them and the others helped out!
The art is much better than much of what they produced for Charlton. Likely the old story, the more you pay the creators, the better the work they give you.
On the cover, 'Dick' Chamberlain?
The stories.
Robb said,

This is a type of Superhero story.

Exactly!
You don't send Surgeons out to emergencies. Doesn't happen.
And Operating theaters are constantly booked.
Jungle Doctor.
This is an oddity here.
There was a the time, a popular series of books called Jungle Doctor, which spawned a radio series and some comic books. This doesn't seem to be related and may be something for a planned book which was unused for it's original purpose.
The Jungle Doctor - A history of Paul White
  https://www.jungledoctorcomics.com/a-history-of-dr-paul-white   
cheers!           

[The Australian Panther]

QQ posted>

CB+ also has 60 episodes of the Dr Kildare radio show from 1950-1951, featuring Lew Ayres as Dr Kildare and Lionel Barrymore as Dr Gillespie. I’ve picked out this episode for a little drama. 

The payment for radio acting and voice-overs must have been quite good - to account for so many top actors appearances in radio shows.

https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=44089

Looking forward to what you have for us tomorrow, Robb!

[Quirky Quokka]

Comic Strip wins the award for best medium version!

Hi Robb - Thanks for your detailed response. I liked the comic strip best of the three as well, and I enjoyed reading your analysis of how newspaper strips were done. So would it have been common for a writer to have the whole story written first before the strips were done or would there have been some 'seat of the pants' strips that were being written as they were being submitted? I guess the best ones would have been planned out beforehand. Probably easier to do piecemeal if you were writing the three-panel gag kinds of strips that were self-contained rather than the continuing serials.

I haven't seen the 1940s Dr Kildare movies, but I did think the voice actors did a good job in the radio show. Like you, I wondered where the special effects were. Maybe they spent all of the money on the actors.

Thanks for persevering, Robb, even though medical themes aren't your favourites. Looks like you found one winner in the collection.

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

Panther said:

I worked 3 years in a hospital, in a non-medical capacity. Bizarrely, the non-medical staff were obsessed with medical matters to the extent that they would talk about it at lunch and morning or afternoon teas.
One guy, who cleaned the surgical ward, idolized the head surgeon. To the extend that on his holidays he booked himself in for surgery with the gentleman concerned. The surgery was not a success and he died in the ward where he had worked for several decades.
That was when I knew I had to get out of there. 

Oh no, that must have been terrible. Sounds like the plot of one of those medical soaps.

Jungle Doctor.
This is an oddity here.
There was a the time, a popular series of books called Jungle Doctor, which spawned a radio series and some comic books. This doesn't seem to be related and may be something for a planned book which was unused for it's original purpose.
The Jungle Doctor - A history of Paul White
https://www.jungledoctorcomics.com/a-history-of-dr-paul-white

I remember that book about 'The Jungle Doctor' being popular, though I haven't read it. When I was in high school and Uni, they also used to play the Audrey Hepburn movie 'The Nun's Story' on TV on constant rotation. I remember being fascinated with her desire to be a nurse in the Congo, though that only takes up the last part of the movie. So I guess there was an interest there. Unfortunately the current story didn't go anywhere, so you may be right about them originally intending it for another purpose.

The payment for radio acting and voice-overs must have been quite good - to account for so many top actors appearances in radio shows.

Yes, they certainly had some big stars in them. I've discovered some old radio shows on Spotify too. They have a lot of the original 'My Favorite Husband' shows starring Lucille Ball. It was the inspiration for 'I Love Lucy' and she does such a good job. It's easy to see why it was such a popular show. I still enjoy listening to them now.

Thanks for all of the extra info you've posted this fortnight.

Cheers

QQ

[SuperScrounge]

So would it have been common for a writer to have the whole story written first before the strips were done or would there have been some 'seat of the pants' strips that were being written as they were being submitted?

I suppose it varied between strips.

I believe Dr. Kildare was written by Elliot Caplin (brother of Li'l Abner's Al Capp) and the script given to artist Ken Bald, so I imagine the script was finished first.

On the other hand you have something like Dick Tracy where writer/artist Chester Gould admitted he made it up as he went along.

As for submission I believe most syndicated comic strips had to have a minimum six-week buffer so it's unlikely for someone to be making it up as it was being printed*, the whole storyline probably would have been drawn (and the artist drawing the next one) before the syndicate sent it out to papers.

* The exception, I believe, would be for staff cartoonists (editorial cartoons, sports cartoons, etc.) who worked for the papers and dealt with news stuff that happens just before the next edition needed to be printed.

[Quirky Quokka]

So would it have been common for a writer to have the whole story written first before the strips were done or would there have been some 'seat of the pants' strips that were being written as they were being submitted?

I suppose it varied between strips.

I believe Dr. Kildare was written by Elliot Caplin (brother of Li'l Abner's Al Capp) and the script given to artist Ken Bald, so I imagine the script was finished first.

On the other hand you have something like Dick Tracy where writer/artist Chester Gould admitted he made it up as he went along.

As for submission I believe most syndicated comic strips had to have a minimum six-week buffer so it's unlikely for someone to be making it up as it was being printed*, the whole storyline probably would have been drawn (and the artist drawing the next one) before the syndicate sent it out to papers.

* The exception, I believe, would be for staff cartoonists (editorial cartoons, sports cartoons, etc.) who worked for the papers and dealt with news stuff that happens just before the next edition needed to be printed.

Thanks for that info, SuperScrounge. That's helpful