The Black Museum 1952 detective radio show

The Black Museum (1952, United Kingdom)

detective radio shows

The Black Museum radio show had an unusual history - originally produced in London, broadcasted by Radio Luxembourg, but it gained most fame in the United States. Perhaps the "exotic" nature of the cases for Americans, different from what was you could hear in the US shows of the genre. The show was concentrating on interesting cases from famous Scotland Yard’s Black Museum, which is a collection of criminal memorabilia gathered by British Police throughout the years. The idea itself wasn’t that original, there already was a radio show based on cases from Black Museum in 1952, called Whitehall 1212, which was produced in the United States.

There were significant differences though - while The Black Museum had Orson Welles as the host, Whitehall 1212 had a British policeman, Chief Superintendent John Davidson, who actually was a curator of the Black Museum. Another big difference was the storytelling - Whitehall 1212 was portraying all events from police perspective, while The Black Museum was offering a more narrative approach. In The Black Museum, not only the crime itself was depicted, but some stories also gave a look into the mind of the killer. Also, the starting point of each story was an item from the museum, gaslighting what is coming later.

Overall 51 episodes of The Black Museum were produced, most of which audience was later able to link to true crimes from files of the Metropolitan Police, although origins of some of them are still unknown. The atmosphere, good performances and well written scripts were strong points of the show.

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Cast of The Black Museum

Orson Welles

as host / narrator

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Trivia about The Black Museum