Thrillers, Chillers, and Killers
Radio and Film Noir
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Rutgers University Press
Published:31st May '25
Should be back in stock very soon
Film noir is one of the most exciting and most debated products of studio-era Hollywood, but did you know that American radio broadcast many programs in the noir vein through the 1940s and 1950s? These included adaptations of such well-known films as The Maltese Falcon, Murder, My Sweet, and Double Indemnity, detective series devoted to the adventures of private eyes Philip Marlowe and Sam Spade, and the spine-tingling anthology programs Lights Out and Suspense. Thrillers, Chillers, and Killers is the first book to explore in detail noir storytelling on the two media, arguing that radio’s noir dramas played an important role as a counterpart to, influence on, or a spin-off from the noir films. Besides shedding new light on long-neglected radio dramas, and a medium that was cinema’s major rival, this scrupulously researched yet accessible study also uses these programs to challenge conventional understandings of the much-debated topic of noir.
"A fascinating and thoroughly engaging book that successfully explores the neglected field of radio drama and its close relationship with cinema. Krutnik's excellent scholarship widens our knowledge of a thrilling era of popular culture, finding a dynamic correlation between the screen and the airwaves." - Richard Hand (author of Terror on the Air!: Horror Radio in America, 1931–1952) "In this incredibly detailed book, Krutnik has thrillingly reimagined the ecosystem of noir by resituating it among the key radio programs through which it reached the public. It models a compelling new approach to the historical study of media interplay." - Neil Verma (author of Theater of the Mind: Imagination, Aesthetics, and American Radio Drama) "Krutnik elegantly synthesizes his meticulous research on the noir mediascape, offering a new and compelling account of the transmedial currency of the noir mystery story across page, screen, and airwaves in American culture." - Helen Hanson (author of Hollywood Heroines: Women in Film Noir and the Female Gothic Film)
ISBN: 9781978836389
Dimensions: 235mm x 156mm x 20mm
Weight: 426g
286 pages