Blog-o-ween 2022: Peter Lorre

There are some actors who were just born to stand in front of a camera. As the transition from the silent era to the sound era taught us, however, sometimes these same beatiful people don't have the pipes to match. It goes the other way, too. There are some actors whose voices are made to spin tales over the airwaves. Unfortunately for them, the powers-that-be deemed their looks to be less than satisfactory. Take the example of William Conrad. Conrad esitmated that during his career on the radio, he voiced more than 7,500 roles. One of those was as "Marshal Matt Dillon," the hardboiled Western hero of the show Gunsmoke. For nearly ten years, Conrad was Dillon. Then, when the show transitioned to television, Conrad was cast aside for the more camera-friendly James Arness. C'est la guerre!

There are, of course, actors of whom the ear and eye just can't get enough. Peter Lorre is one of those actors. The man looks and sounds so unique, so odd, that we as viewers and listeners are naturally drawn to him.

Born László Löwenstein in Hungary, Lorre began his acting career on the Viennese stage in the early 1920s. Later, he moved to Berlin, then the cinematic cultural center of Europe. There, he played his most famous part as the child murderer in Fritz Lang's M. When the Nazis came to power, Lorre, a Jew, fled to Paris, then to London, then to the United States. He worked at several studios, lending every picture he appeared in an aura of the strange and outre. He appeared in such films as The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca, Mad Love, Crime and Punishment, Stranger on the Third Floor, and Arsenic and Old Lace.

On the radio, his rasping, sibilant tones gave his characters a quality of menace. He always seemed to be teetering on the edge of insanity. Let's take a listen to three such performances and see of you agree.

First up is an episode of Inner Sanctum, "The Black Seagull." After Raymond opens the squeaking door, we find Lorre playing a man whose wife is fatally injured in a boating accident. Her dying words to her husband promise him that she will one day return to him and...you guessed it...drag him along with her!

Next, we have an adaptation of the Alexander Pushkin tale "The Queen of Spades" for the radio show Mystery of the Air. Lorre plays a Russian officer who commits murder in order to learn how to play cards without losing. He acquires the knowledge, but...you guessed it again...at a terrible price!

Last, is an episode of Mollé Mystery Theater. Lorre merely acts as emcee here for an adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's "Bottle Imp." Anything you wished for while the bottle was in your possession came true, but you had to sell it in a fortnight for less than you paid for it. If you didn’t...you know the drill...you’d go stark staring mad!