Getting ready for Season 5 on the air!

We start our 5th Season on Sirius / XM Radio with new programs starting on Fri. Sept. 11th. New shows will be running on Fridays, with Mon-Thurs. airing encores of past programs. I just shipped the first six weeks, and we will have new programs running weekly thru June of 2010. Somewhere in the schedule we will run Season 5 of POWDER RIVER, which will run Mon-Thurs; so folks won't have to wait each week for new episodes. No date on that yet; some contractual projects put Britt and Company on the back burner, but we'll get them done, don't worry about that.
AND
Most important - a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY Shout out to my friend Fess Parker! I'm gonna watch a couple of Daniel Boone episodes tonight and raise a glass of the good stuff for a toast :)

Some new stuff!

Our new audio book division of CRT, called Wavern Audio, is just about finished with our very first release, THE BOOK OF NONSENSE, by David Michael Slater and read by J.T. Turner - in a nutshell:
The book is ancient, ravaged and full of utter nonsense. But the moment it enters Daphna and Dexter's lives, bizarre things begin to happen. Why is their father, who found the book, suddenly so distant? Is the old man who took it from him some kind of hypnotist? Why is a giant, red-eyed boy menancing them? And what does their thirteenth birthday have to do with all this? Daphna and Dexter can't stand each other, but they'll have to work together to learn the truth about the Book of Nonsense - before their lives come apart completely.

This is the first in a series of several books and we are very excited about producing them.

Also, we have begun recording our second book, LORENZO AND THE PIRATE, by authors by Rick and Lila Guzman. This is the latest in a series of books that follow Lorenzo Bannister through the American Revolutionary War. Read by Anastas Varinos, the book will be released on Sept. 22, and we hope to have the audio version ready at the same time.

Both of these titles will also lead off our brand new series on Sirius / XM Radio this September, airing on Saturdays with a time to be announced soon. This new series will consist only of our new audio book productions and is designed for kids in the 9-16 range (Our normal show will still be airing in our regular time slots). Of course, I'll be posting updates right here as soon as I get them.

ZORRO COMPLETED

Today we finished production on ZORRO AND THE PIRATE RAIDERS, ironically on the 90th Anniversary of the publication of the first book Zorro appeared in, The Curse of Capistrano." Running time came in at 163 minutes.

NEW ON AUDIBLE!

New CRT titles just released onto Audible.Com

MOONFLEET

POWDER RIVER And The MOUNTAIN OF GOLD

A VISIT WITH AESOP

THE BLOCKADE RUNNERS

PERRY MASON AND SPOKEN NETWORK

You probably will not be seeing PERRY MASON AND THE CASE OF THE HOWLING DOG on the Spoken Network download site. We have been with them since their beginning, but lately I have had trouble uploading new shows with the system either freezing or just not responding - usually after you have already spent 20 minutes inputting information. I've tried to get HOWLING DOG up and running for a week, and I'm not spending anymore time with it; so at this point, Lulu.Com is the best bet to download our new releases before they appear on CD.

NEW PERRY MASON ON JULY 24TH

On July 24th we will release our third PERRY MASON Radio Drama, THE CASE OF THE HOWLING DOG. Arthur Cartwright, an anxious man, goes to Perry Mason to have his neighbor arrested for his vindictive and noisy dog. He is under the belief that his howling is an indication that somebody has been murdered in the neighborhood. He demands that his will be written bequeathing the estate to the lady living at the neighbor's house. However, the will is mysteriously altered by an unknown person and Cartwright goes missing, along with the lady. It is up to Mason to investigate. The production will be released on Lulu.Com, and the following week on Spoken Network, followed in just a few weeks on Audible.Com (along with the two previous releases, THE CASE OF THE VELVET CLAWS and THE CASE OF THE SULKY GIRL.

Updates

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Seth is closing in on ZORRO AND THE PIRATE RAIDERS! We are scheduled to finish and ship the production to Zorro Productions in CA the week of Aug. 10th, and so far we are on track! We may present this program on our Sirius/XM show to kick off the fall season, but nothing set in stone yet. Watch this space for more info!

TICONDEROGA is what some around here are calling POWDER RIVER with muskets! Seth was taken off post production on this series to complete ZORRO, but he will soon be returning to finish post. It's a good one, folks! We're debating continuing the series with Season 2.

NEW ON AUDIBLE.COM

We have two new shows just released on Audible (well, new to Audible anyway) GUNS OF POWDER RIVER from 2007, THE RIVALS (2005).

GUNS OF POWDER RIVER is a feature length production based on our western series. Two families arrive in Clearmont, determined to reach California before the snow falls. Britt, Doc, Sheriff Wilkins, and Rusty escort them through dangerous territory on the long journey.

in THE RIVALS, The idealistic Lydia Languish reads nothing but romance novels, and in doing so, believes she can only find true love in the arms of a man without wealth. Captain Jack Absolute has fallen in love with her, and pretends to be a penniless ensign to win her heart. Coming between these two lovers are some of the most extraordinary comic characters ever to grace a stage: Sir Anthony Absolute; the misspeaking Mrs. Malaprop; the fiery Irishman from Clod Hall, Sir Lucius O'Trigger; and poor Bob Acres, a country squire who finds himself with a dueling pistol in hand.

Many other CRT titles are also available on Audible, including TREASURE ISLAND, THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW, BARRYMORE, FATHER BROWN, YANKEE CLIPPER, and the entire POWDER RIVER series.

Quick update

Just a quick update on things. I haven't been able to post as regularly as I would like as things are just so busy around here. Earlier this month I wrote the first draft screenplay of a movie we are pitching. Coming in at 144 pages, I then did a second draft, cutting it to 114 pages. In the meantime, Jeff Gage wrote two songs to go with it (it's an animated feature with about 6 songs), and we record the vocals for them this Thursday. The script ships off to London next week, so we've been working to get everything in good shape and ready to go.

Today I get to have the car inspected for a new sticker, and an oil change, and hopefully be back here for a live on the air interview on Sirius/XM. Next Monday night, our 1999 production GETTYSBURG will have its first broadcast!

Also, our third PERRY MASON production, THE CASE OF THE HOWLING DOG will be released in early July. Date TBA; I'll post it here as soon as I know.

THE COLONIAL RADIO SUMMER THEATER

It's summer, and that means Sirius/XM begins several weeks of brand new productions hitting the air for the first time. First up, starting today, is J.T. Turner in A VISIT WITH AESOP, and after that you will be hearing PERRY MASON, MOONFLEET, and GETTYSBURG. From June thru August, it's all new! Mon-Fri. 3am, 12pm, Saturdays 8am-10:30am, Sundays 8:30pm-11pm. EST.

Keeping Busy

Just finished writing a screenplay for a story we've been working on for a little over a year. Must admit it was fun writing for the screen instead of radio!

ZORRO AND THE PIRATE RAIDERS is in full swing with post production. The folks at Zorro Productions like what they have heard so far, so that's awesome! We are almost halfway finished with post.

Jeremy Benson will be replacing David Alley as the co-star in our new series JARREM LEE - GHOST HUNTER. David has been called to Hollywood for a 21 week shoot on a new series! How cool is that!? I'm very happy for him. David recorded 6 episodes before he got the good news, and Jeremy steps into episode 7 on Monday night. I was asked if I was worried about changing a lead actor mid-series; we already did it in THE NEW DIBBLE SHOW when Deniz Cordell took over the role of Jake from Nick Aalerud. Just remember the two Darren's from BEWITCHED. I think we'll be okay.

We have new programs airing on our SIRIUS/SM show this summer! I think they start next week; New shows include J.T. Turners A VISIT WITH AESOP, which kicks off the new line up; and watch for the 12 episode MOONFLEET, as well as PERRY MASON AND THE CASE OF THE VELVET CLAWS and PERRY MASON AND THE CASE OF THE SULKY GIRL. Also running July 4th weekend will be our 1999 production of GETTYSBURG. This is the first time this show has been broadcast, and it will run as a 3 hour special. So, keep checking the BOOK RADIO schedule on Sirius / XM for details. I'll post the times as soon as I get them.

Our third collaboration with the great Ray Bradbury has won us our 4th Ogle Award! THE HALLOWEEN TREE won the Silver Ogle for Best Fantasy production of 2008!