The Old Acquaintance: The Adventures of Philip Marlowe (December 26, 1948)

“The Old Acquaintance” is an episode of The Adventures of Philip Marlowe, the old-time radio show, first broadcast December 26, 1948. Listen free on Stupid Potato.

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What happens

Private detective Philip Marlowe is hired on New Year's Eve by insurance broker Paul Riker to find his fiancée Nancy Marshall, who has disappeared and told Riker she's in terrible trouble. When someone takes shots at Marlowe's office, he pursues the shooter's pickup truck and then investigates Nancy's villa, where he discovers a newspaper story about three escaped convicts—including a man named Steve Doyle whose photograph matches one found in Nancy's home. Marlowe encounters a mysterious woman at the villa who identifies herself as an old acquaintance and forces him at gunpoint into a closet before disappearing.

Los Angeles on New Year's Eve: Marlowe's office, Nancy Marshall's villa on North Havenhurst Drive, and Jerry Graff's mechanic shop and slot machine operation.

Characters: Philip Marlowe, Paul Riker, Nancy Marshall, Steve Doyle, The mysterious woman, Jerry Graff, Fred, Lieutenant Ibarra

Listen for: The identity and motives of the mysterious woman at Nancy's villa; the connection between escaped convict Steve Doyle and Nancy Marshall; what Jerry Graff reveals about his involvement with the pickup truck and the escaped convict.

Written from the episode itself; it never gives away the ending. Every recording is remastered for the stream: cleaned of rumble, hiss and mains hum (and the old TV whine where we found it), then levelled in two passes to steady broadcast loudness, so one show is never quieter than the next.