This is a snippet from Breaking Walls Episode 102: The Return of Johnny Dollar (1955)

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On December 7th, 1948, film veteran Dick Powell recorded an audition for a new detective series called, Yours Truly Johnny Dollar. Powell had been an a-list crooner in the 1930s, starring in both musicals and comedies at Warner Brothers and Paramount. He was also the emcee of radio’s Campana Serenade.

His career changed in 1944 when Powell was cast as Raymond Chandler’s private eye Philip Marlowe, in Murder My Sweet. The Lux Radio Theater broadcast an adaptation on June 6th, 1945.

Two weeks later Powell was starring as Richard Rogue in Rogue’s Gallery on NBC. The series was a summer replacement for the Fitch Bandwagon. When Fitch returned in the Fall, Mutual Broadcasting picked the show up. It lasted for one season on Mutual before returning for a final thirteen weeks on NBC in the summer of 1946.

Simultaneously on film Powell made Cornered, Johnny O’Clock, To The Ends of the Earth, and Pitfall. Wanting to get back into network radio, he recorded this Dollar audition just before Christmas.