A Leyden jar is an electrical component that stores a high-voltage electric charge between electrical conductors on the inside and outside of a glass jar. It typically consists of a glass jar with metal foil cemented to the inside and the outside surfaces, and a metal terminal projecting vertically through the jar lid to make contact with the inner foil. It was the original form of the capacitor.
Radio drama is a dramatized, purely acoustic performance. With no visual component, radio drama depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine the characters and story: "It is auditory in the physical dimension but equally powerful as a visual force in the psychological dimension." Radio drama includes plays specifically written for radio, docudrama, dramatized works of fiction, as well as plays originally written for the theatre, including musical theatre, and opera.
In 1981, BBC Radio 4 produced a dramatisation of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings in 26 half-hour stereo instalments. The novel had previously been adapted as a 12-part BBC Radio adaptation in 1955 and 1956, and a 1979 production by The Mind's Eye for National Public Radio in the USA.
Thomas Nigel Kneale was a Manx screenwriter who wrote professionally for more than 50 years, was a winner of the Somerset Maugham Award, and was twice nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best British Screenplay.
Nick Carter is a fictional character who began as a dime novel private detective in 1886 and has appeared in a variety of formats over more than a century. The character was first conceived by Ormond G. Smith and created by John R. Coryell. Carter headlined his own magazine for years, and was then part of a long-running series of novels from 1964 to 1990. Films were created based on Carter in France, Czechoslovakia and Hollywood. Nick Carter has also appeared in many comic books and in radio programs.
The King's Demons is the sixth and final serial of the 20th season of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was originally broadcast on BBC1 on 15 and 16 March 1983. This serial introduced Kamelion, voiced by Gerald Flood, as a companion.
The Phantom Empire is a 1935 American Western serial film directed by Otto Brower and B. Reeves Eason and starring Gene Autry, Frankie Darro, and Betsy King Ross. This 12-chapter Mascot Pictures serial combined the Western, musical and science-fiction genres. The first episode is 30 minutes, the rest about 20 minutes. The serial film is about a singing cowboy who stumbles upon an ancient subterranean civilization living beneath his own ranch that becomes corrupted by unscrupulous greedy speculators from the surface. In 1940, a 70-minute feature film edited from the serial was released under the titles Radio Ranch or Men with Steel Faces. This was Gene Autry's first starring role, playing himself as a singing cowboy. It is considered to be the first science-fiction Western.
The Whispering Shadow is a 1933 American pre-Code mystery serial film directed by Colbert Clark and Albert Herman and starring Béla Lugosi in his first of five serial roles. Lugosi received $10,000, the highest known salary of his career, for this film. The serial was filmed in 12 days and was the last role for actor Karl Dane.
The Lone Ranger is a 1938 American Republic Movie serial based on the radio program of the same name. It was the ninth of the sixty-six serials produced by Republic, the fourth Western and the first Republic serial release of 1938. The following year a sequel serial The Lone Ranger Rides Again was released. The fifteen chapters of the serial were condensed into the film Hi-Yo Silver, which was released in 1940.
Louis Joseph Gasnier was a French-American film director, producer, screenwriter and stage actor. A cinema pioneer, Gasnier shepherded the early career of comedian Max Linder, co-directed the enormously successful film serial The Perils of Pauline (1914) and capped his output with the notorious low-budget exploitation film Reefer Madness (1936) which was both a critical and box office failure.
Guy Edward Hearn was an American actor who, in a forty-year film career, starting in 1915, played hundreds of roles, starting with juvenile leads, then, briefly, as leading man, all during the silent era.
The Diamond Queen is a 1921 American adventure film serial directed by Edward A. Kull. The film is considered to be lost. The creator of the story Jacques Futrelle was lost in the Titanic disaster in 1912.
The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe is a 1922 American adventure film serial directed by Robert F. Hill and based upon the 1719 novel by Daniel Defoe. It is now considered to be a lost film.
In the Days of Buffalo Bill is a 1922 American silent Western film serial directed by Edward Laemmle. The film, which consisted of 18 episodes, is currently classified as lost.
The Ace of Spades is a 1925 American silent Western film serial directed by Henry MacRae. The serial is considered to be a lost film.
Plunder is a 1923 American drama film serial directed by George B. Seitz. During the production of this serial, on August 10, 1922, John Stevenson, a stuntman for Pearl White, was killed doing a stunt from a moving bus to an elevated platform. The film survives in the UCLA Film and Television Archive and a trailer is preserved at the Library of Congress.
The Man from M.A.R.S. is a 1922 silent U.S. science fiction film. It is notable for using the 3-D process called Teleview, similar to today's alternating frame 3-D systems. Shown in 3-D only at the Selwyn Theater in New York City, it was previewed as Mars Calling at a trade and press screening on October 13, 1922, premiered as M.A.R.S. on December 27, 1922, and ran through January 20, 1923. A 2-D version was distributed as Radio-Mania in 1923–1924. The film was directed by Roy William Neil and photographed by George J. Folsey.
Albert J. Smith was an American film actor. He appeared in more than 80 films between 1921 and 1937.
The Rose of Paris is a 1924 American drama film directed by Irving Cummings and written by Melville W. Brown, Edward T. Lowe Jr., Lenore Coffee, and Bernard McConville. It is based on the 1922 novel Mitsi by Ethel M. Dell. The film stars Mary Philbin, Robert Cain, John St. Polis, Rose Dione, Dorothy Revier, and Gino Corrado. The film was released on November 9, 1924, by Universal Pictures.
A serial film,film serial, movie serial, or chapter play, is a motion picture form popular during the first half of the 20th century, consisting of a series of short subjects exhibited in consecutive order at one theater, generally advancing weekly, until the series is completed. Usually, each serial involves a single set of characters, protagonistic and antagonistic, involved in a single story, which has been edited into chapters after the fashion of serial fiction and the episodes cannot be shown out of order or as a single or a random collection of short subjects.
