Sidney Slon

Sidney Slon

Real Name

Sidney Slon

Employers

Street & Smith

Titles

The Shadow Radio Show

Biography:

Gender

Male

First "Shadow" publication

Phantom Fingerprints (Radio Show)

Creations

Moses Shrevnitz (Radio Show)

Place of Birth

Chicago , Illinois , United States of America

Date of Birth

Date of Death

May 27, 1910

January 21, 1995

Professional History

Sidney Slon was a radio scriptwriter who wrote several episodes for "The Shadow" and "The CBS Radio Mystery Theatre" during the 1930s and '40s.

Prior to becoming a writer, he studied acting in the Goodman Theater in Chicago. He then moved to New York City in 1933 to pursue a career as a performer. He encountered some success on radio and assumed various character roles on "Famous Jury Trials," "The Life of Mary Sothern" and playing Solly in the comedy "The Goldbergs."

In 1938, he became the writer of The Shadow Radio Show starring Orson Welles. Though credited for bringing the character "Shrevie" into the show, his most influential episode is perhaps The Laughing Corpse. Slon's script introduced the listeners to a mad chemist who injected his victims with a poison that induces laughter before death. Batman's villain The Joker is believed to be inspired by this episode. It should be noted that The Joker made his comic book debut in the spring of 1940, only a few months after the show aired.

Slon's scripts for The Shadow were well written, gritty, short stories which were filled with "pulp" elements. Many of them were about death house inmates seeking revenge or cold blooded killers somehow returning from the grave. All of them concluding with a reasonable, but ghastly, explanation to how the crimes were committed.

After leaving radio in the 1950s, Slon produced and wrote for some of the earliest television series, including "Big Town" and "Sergeant Preston of the Yukon." He also wrote, "Invitation to Paris," a musical tour of the city with actor Maurice Chevalier, which aired on ABC-TV in April of 1960.

In the 1960s, he left the entertainment business and went to work for a family enterprise.

In January of 1995, he died at a nursing home in Ramapo, N.Y. He was 84 years old.

Work History

• Publications that "Sidney Slon" Wrote

Notes

• No special notes.

Trivia

• No trivia.

See Also

• Gallery of Sidney Slon's pictures

Official Website

• None.
  

Links and References

• Recommended:

• Episodes written by Edward Hale Bierstadt.