A predictable plot but still a good story.

I was not sure how this episode was going to end. Did not end like I thought it would. Great ending. This episode had Richard Crenna and Sam Edwards. The only appearance on CBSRMT for these two actors. Janet Waldo, Casey Kasem, and Virginia Gregg were in three episodes or less as well. This episode is full of commercials, which I love, and top of the hour news about President Ford. I gave this episode 5 stars.

Yep.💭 Everything he ☝️ said!!👏💥😄

I fell asleep twice on this....which means its good to me. I am back for round three....think I will make it this time.

Funny how as a kid back in 1974, I never fell asleep listening to Mystery Theater. I found every episode riveting. Now at age 56, I can never make it through an entire episode without falling asleep! Fell asleep last night trying to listen to this one. Woke back up and heard these people in hushed tones droning on and on in the background. At first I didn't know who I was or were I was going! Maybe I'll give it another try in the day time while sitting up and see if I can get through to the end. No need for any sleep medication if I listen to these old episodes while laying down, Lol

I remember listening to this episode in bed when I was 11. I definitely didn’t fall asleep!

I made it through to the end...awesome!

A small group of people all end up on a mysterious flight to a place they don’t know, but they do know they fear. (Stars: Richard Crenna, Casey Kasam). A little drawn out and moralistic, but it works!

Two people, a young girl and an older man, awaken from a sleep to find themselves as the only passengers on a large airplane. They do not know why they are there. They are not easily able to even recall their names. They talk about this strange situation for a bit in an attempt to figure out an explanation. The plane stops briefly at an unknown destination and more people appear on the plane. After departure they too awaken without knowing why they are there. Join them on their flight as they start to deduce what is happening to them.

Two people wake up on a plane, unsure of their names and having no idea of why they are there and where they are going. On the way, they make two stops and pick up three more people, all in the same circumstances.

A diverse group of people find themselves on an airliner... They don't know where they are going or how they got on the plane. It's just what you think. Ho hum. Not badly done though.

Casey Kasem appears again in this episode! Two individuals find themselves waking onboard a plane on a strange flight for which there are more questions than answers. The elderly stewardess is gentle but provides no answers, the captain locks them in their seats for their stops during which they pick up a few more people. None of them seem to know where they are or why they are on the flight, but as they talk they begin to work things out.

Good one. Full commercials and news makes for a real trip back to 1970s. Fun cast too. Sam Edwards voice of Tigger, Richard Crenna voice of Walter (Our Miss Brooks), Casey Kasem voice of American Top 40, Virginia Gregg so many radio & TV shows & the voice of Mrs. Bates in the Psycho movies, Janet Waldo so many radio & TV voices including... Judy Jetson - Penelope Pitstop - Josie McCoy in Josie and the Pussycats.

I have heard this several times and it is a great episode. I did not like the ending but it was still a very good episode and very well written. But Casey Casim (spelling) is great in this one.

The music is mystifying and Casey Kasem did a good job. However, after listening to this episode, the storyline reminds me of that SOUTH PARK episode called "Dead Celebrities" from 2009. Listen to this CBSRMT episode first, then watch the show and you'll know what I mean.

This was a poor episode, I thought, but still sort of interesting in a variety of ways. The story is painfully obvious almost from the beginning, and yet it's not until the end of Act 2 that a character finally announces what every listener in the land must have realized a half an hour before--that they're all dead, and en route to hell. Act 3, then, becomes a bunch of heavy moralizing about each person's past --complete with Casey Kasem, the voice of America's Top 40, playing not one but two roles!--until the deus ex machina ending arrives, magically offering everyone a second chance. (By the way, there was a thread a while back about religiously-themed RMTs--I don't know if this one was listed, but it certainly should have been.) Still, I did find this interesting. Structurally it's very unusual. There are no scene breaks at all; the entire tale takes place in real time (or "hell time," maybe). But what struck me most was the fact that, if I hadn't heard differently in the opening credits, I would have sworn we were listening to the writing not of Ian Martin but of Arch Oboler, the OTR giant behind LIGHTS OUT, ARCH OBOLER'S PLAYS and many other series. In fact, in general outline it's not unlike an Oboler play called "Special to Hollywood," in which a group of people are trapped in a plane suspended in midair (Bette Davis starred in the original production). Anyway, the style here is very much like his, and he must have been in the back of Ian Martin's mind as he wrote this play. Naturally nowadays no one can listen to a play about people trapped in an airplane without thinking of 9/11 (especially if you've just seen the movie UNITED 93), but that doesn't make this utterly inert piece any more dramatically compelling. I've long been very interested in Arch Oboler, so this show managed to hold my attention; but in terms of drama it's dull, obvious, and wa-a-a-y too long.

I think CC said it all and said it best. The only thing I could add is that it did touch interestingly on some adult themes, in the sense of, what is it that adults can feel guilty about? I found that a little surprising for RMT. Other than that I agree that it was tough to keep myself in suspense when I figured out the outcome five minutes into the play.

i try to imagine the writers of 1975, fresh off the heels of the fabulous television and radio writing of the 1960s, trying to maintain fresh, new ideas and experimenting with different and alternative plot styles. i applaud this episode for trying to rally in the human condition and centering around a very rare topic of the times: guilt. in a time when crime dramas and thrillers were the genres of choice for most writers, Ian Martin - perhaps influenced by Oboler, perhaps not - decided to take an almost Elspeth Eric approach to a cliché scenario of a group of people trapped. It's possibly a traditional, thematic twisting of The Tempest, Swiss Family Robinson, or even Hitchcock's, Lifeboat, and for Martin to have explored the role of guilt within the characters, i thought, was done well, especially in the sense of experimentation. While the program was obvious and predictable right from the start, i truly enjoyed the way the events unfolded. there are some terrific, small details which enhance the immersion, like the knife, the prostitute's eveningware, the business card, the smoking, and even the seat belts and seat belt signs. The concentration on character development within a 48 minute program was, i thought, quite tight. The rhythm and pace of the show was also worth noting. I felt there was enough about this program to make a fair study of human emotion, despite not being the most original setting for it. i gave it a "good" rating overall, but for me personally, it was more in line with "very good" and i enjoyed the program. just a few thoughts.

My only question is if they take the second chance are they to wake up in the condition they were in when they were killed? The punk survives a bullit thru the heart and goes on trial for killing a cop.(Remember there was no death penalty in 1975).Talk about a near death expierience.

for me, that was the beauty of the show. i can only agree that the bulk of the show was full of droll cliché, but the whole take on guilt and morality and, indeed, the idea of a "second chance" was very intriguing. i thought about it for some time after listening. my assumption is that the people go back right to the moment when they were killed. from there, they had to make their ammends, one way or another - for better or for worse. anyhow, just saying is all.

Actually, this is an episode that I'm quite fond of it, whatever its faults.

This episode was OK. It reminded me a little of a Stephen King story that I read a long time ago called, "The Langoliers". I guess just because both stories took place on a plane. I had a hard time staying focused on this storyline but it was strange to hear Casey Kasem's voice in the story! The general message was an intriguing one...it kind of makes you consider the question, "What will I be doing when I die?"

Quote: I had a hard time staying focused on this storyline but it was strange to hear Casey Kasem's voice in the story! It would have been fun to hear E. G. Marshall on an "outro" for this episode saying: "A woman listener wrote me recently and she said, 'Dear E.G....' "

"Here's a long-distance dedication from a plane..."

Good show. Kinda cliche, but I still like that one.

Quote: This episode was OK. It reminded me a little of a Stephen King story that I read a long time ago called, "The Langoliers". I guess just because both stories took place on a plane. I had a hard time staying focused on this storyline but it was strange to hear Casey Kasem's voice in the story! The general message was an intriguing one...it kind of makes you consider the question, "What will I be doing when I die?" Nothing original to say here. JWeb wrote what I was thinking throughout listening to this episode. This was rather twilight zone-esque, I thought. I, also, was reminded of "The Langoliers" for some odd reason; perhaps because I just watched the movie version, last Christmas. As far as Kasem, I kept picturing Shaggy from Scooby-Doo sitting on the plane..which made it rather comical. As for what I'm gonna do when I die, I haven't decided yet.

Indeed it was predictable. I found myself going through the archives looking for Casey Kassem episodes. He has done voices for so much! Such a recognizable voice, kind of like one of my personal favorites, Fred Gwynne!

I guess I am one of the rare people that don't care much for Casey Kasem but I am probably in the minority there. But, I listened to this episode the other day myself and it was a good one. The ending was not what I expected it to be. Kind of a bubblegum ending for an otherwise riveting plot.

No doubt, the plane was from USair.

Comparisons to the Stephen King "Langoliers" story are apt here. Also, worth tuning in if your recording has the "Carvel" ice cream commercial after Act 1 - try and understand the founder (Tom Carvel) as the interviewer.

Love this episode! One of my favorites along with "The Black Whale".

Casey Kasem, what a voice!

I've always been rather fond of this episode. Does it have it's faults? Of course it does. But even so, it's still a kind of intriguing premise. And that brings up why I'm posting here. Many of the above posts are comparing this story to others they've experienced—most referenced from TV shows or books of the past 20 years. This story comes from the later 3rd of 1975, and with that frame of reference came first. With so much media that we as audiences today are exposed to, what plot or premise hasn't been thought of already? In fact, some movies these days are on their 3rd "re-imaginings" from their original appearances in the 70s and 80s. IMHO, "Ghost Plane" was written in a rather halcyon time of broadcast storytelling; great ABC Movies of the Week (i.e., "Brian's Song", "Duel," "The Night Stalker"), landmark studio & indie films (Godfather, Exorcist, Network, Jaws, Omen, Halloween, etc.) even radio dramas like CBS RMT and Zero Hour were being produced. Stories of their kind might be way more predicable when heard in today's context, but back then not so much. "Ghost Plane" was a drama written for its time; like "Twilight Zone", like "Night Gallery", like "Outer Limits" and countless others too.

You're going to need a good supply of body bags.

Intrigue. Suspense. Who's doing it? What's going to happen? This episode has it all to keep the listener happy and entertained. Good to hear Casey Kasem portraying another role different from Scooby Doo's Shaggy. Love the old radio advertisements and commercials as well. Janet Waldo, one of the great lady radio performers of all time. Richard Crenna, a good radio personality no doubt!. Virginia, Sam, and Ian were superb in this story too.

I found this to be a good story and I enjoyed the news and commercials in the file as well. It was somewhat predictable, but still a good listen.

Arch Oboler did this same type of story much better years before this episode. I thought this was a weak episode and very predictable, not to mention boring.

Intriguing episode; when National Public Radio reran the CBS Radio Mystery Theater in the late 1990s, I actually heard this episode. Oddly enough, at the time I didn't know that the radio dramas NPR was running at the time were episodes of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater. Basically when I heard this episode back then, I was just starting to watch Scooby Doo reruns as well and was just starting to become a Scooby Doo fan. I knew Casey Kasem was the voice of Shaggy(due partly to surfing the net a lot and finding it out) and I picked up his voice pretty quick when I heard the character he played in this; considering i'm a big old school Hanna-Barbera cartoon fan, I thought it was rather funny that two veteran voice actors from Hanna-Barbera(Casey Kasem and Janet Waldo) were both in the same episode. It was actually this episode and an episode called The Grey Ghost that got me hooked onto the CBS Mystery Theater; except I didn't find that out as I mentioned until some years later, after that I really got into listening to the series and that's how I found out about this website and started listening to the series on a regular basis.

a very powerful and compelling episode that did not disappoint..

Great performances. Enjoyed the 101 minutes of this particular episode. Must rank as 1 of the longest dramas in all of the episodes of CBSRMT.

This is one of the better episodes. The story is engrossing. There are two celebrity voices. There is a good moral message. This one can be enjoyed more than once!

One of the best..great story..great acting!

Interesting update on the 1923 Play by Sutton Vane entitled Outward Bound. The play has been made a couple times into a movie. The 1930 movie with Douglas Fairbanks and Leslie Howard and the 1944 remake entitled Between two worlds.

Certainly one of the best episodes! I was very moved and hung on every word! God is good!

Did Casey’s character say ‘shit’ in Act II? Caught me off guard; maybe I mis-heard?

Classic CBSRMT Episode with the cream of the crop of voice actors assembled in an intriguing mystery story. From the great Richard Crenna to the awesomely memorable voice of Virginia “Mrs. Bates” Gregg, we complete the troop with two of our favorite cartoon actors in serious adult roles. Janet Waldo’s performance keeps you removed from her Judy Jetson image. It is, however, a wee bit challenging to not hear Shaggy with Casey’s groovy acting as a threatening hood ! Five Stars !⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️