Murder, He Says (1945)

Pete Marshall: It's like looking for a needle in a... a slaughter house.

Trivia: In this wacky 1945 comedy (starring Fred MacMurray, Helen Walker, Marjorie Main, Peter Whitney and Porter Hall), the entire life-or-death plot is driven by a nonsense rhyme that must be decoded: "Honors Flysis, Income Beezis, Onches Nobis, Inob Keesis." The rhyme translates: "On horse flies is, In comb bees is, On chest knob is, In knob keys is" (and, indeed, the hero and heroine of the story eventually discover a valuable safe deposit box key hidden within a knob on a wooden chest). Throughout the film, this nonsense rhyme is repeatedly delivered as a simple but catchy 8-note musical ditty (that was also the movie's main theme song). Some 26 years later, when National Public Radio debuted "All Things Considered" in 1971 (its first news program in the United States), the radio show featured a simple and yet very-familiar musical intro that was credited to composer Don Vogeli. However, many listeners instantly recognized the "All Things Considered" intro as the theme music to "Murder, He Says," composed by Robert Emmett Dolan in 1944. National Public Radio was apparently oblivious to this amazing similarity. In fact, years after "All Things Considered" became their flagship news program, NPR conducted a listener contest inviting the audience to submit original lyrics for the established "All Things Considered" intro tune. To NPR's consternation, many hundreds of listeners contributed the lyrics: "Honors Flysis, Income Beezis, Onches Nobis, Inob Keesis."

Charles Austin Miller