Call-In Radio Show : Lonely Voices in the Night Discover Love on Airwaves

Susan Block hears voices in the night:

“I’m a model and I’m also a former Playboy bunny, so I’m not a dog.”

“I’m interested in astrology, life extension, bicycling, erotic cuisine--whoops, exotic cuisine.”

“I’m looking for a mature guy, between 30 and 40, who’s got his act together.”

“I don’t find anything strange about meeting people on the radio. It’s normal. Nothing is strange to me anymore. Not after living here.”

“Susan Block’s Match Night” is broadcast Mondays from 9 to 11 p.m. on KFOX-FM in Redondo Beach. Anyone who has ever squirmed through an episode of “Love Connection” or “Dating Game” on television has some idea of why “Match Night” is a success.

‘Audio Voyeurism’

The program is more than a radio call-in show for singles on the hunt. It is a cultural phenomenon spawned by life and loneliness in Los Angeles, a courtship ritual combining aspects of the 19th, 20th and possibly the 21st centuries. It has been called the ultimate in “audio voyeurism” and safe sex.

“We don’t push anybody into anything,” said Block, the program host, during an interview in the cramped KFOX studio on the Redondo Beach Pier.

The program is like a party, she said, where “the hostess brings you together but you don’t have to give your phone number or go home with anyone. . . . Basically, people are auditioning for a relationship.”

“Match Night” starts with the crashing strains of the Doors’ “Hello, I Love You” and lead singer Jim Morrison asking if he can “jump in your game.”

Then Block jumps in, a wiry dynamo whose charm takes on a frenzied quality as the show progresses. She presides over the next two hours as matchmaker, talk show philosopher and performer in what she calls the “Andy Warhol school of art.”

Callers--from as far as the San Fernando Valley and Pasadena--describe themselves and their interests, then are introduced to other callers who have been screened to get a sense of their compatibility. If they express interest in each other, they continue talking off the air and receive free dinners or tickets from advertisers.

Women are given the men’s phone numbers; the decision to follow through is left to them. Identification numbers are also provided so listeners can write to callers who strike their fancy, in care of the station. In either case, couples will have communicated more than once before they meet.

Nonetheless, program staffers urge caution and recommend that the first face-to-face meeting occur in a public place.

They also try to ferret out prank callers such as “fraternity boys with toilet mouths who make barnyard noises and talk about their anatomies,” Block said.

Each program examines a theme about relationships: “How do you let a member of the opposite sex know you’re interested?” “Do you think monogamy is natural?” “What annoys you most about the opposite sex?”

There is an accompanying barrage of unabashedly corny sound effects and songs--”You Can Get It If You Really Want,” “Tell Her About It”--as well as news flashes poking fun at celebrities’ love lives and conversations with guests such as author Erica Jong, Screw magazine publisher Al Goldstein (by car phone) and actress Udana Power of “General Hospital.”

Offers Commentaries

Block also offers brief commentaries on the state of romance. On a recent show, she discussed the theme of “Mixing Business and Pleasure,” saying the “sex-phobic ‘80s” have turned “the Summer of Love into the Winter of Work,” converted wealth into the ultimate sex symbol and replaced romance with yearning for a “mutually beneficent business partnership.”

Block then talked to a caller named Terry, a secretary who said she worked out at a gym six days a week and was looking for a mature man in the wake of an office romance that soured, forcing her to change jobs.

Producer Susan Steinberg gave Block the thumbs-up from the other side of the control booth window, pointing to one of several cards she had taped to the glass bearing the names and ages of male callers on hold.

Terry was introduced to Larry, a recently divorced 31-year-old, fitness enthusiast and consultant in the “business opportunity business.”

With Terry giggling and Larry playing the suave conversationalist, Block guided Cupid’s arrow. At Block’s prompting, Terry described herself as “nice-looking. They say I am. I don’t mean to brag.”

‘What Do You Look Like?’

Larry responded by saying he had a “good build. But what really counts is on the inside.”

Right. By an overwhelming margin, the first thing callers ask about is physical appearance, Block said. “You have an opportunity to say whatever you want,” she said. “But 85% ask, ‘What do you look like?’ ”

After further repartee between Larry and Terry, Block cut things short, awarding the prospective couple free theater tickets.

Although the program has done no scientific research, executive producer Warren Jason estimates that “Match Night” has an audience of 45,000 to 55,000.

As the program’s popularity grows, Block and Jason have expanded their fledgling electronic courtship empire, Block Party Productions.

Personal Ad Services

The show promotes the company’s several 976 numbers that provide personal ad services. For $2, callers can record messages describing themselves and the ideal object of their desire or listen to other messages, all organized according to sexual orientation, preferences and geography. Some of the ads are played on the radio show.

“The big criticism of 976 numbers has been that they’re sleazy,” said Jason, who wrote the computer program that operates the 24-hour phone lines. “We’re trying to change that by making our lines more formal and, therefore, safer.”

Block also uses the show to promote her book, “Advertising for Love: How to Play the Personals.”

Block said she and Jason are discussing numerous projects: moving to a larger radio station, syndicating the program nationally, matching celebrities on the air, a “Match Night” for homosexuals and, yes, a television version.

The show answers a surging demand, its creators say. It began three years ago after Block, who studied theater at Yale and worked as a journalist in San Francisco, wrote an article about personal ads that became the basis for her book.

In Search of Traditional

While the concept of meeting strangers over the radio may sound typically Southern Californian, Block says most callers are looking for a traditional, long-term relationship.

Inhabitants of an increasingly foreboding and alienating social landscape, they turn for companionship to the technology on which they were weaned, the telephone and the radio.

“We’re addressing a problem,” Block said, predicting that the next decade will be known as the “nesting ‘90s” because more people will spend more time in their fortified, high-technology homes. “Everyone’s out there looking for a way to meet people. I see us as something to help ease the problem.”

Obed F. Woods, a marriage and family counselor in Torrance, said the existence of the show “is a real statement on how isolated we have become. We are willing to develop relationships with people we have never met.”

There is nothing unhealthy about meeting people through such a program if precautions are taken, Woods said in an interview, adding that one positive aspect is that first impressions are not based wholly on physical appearance.

‘Doesn’t Seem Very Natural’

“As a professional, I can’t find much wrong with it,” Woods said. “But personally, it doesn’t seem very natural. Maybe I don’t trust electronics as much as some younger people do.”

Janelle Hopkins, 21, is a former “Match Night” junkie. Block and Jason said a group of regular callers have found relationships and even marriages via the airwaves.

Asked how many men she dated through the show, Hopkins laughed and said, “Oh my God. I don’t know. Maybe 30 in the past two years. There were only a few weird ones. I never got attacked or anything.”

Hopkins said she used to listen to the program with friends for entertainment. But she called in one day “for the fun of it” and met Donny.

“I couldn’t believe how gorgeous he was,” she said.

Screening Calls

Hopkins received 15 letters as a result of that first call. Her date with Donny and several other men led to relationships. She became such a devotee of the show that she went to work on the program screening calls.

“What I liked about it is that it was different than meeting someone in person,” she said. “When you talk to them on the phone, it’s easier to talk for some reason. In a club, you can’t really tell if they just want to pick you up because they like your body or something. It’s nice to know the mental part first.”

Hopkins said most of the callers she talked to were serious.

“People are busy. People are scared of AIDS. I think they’re looking for real relationships.”