OTR's "Smelly" Clark, Charlie Razorscum and Rochester Van Jones Shine as Superman Eavesdrops!

It's time to smile again with your old pals "Vic & Sade" and Jack Benny as we relive just a little piece of the golden age of OldTime Radio.


Our first "Vic & Sade" episode is from November 6, 1939 and at the very end, we come a fraction of a second from hearing another characters voice as Charlie Razorscum comes to the door. I suspect this was Paul Rhymer's little joke and nod to the audience to all those who had caught on that he was working all this magic with but three voices.

The episode also has yet another reference to the bill for $2 that Kleeburger's Department Store keeps sending to Vic. I don't know if there was ever an episode (remember, thousands were lost) ever explained the root of this bill...but I doubt it. It's funny wnough on it's own.

Favorite VicandSade-onyms from this episode? After Sade asks Rush if he'd washed his hands after loading the coal bin, Rush assures her that his hands are "Clean as toast!"

Let's listen in, shall we?...



The next "Vic & Sade" is from November 7, 1939. In this one Rush recounts a tale from the street and how "Smelly" Clark stood before his peers and gave a speech. A speech as impromptu and well spoken as it was full of hubris. This all left Rush as "Impressed as a horse".

I lay it before you now...

"Fellas, you all know me, I am 'Smelly' Clark. I have been checking up on myself and I wish to tell you, I am deeply gratified with my discoveries. Fellas, this is November 1939, a whole year has passed since November 1938. 365 days. Fellows, in those 365 days, I have not stood still. I have grown in mind and body. The radience of the streetlight is playing across my features as I utter these words and I think you can plainly tell that I am sincere."

Since Novemer of 1938 I have become smarter, taller, nobler, richer and better-lookin'. If I were to pass away in the next 5 minutes I believe it could be truthfully said that the world was better for my havin' lived."

I am young in years yet, fellas, but my career thus far has given promise of a glorious future. There are those that say I am wonderful. I do not say that I am wonderful, because that would sound like braggin'. When people come up to me on the street and tell me I'm wonderful, I wave my hand carelessly and remark 'Let time tell the story.'."

I would give the last drop of blood in my body for mother, home and friends. I would gladly die for the things dearest to my heart."

Fellas, I am smart, I am strong, I am good-lookin'. I am patriotic, I am brave, I am gentle, I am kind, I am generous. I protect the young, I defend the weak, I obey the laws. I am neat, clean, tender, sympathetic, intelligent, industrious, thrifty, sweet-tempered, courageous and handsome. I am spruce, tidy, trim, dapper, vigorous, hearty, hale, useful, witty, tried and true...."

Man oh man, now THAT'S daily affirmation that would make Stewart Smalley blush.

What a world it would be if all 16 year old's could stand and say this truthfully. But still, it's no wonder it ended like it did.

Give a listen...



In "Speaking of Radio: The Jack Benny Program" part 8 of 12 brings us two pieces of the program it would be hard to envision without.

First up, the heart and soul of the cast, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson is spotlighted with an all-too-brief recollection by writer george Balzer on Eddie's history with the show. Describing Anderson's first appearance as a pullman porter named "Syracuse". Then a later episode in which the real life Anderson was briefly lost at sea during a deep-sea fishing trip off Catalina, and was rescued the day of the live show and how the script was re-written to acknowledge the happening.

Next up Balzer relates the history and variations of "Anaheim, Asuza and Cuc.............amonga!", with clips and highlights of train station goings on with Frank Nelson, Mel Blanc and Sheldon Leonard making Jack's life miserable.

Interestingly enough, Jack Benny was so appreciated by these 3 little-known (Disneyland was still a decade away from putting Anaheim on the map) California towns, a year after the running gag began on his show in 1945, all three named Jack an honorary citizen.

Here's some great shots of Jack visiting them in later years.

Jack Benny (and Johnny Carson) opening the Anaheim train depot in 1963...

Jack Benny at the opening ceremony for the Asuza Civic Center in 1966...

Jack may not have gotten to Cucamonga, but here he is in 1966 or 7 at the at the Regina winery (later Filippi) in Etiwanda...

I used to work in Ontario, California and my office was situated at a spot between Etiwanda and Cucamonga and I could have easily walked to either...so I figure this is close enough.

Sidebar up for all you developers and land barons who insist on now calling your town "Rancho Cucamonga" or even more snobbily, just plain "Rancho". You'll NEVER be as famous OR as cool as when Jack Benny and Mel Blanc used to tout your name! So just give it a rest.

P.S. (Post Sidebar) You were Orange and Grape country...don't you have to raise cows to be a "rancho"?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

But I digress...enjoy the show!




Talk to you soon.

BONUS: For you Halloweener's...take a trip in the wayback machine to the post I did for Orson Welles' "The War of the Worlds" last year. It's a gooooooood listen, find it here!

OTR Friday - Vic & Sade and Jack Benny...Radio Comedy at it's Best

"Jello again!" it's "Time to smile again." with my two favorite radio series of all time, Vic & Sade and Jack Benny.

When I hear either of these programs, I sit back and I swear, every part of my body must be smiling. I don't think my condition is contageous, but I sure wish it was...I could hip the whole of the English speaking world to some really good stuff.

First up, our continuing appreciation of Vic & Sade, the midwestern family who seemed to be all of us...

You're right if you noticed that the teen-aged boy in the above picture was NOT Billy "Rush Gook" Idelson alongside our heroes Art "Vic" Van Harvey and Bernadine "Sade" Flynn...but that's a story for muuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuch later in the series. I only chose the pic for today because there is a serious lacking of Vic & Sade cast images out there.

Show #1 for today is from April 25, 1939. Rotten Davis (one of Rush's school chums...albeit a few years advanced at 19 years old...actually the older brother of Rooster Davis) has found himself in the steady company of a young lady. The issue being, Rotten's allowance doesn't allow him to take a lady friend on the town every day of the week, so he's begun to impose on the company of the couple half way up in the next block, Vic and Sade Gook.

The niceties of social interactions and the dilema of how Vic & Sade can entertain Rotten and his lady friend while expecting Fred and Ruthie Stembottom for a game of 500 are rich comedy fodder in Paul Rhymer's hands.

Such a pedestrian situation is pure comedy gold here...



From April 26, 1939 this episode has Sade full appreciation for human generosity as she fawns over the new luggage that was given her by Mr. and Mis' Donahue.

The opening is rich with wonderful language as Rush recounts almost-a-fight between Leroy Snow and Milton Welch over at the vacant lot while Vic makes it through his routine in his signature humor. "Proceed me to the living room. We'll look over the pile of important letters,telegrams and trans-oceanic cables that have arrived in our absence." I wish Vic would narrate the drudgery of my life sometimes.

This may be a good time to point out the obvious that is sometimes NOT. With all the interactions we've heard with Fred and Ruthie Stembottom, Mr. and Mis' Donahue, Aunt Bess, Mr. Erickson, Mr. Gumpoc, Blue-Tooth Johson, Rooster Davis, Rotten Davis, and the rest...please note that there are only 3 speaking rolls (later 4) in the entire show.

In this wonderful audio-only medium, Paul Rhymer lets your imagination participate even more, by never letting you hear any of the characters speak. All you think you know about all these perephery characters (the sounds of their voices, their attitudes, their actions) is supplied simply through conversations by Vic, Sade and Rush.

Oh...and they never leave their house on the show either.

Enjoy...



Jack Benny. That's all I have to say to make me start to giggle.

Jack Benny broke into radio in 1932 as a guest on Ed Sullivan's program. At the time Sulivan was doing a sports themed show (as Jack recalls in an interview) and had Jack on as a guest. Jack Benny was probably well known to Sullivan as a vaudevilly comedian appearing on Broadway and in and around New York frequently. The sponsors of Sullivan's show (The Canada Dry Company) liked Benny so much, they signed him onto a show of his own almost immediately. From Canada Dry Jack went to The American Tire Company and then to General Foods who had Jack barking for Jello gelatine and Grape Nuts cereal for over a decade, from there he jumped to the American Tobacco Co. and pitched Lucky Strikes for well over the next decade.

From 1932 to 1952, Jack hosted a show every Sunday night for 20 years for 39 weeks a year. The show was in repeats till 1955, but by 1950 Jack had been double timing it on television, and after a few years there did specials and guest appearance right up to his death in the 1970's.

Doing what he loved from the 1920's to the 1970's. I'm very jealous.

There was a retrospective of the Jack Benny Program produced for radio, from what sounds like the 1970's under the title "Speaking of Radio". The show is a 6 hour crash course into all things Benny and features interviews with Jack and every major player on the show. Today I'd like to bring you the first half hour in the 12 part series. It's enjoyable on it's own merits with said interviews and clips from the show showing hints of the creativity and just solid entertainment of the show...I hope you take the time to listen in...it may be the best 30 minutes of your day. ...Not counting the 30 minutes of Vic & Sade above.

This first entry in the series, not only features Jack Benny himself telling the tale of his radio career, but also Sheldon Leonard (above). Leonard you will remember from the many gangster rolls he played in TV and movies for many years (including Harry the Horse in "Guys and Dolls"), not to mention Nick the Bartender in "It's a Wonderful Life" and others. There's also no ignoring the wide swath he cut as a producer for early television. "I Spy", "The Dick Van Dyke Show", "The Danny Thomas Show", "The Andy Griffith Show", "Damon Runyan Theatre", "The Real McCoys" and on and on have the Leonard stamp. It's no wonder that writer/producer/creator Chuck Lorre named his two main characters on "The Big Bang Theory" after this guy.

Well, to make a short story long, Leonard often appeared on the Jack Benny Program as "The Tout"

Enjoy "Speaking of Radio: The Jack Benny Program" part 1 of 12



More to come next week...this is just plain good stuff

A little bonus reading candy...from 1949 Action Comics #138, a two page article about Jack's history BEFORE radio...

Special bonus show: The VERY first Jack Benny program from March 2, 1932. This was Jack's first M.C.ing gig and it's a far cry from what the show would eventually become. Quaint I suppose is what you could call it, but historically significant to be sure.

The show is sponsored by Canada Dry Ginger Ale, if you have some in your fridge, enjoy a glass while listening...sometimes I buy some special just for these shows, and is as much starring band leader George Olsen as Jack. Jack is in full nervous mode for this one...I guess a better term would be "unnatural" than nervous. He'd been a performer and headliner in vaudeville for so long, that performing here for the microphone, he seems much out of his element. Ethel Shutta is the vocalist for the band as the upstart show makes a lively turn at a half hour of music and one-liners.

This is just 7 years into the advent of radio as a commercial medium and it's mind-boggling to think of how Jack would transform it in just a few short years, from a pack of one-line joke segues between musical numbers into a full fledged show full of characters and the humor derived from them.

Enjoy...30 years of radio comedy to come!



Talk to you soon!

Jack Benny - 39 Years Old and Still Counting!

This coming Sunday is Jack Benny's birthday! Born February 14, 1894, he would have been 39 years old! :)

For those not hip to Jack Benny, the character he developed and fostered for almost 25 years in radio and almost 25 in television, was a vain, self-centered miser who was perpetually and perennially 39 years old.

Benny was born Benjamin Kubelsky in Waukeegan, Illinois to a Polish father and Lithuanian mother who both emigrated to America. Benny was a poor student who was expelled from high school and later dropped out of business school and failed miserably when trying to work at his fathers haberdashery.

At the age of 17 he began playing violin in local vaudeville houses. After a while he began to talk between songs on the violin...people laughed. After a while he began to just talk and make people laugh.

Benny had a good career in vaudeville which lead him to a guest spot on Ed Sullivan's radio show in 1932. He opened with the line, "Hello folks, this is Jack Benny. I'll now pause a moment while you all ask yourselves, 'who cares?'".

This self-effacing attitude, one where the butt of the joke was usually himself, was to be his long standing stock-in-trade.

He began his own show for "Canada Dry Ginger Ale" in 1932, then was sponsored by "Cheverolet" and then "American Tire Co." over the next 2 years. He kept getting in trouble with his sponsors when reading their commercials, for taking a light-hearted approach to hawking their wares. In 1934 "General Foods" came to him with a product that had been failing and that they were preparing to take off the market. Jack said he would only do it if he was left to himself to talk about their product any way he liked. They agreed, since it was failing anyway, what harm could come? In October 1934 Jack starred on the "Jello" program for NBC and soon Jello's 6 delicious flavors "Strawberry, Raspberry, Cherry, Orange, Lemon and Lime" were the nations #1 selling gelatine desert, knocking top-ranking "Royal gelatine" off the map.

During WWII when sugar was being rationed and Jello was in short supply, General Foods stayed with him and Jack advertised "Grape Nuts" for the duration.

In 1944, Jack switched sponsers to the American Tobacco Co. and "Lucky Strikes" was his sponsor from 1944 right on through Jacks transition to television right up until he stopped his regular series in 1955.

I tell you about this because this kind of loyalty from sponsors is just a clue to the kind of loyalty Jack fostered from everyone he worked with. His radio show was so special because of the wonderful cast of characters that Jack built around him.

There was his real life wife and on-air foil and girl friend Mary Livingstone.

His butler, valet and all around man friday, Eddie "Rochester" Anderson:

Jovial announcer Don Wilson:

Drunken/carrouser/hipster/orchestra leader Phil Harris (seen here with real-life wife Alice Faye):

And Naive boy tenor, a role first filled by Kenny Baker...:

...then by Dennis Day:

Jack's cast was wider than just this, filled with great comedians and voice actors, often playing multiple roles.

Jack's violin teacher and the source of the sounds coming from his delapidated Maxwell automobile, Mel Blanc:

A race-track tout who advises Jack about everything from what to order at a lunch counter to which elevator to take in a department store, Sheldon Leonard:

Jack even made other radio shows part of his ensemble. His feud with Fred Allen was funny and legendary.

The Jack Benny Show radio cast was the tightest group of funny people anywhere on the dial and made every minute of the show worth listening to. Someone once asked Jack if he wanted a script re-written because he didn't get any funny lines, all the jokes were delivered by his cast. His response was, "I don't care who gets the laughs as long as the show's funny. It doesn't matter if it's Mary or Rochester of Phil who get the laughs, the audience still tunes in to the Jack Benny Show."

Jack had a long television career and a long feature film career too, but it was this radio show that ran from 1932 to 1955 that will always have a place in my heart and mind.

39 shows a year for 23 years adds up to a lot of laughs. Thanks to the internet and MP3 technology, I'm happy to say I've heard nearly every one of them. And they're damn funny!

The miserly, self-centered jerk he played never fooled any of us.

Jack died in 1974 at age 80. Headlines in newspapers all over the country read, "Jack Benny dies at 39!"

He always got the last laugh