It's Not Corn, It's Golonka

What was the appeal of Mayberry R.F.D.?

Maybe it was because of people looking for those non-existent “simpler times” before the Vietnam War, assassinations and accompanying unrest. Maybe it was because the show was concocted from the fumes of The Andy Griffith Show.

Maybe it was because of Arlene Golonka.

Okay, maybe not. But she moved from the Wicker Park Junior Players of post-World War Two Chicago to fame in Mayberry, then went on to 3400 Cahuenga Boulevard where she voiced characters in a number of Hanna-Barbera series.

Actually, she made her name because of her name, as we learn from a Sunday feature story from The Record of Hackensack, New Jersey on October 5, 1969.

She Had To Be Better
By DAN LEWIS
SOMEHOW, a Golonka sounds like the clunk from a clout on the head. One doesn't really expect a Golonka to be a pretty, 5-foot-5, 112 pound, somewhat kooky blonde actress verging on stardom.
I can remember a number of years ago when an old friend, comedian Phil Foster, called me one afternoon and, in his dulcet tones demanded: "You wanna interview a gal who's gonna be a great big star? Then you'd better interview Arlene Golonka."
Arlene Golonka? Nobody could be a star with a name like that. But I followed the dictates of friend Foster and went over to the Playhouse on the Mall in Paramus, where indeed I found Arlene Golonka, in a supporting role to Foster in a play whose title now escapes me and since this pre-Broadway tryout ended in Paramus, it's just as well. I also met two other supporting players in show, one humorous little guy with glasses named Arte Johnson, and another tall, handsome young man named James Farentino.

To repeat an immortal phrase, that's all ver-r-ry interesting, since Arte Johnson, on "Laugh-In" and James Farentino, going into "The Bold Ones", and Arlene Golonka are all starred on TV this season. Arlene plays Millie Swanson, the girlfriend, on "Mayberry R.F.D.", opposite Ken Berry. The show had a big opening season and shrilly-voiced Arlene, the happy blonde from Chicago, is ecstatic about its success and the prospects of the new season.
Foster turns out to be quite a seer, too, in the light of Arlene's success. But when I met with Arlene again in Hollywood recently here, I couldn't help but wonder why she never changed her name. Whoever heard of a star named Golonka?
"I'm always asked the question," replied Arlene. "And I tell them I once considered changing it—to Sam Golonka."
There is, of course, a better reason. Arlene explained:
"I began to get recognition in the days when we had stars with names like Marlon Brando, Tab Hunter, Rory Calhoun, Rip Torn, and Rock Hudson. I just thought it would be nice to have an Arlene Golonka in there."
Preservation of her name was not an ulterior motive, either. She found its awkward sound an asset, in a way one wouldn't suspect: "When I would go into an audition, and write my name down," said Arlene, "the director would call out, 'Arlene Golonka!' and he would expect to see a big, heavy gal. Then I would step up and I bad to be better than anything they expected."
Arlene exudes excitement over her television success. "It was the loveliest year of my life last year. I love doing television because it goes so quickly. I found movies very dull—boring. There's always so much waiting around."
In reality, though, she recognizes the importance of making movies. "The ideal situation, my Utopia," she claimed, "would be a television series, 3 months in an important play, and one movie a year. Maybe go to Europe to make the movie."
Arlene's career has been marked by continued progress—after her first flop. She came to New York from Chicago, and worked as a waitress in the Gaslight Club until she got her first stage role. It was in a play called "Night Circus".
The play costarred Ben Gazzara and his wife Janice Rule.
"They (her fellow employes) gave me a party at the Gaslight," Arlene said. "They also gave me presents. Then the show played one week in Detroit, Boston, Philadelphia, and New Haven. Then a week on New York, and it closed. I went back to the Gaslight Club. It was so embarrassing. I didn't know whether to give back the presents."
Things got much better after that. She appeared in six more shows, including "Take Me Along" with Jackie Gleason, and then was summoned to Hollywood for her first movie, "Penelope", with Natalie Wood.
Arlene, who married handsome, 6-foot-2 Larry Delaney, a publicist-turned-actor (he has one guest appearance on "Mayberry" early in the season), has a 5-year-contract for the show and isn't the least bit concerned about the prospect of being tied up that long. "I've had other offers now, as a result of the 'Mayberry' show," she confided, "but this is a funny time for me. I've got to stop doing the little parts. I did four cute vignettes in films but I know I must be more choosey."
To what does she attribute the show's success?
"We're not part of recognized show business," she answered. "But we're not really corn. We're really human."

The San Bernadino Star-Telegram checked in with her a season later. This was published November 28, 1970.

Especially Arlene
Mayberry Boys Like Girls
By TOM GREEN
Sun-Telegram Staff Writer
HOLLYWOOD — The boys of Mayberry were sitting around the farmhouse set of "Mayberry R.F.D." ogling in the finest Mayberry fashion an attractive young cousin of series regular Arlene Golonka.
"George, you stay away from my girl friend," Jack Dodson chided George Lindsey. "She's very nice," said Ken Berry, who was holding the girl's purse in his lap and trying to concentrate on a script.
Arlene Golonka was enjoying the attention her visiting cousin was getting from the male cast of CBS' ratings powerhouse.
"The boys of Mayberry like women," said Arlene, who has no doubt gotten a little adrenalin flowing herself. "But they're barking dogs that don't bite."
Little wide-eyed Millie, the bakery girl, got comfortable in her chair.
"Ah, the simple life of Mayberry...A woman is a woman. We seldom get to wear slacks. There's no women's liberation. We're not the dumb ones. We're the women. We cook and have babies. Of course, you have to get married first."
Arlene plays Ken Berry's girlfriend on "Mayberry."

"Millie is living to marry Sam. But I don't think we'll get married until the show gets in trouble."
The women's liberation movement doesn't exactly have a fan in Arlene Golonka.
"Many years ago, I felt women needed the freedom that liberation is going for. Still, I'd rather have a man open the door for me. I think abortion should be legalized. And I think women should have a career with good pay. But the women fighting for liberation are so ridiculous. No man would want them."
Last year, Arlene tried to break out of the Mayberry mold a little. She opened a nightclub act at the Playboy Club in Hollywood.
"It was a fiasco. I invited all my friends in the show to come down and I was dreadful my opening night. I could hardly talk. I didn't know you're supposed to go out of town before you perform for your friends.
"I thought if I had a chance once in my life to be a nightclub entertainer, why not? No, I wouldn't do it again...It was difficult. For one thing, I'm allergic to smoke and I don't drink I woke up every morning with a headache."
Feeling good is pretty important to Arlene Golonka these days.
"I'm a vegetarian, you know. I've been on it now for two months. It's my third try, but this is going to be a way of life for me. I just feel better. I could go to a retreat somewhere and live the rest of my life."
Her eyes light up as she starts talking about yoga and exercise and health foods and the eating regimen she has established for herself.
"For lunch today I'm going out, so I'll have a salad. If I were at home I'd have fruit. At night I'll have an organic baked potato or an egg plant. I make salad with oil and lemon juice and oregano and a dill pickle and lettuce and tomato."
She stopped for a second.
"I still have yogurt. I do love it so."
In her spare time, she munches nuts and grains, reads books like "Yoga, Youth and Reincarnation" takes four yoga lessons a week, and works on getting her husband to join the lettuce for lunch bunch.
She and her husband, publicist turned actor Larry Delaney, have taken up tennis.
"We're flipping over the game. It'll be like our sport."
Her husband likes football, so she gave him some tickets to some Los Angeles Rams games. She doesn't exactly thrill to football, so she takes her needlepoint along.
"I tell him, 'I'm here with you, that's enough."
Arlene isn't working as much on "Mayberry" as she'd like. She worked 17 out of 26 weeks last season.
"As an actress, you want to work. I'll be home and my husband will say, 'Vacation, again, huh?' It's not a vacation. There's just no work."
Her husband dropped onto the set to take her and her cousin to lunch.
"I've just been married a year and a half. George Lindsey introduced us. Didn't you, George? I changed my husband all over. He's now an actor. He's done four TV shows and he's up for a pilot. I love having an actor for a husband. Our interests are the same and there's understanding."
Arlene told him she had been talking about their new eating plan.
"What's this 'our' stuff?" he laughed.
"Well, he eats more lettuce and vegetables. But I still give him a little meat."

Millie never had to marry Sam because the ratings didn’t slip. But Mayberry had too much of a hickory-smoked flavour for CBS executives, who got rid of all comedies even hinting at rural sensibilities in 1971.

Which brings us to where we started. I found Mayberry R.F.D. bland, but perhaps it was that rural sensibility, or at least a relaxed, small-town one, that attracted an audience across America. And part of it was pert Arlene Golonka, who has passed away from Alzheimer's at age 85.