Mike Maltese revived and revamped the old poker “I’ve got four aces/I’ve got five aces” gag. He changes the numbers to five and six. With both players cheating it’s even more ridiculous. The players in question are Bugs Bunny and Colonel Shuffle.
I really like subtle sight gag where Shuffle’s eyes give away his hand.
Note how Bugs is holding five cards but a sixth somehow appears when he spreads them out on the table.
Ken Harris, Lloyd Vaughan, Ben Washam and Phil Monroe are Chuck Jones’ animation crew in “Mississippi Hare.”
Once upon a time, there was such a thing as a summer replacement programme. It dated its origin in radio, where a star would work 39 weeks and then (s)he’d take the summer off, with a different programme substituting for the next 13 weeks. Reruns didn’t exist; the networks (until the late ‘40s) steadfastly broadcast only live programming.
A fan magazine came up with a stroke of genius. Radio Mirror decided—at least, I presume the magazine’s publishers made the decision—to present a Jack Benny radio programme over the summer, printing a script made from a composite of previous Benny programmes. The first one appeared in the September 1937 edition.
The 1936-37 season was marked by several things. Phil Harris replaced Johnny Green as the orchestra leader (Green went to work for Fred Astaire). Eddie Anderson was added to the show as Rochester but was not a regular. The Benny-Allen feud over “The Bee” began that season. So did the Buck Benny sketches.
I haven’t hunted around for the origins of all of the various parts used to create the “show” below. The play was rewritten from the May 3, 1936 broadcast; it featured Frank Parker and Don Bester guesting while the “script” omits them. Maw was played on the radio by the versatile Blanche Stewart. The Don-vs-Insurance Salesman portion is reworked from the Nov. 10, 1935 programme with Pat C. Flick as the salesman. The traffic cop appeared on Oct. 27, 1935; the actor was someone named Bennett. Recordings of these show don’t exist so this is the closest you’ll get to hearing them. Both of those programmes were written by Harry W. Conn, the writer who felt he was the brains behind Jack Benny’s success and quit in April 1936. History has shown us Conn was sadly mistaken.
No Maxwell yet. Jack drives a Whippet. They existed from 1926-31, so there should have been some on the streets at the time this was written. There’s a reference to Mary Livingstones real-life brother Hilliard Marks, who later produced the show. The script has the NBC chimes at the quarter-hour mark; the network did that until...hmm, I don’t actually know. It had certainly stopped by 1937. Jack isn’t And General Foods must have been ecstatic about the free plugs for Jell-O in the script (maybe it’s equally happy today that we’ve transcribed it).
JACK BENNY’S “VACATION BROADCAST”
EDITOR’S NOTE: Here is a new idea — Radio Mirror’s own READIO-broadcast. You can’t hear it, but you can read it, and get thirty minutes of the same fun you have when you tune in America’s number one comedian. On these pages you will find some of the best laughs and playlets that have made Jack Benny’s program the most popular in the past three years. It’s all based on material furnished by Jack Benny himself, and skilfully blended to make a perfect program — Jack’s “Vacation Broadcast.” Watch for his second READIO-broadcast next month.
THOUGH Jack Benny’s off the air, Radio Mirror magazine is bringing you a full Benny program! All you have to do is lean back in your favorite easy-chair and tune in to this magazine. The reception is good — the dials are set just right — are you ready? Then imagine that it’s Sunday evening. If you live in New York the time is seven o’clock. If you live in a daze, it’s seven o’clock anyway. There go the chimes, and the announcer saying, "This is the National Broadcasting Company". Another voice, hearty, robust — it’s Don Wilson:
“The Jell-O program! Starring Jack Benny, with Mary Livingstone and Phil Harris and his orchestra. The orchestra opens the program with “September in the Rain.” (Close your eyes and listen a minute. Sure enough, it’s Phil Harris leading his men in the charming music of “September in the Rain.”)
DON: Tonight, ladies and gentlemen. Jack, Mary, and all the rest of us are sailing for Europe on our summer vacation. We’re all here on board the good ship Jelloa, which is due to get up steam and start out any minute. And now we bring you your friend, my friend, and Jack Benny’s friend — as fine a fellow as ever stooped to pick up a cigar butt — Jack Benny! . . . Uh, where is Jack, anyway?
PHIL: Jack just called up, Don. He said he and Mary were on their way over to the ship now. They ought to be here any minute. (. . . Listen. There’s the sound of an automobile motor and an auto horn. Somebody’s in an awful hurry. Now they’re talking. Remember that high-pitched voice of Mary’s, and that worried one of Jack’s?)
MARY: Watch out, Jack. You nearly hit that dog.
JACK: Mary, I’m driving this car, and I’ve got to step on it. We’re late.
MARY: Watch out! You nearly hit that bakery truck.
JACK: Hey, you big palooka, why didn’t you put your hand out?
TRUCK DRIVER: If I did, I’d put it on yer jaw.
JACK: Oh yeah?
TRUCK DRIVER: Yeah!
JACK: (He starts the car again). Oh well, it’s a good thing for that mugg I’m in a hurry.
MARY: It’s a good thing for you, too. Careful, Jack, you’re on the sidewalk.
JACK: How did I get up here? A fine place for the city to put up sidewalks.
MARY: Oh look. Jack, a fellow wants you to stop here.
JACK: Who is it?
MARY: He’s got a uniform on and he doesn’t look like a sailor.
JACK: Well. I can’t stop now. (We hear a police whistle).
MARY: Look, Jack, he’s running after us and he’s got a motorcycle under him.
JACK: Oh, that’s different.
THE COP: Hey, you, pull over there to the curb!
(We hear the car and the motorcycle slow up and stop)
THE COP: What’s your hurry and where’s your driver’s license?
JACK: Why, officer, it isn’t at all necessary. I’m Jack Benny.
THE COP: So what? What make car is this?
JACK: A late Whippet.
THE COP: Whaddaya mean a late Whippet?
MARY: He’s always late in it.
THE COP: Who owns it?
JACK: The finance company.
THE COP: Well, I’ll have to give you a ticket. What did you say your name was?
JACK: Jack Benny.
THE COP: Not the Jack Benny of the Jell-O program — with six delicious flavors?
JACK: Yep, that’s me.
THE COP: Well, whaddaya know about that? Gee, the wife and kids will be surprised when I tell ‘em I met you two. We get a great kick out of you on the air.
JACK: Well, thanks, officer. (We hear him mutter to Mary, but the cop doesn’t.) I got him now, Mary.
THE COP: Are you on your way to a broadcast now?
JACK: Yes, we’re going to Europe and we’re going to broadcast from the ship. We’re late now.
THE COP: That’s too bad. I certainly hope you get there in time. I want to listen in.
JACK: Thank you, officer. Here’s a cigar.
THE COP: Thank you. Mr. Benny. Here’s your ticket.
JACK: Play, Phil! (There’s the music of Phil Harris orchestra again, and darned if it isn’t playing your favorite piece. “There’s a Lull in My Life.” When it finishes, we hear Jack Benny again — and what’s he saying? Listen:)
JACK: Jell-O, again, folks. This is Jack Benny, the Ancient Mariner — you see we finally caught the ship and here we are, broadcasting an exclusive summer program on station R-A-D-I-O M-I-R-R-O-R—brought to you through the courtesy of the editor of Radio Mirror—
DON: Who comes in six delicious flavors—Strawberry, Raspberry, Cherry—
JACK: Quiet, Don! That was Don Wilson, folks, scrambling sponsors. We’re broadcasting direct from the drawing room of the S. S. Jelloa, on our way to Europe. Say, Don, I meant to ask you before — how much is this trip going to — er —
DON: Oh, I think we can do it easily for ten thousand dollars — not more than eleven, anyway. Not bad, is it?
JACK: (He makes a noise that sounds something like a strangled seal) Ten thou — Oh, no, not at all — not at all bad. But — I was just thinking, Don. Why can’t we all go second class instead of first? So many of my friends tell me it’s much more fun second class.
DON: It’s cheaper, too.
JACK: (Innocently) Oh, is it? Well, I hear there’s very little difference between first and second class.
DON: No, that’s wrong. Jack. For one thing, second class has no swimming pool.
JACK: Well, good heavens, Don, who needs a swimming pool? You got the whole ocean. That’s ridiculous!
MARY: And besides. Jack can’t swim.
DON: All right, we’ll ask Phil and all the boys if they’d rather go second class. (He shouts) How about it?
EVERYBODY: No!
JACK: Oh, all right, but you’re making a great mistake.
PHIL: Jack, there’s a man just came in and he wants to see you.
JACK: Oh, I suppose it’s somebody wanting me to appear in the ship’s concert. And I was hoping I’d get a vacation! Well, I suppose I must.
THE SALESMAN: Mr. Benny, now is the time to take advantage of our liberal offer.
JACK: Oh! What are you selling?
THE SALESMAN: Life insurance. I represent the Here-Today-and-Gone Tomorrow Insurance Company. How old are you?
JACK: Well, a man is as old as he feels.
THE SALESMAN: And how are you feeling today?
JACK: I never felt better in my life.
THE SALESMAN: That’s good, but how long can it last? How do you know what will be in your hamburger steak tonight?
JACK: I don’t eat hamburger.
THE SALESMAN: What do you eat?
JACK: Hash.
THE SALESMAN: Our policy covers that too.
JACK: No, thanks, I don’t want any.
THE SALESMAN: Well, how about an annuity?
JACK: What kind have you?
THE SALESMAN: What kind, he’s asking! You pay us all the money you got until you’re seventy.
JACK: And then?
THE SALESMAN: After that, then we are the suckers.
JACK: But suppose I live until I’m ninety?
THE SALESMAN: There’s a clause here — you can’t do it.
JACK: Well, tell me how much do I need for an annuity policy?
THE SALESMAN: You give me a hundred thousand dollars now, and the minute you’re seventy years old, Pacific Standard Time, we pay you fifty bucks a week.
JACK: Well, I don’t happen to have that much change with me.
THE SALESMAN: Make it fifty thousand dollars and enjoy twenty-five dollars a week.
JACK: I’m a little embarrassed. I only have ten dollars with me.
THE SALESMAN: Well, give me that and we’ll send you a cigar every week.
JACK: No, thanks — but maybe Wilson wants some insurance. Hey, Don, you talk to him awhile, won’t you?
THE SALESMAN: Mr. Wilson, let me tell you about our policies with our liberal offer —
DON: Let me tell you about Jell-O, with its six delicious flavors —
THE SALESMAN: We have annuities, endowments, straight life and accident policies —
DON: We have Strawberry, Raspberry, Cherry, Orange, Lemon and Lime —
JACK: Boys! Boys!
THE SALESMAN: But I’m selling insurance.
DON: And I’m selling Jell-O. Look for the big red letters on the box!
THE SALESMAN: (He’s licked now:) Six million programs on the air and I had to come here. . . Play, Phil! (Phil and the Boys play “Sailing, Sailing, Over the Bounding Main.” When they’re through, we hear two long blasts of a ship’s whistle.)
JACK: (He’s yawning, and you can almost see him stretching.) Ho-hum, only the second day out, and already I feel like a million dollars, only lazier. Sea air does make you lazy, doesn’t it, Mary?
MARY: It’s not what makes you lazy.
JACK: Just think, Mary — all that ocean is filled with fish.
MARY: Yeah — did you ever hear the one about the racketeer sardine?
JACK: No.
MARY: He wound up in the can.
JACK: Mary, next time you pass my deck chair, pass my deck chair.
PHIL: Hello, Jack!
Jack: Hello, Phil. Haven’t seen you since we sailed. Where’ve you been?
PHIL: Oh, around. We ought to get together for dinner some evening.
JACK: Which is your stateroom?
PHIL: Four-B What’s yours?
JACK: Why, I’m in Four-B too. That must be you in the next twin bed. I was wondering who it was. Well, I’m certainly glad to know that . . . Hello, Don. Funny, Phil and I just found out we’re in the same stateroom, and we never even knew it. What’s your stateroom.
DON: Four-B.
JACK: Four-B — Hey, wait a minute. Phil and I are in there. We didn’t see you.
DON: I’m in the Murphy bed you can’t let down.
MESSENGER BOY: Jellogram for Jack Benny!
JACK: Right here, son, and stick to your own racket.
DON: Who’s it from, Jack?
JACK: Wait until I open it. (There is a loud ripping noise.) Hey, what is this, a cheese cloth envelope?
MARY: Better get glasses— that was your shirt.
JACK: Oh! Say, fellows, here’s a lovely radiogram from New York. It says, “Here’s wishing you and your gang a very happy vacation trip,” signed Fred Allen, Phil Baker, Stoopnagle and Bud, Jessica Dragonette, Rubinoff and his violin, the Easy Aces, Kate Smith, Lanny Ross and the Hall Johnson Choir. Isn’t that sweet? They must have all chipped in to send the wire.
DON: Yeah.
MARY: I wonder who swung the deal.
JACK: I’m surprised Jack Pearl didn’t get his name in.
MARY: He didn’t have to. You just mentioned it.
JACK: That’s right. I did.
MARY: That reminds me, Jack, I got a letter from my mother just before we sailed.
JACK: You did, eh? Well, read it to us, your mother’s always good for a laugh.
MARY: Okay, you know she had a birthday last week. “Plainfield, New Jersey. My dear daughter Mary—”
JACK: Huh, no laughs yet.
MARY: Well, it takes Ma a little time to get going. “Just a line to let you know that we are all well. I had a wonderful birthday. I got a lot of beautiful presents. Your father gave me a washing machine with a built-in radio. Isn’t he thoughtful? Right now I am waltzing through your father’s underwear, while Bing Crosby is singing, ‘Soap Gets in Your Eyes.’”
JACK: Well, well.
MARY: “Sunday night I am going to wash Father’s socks and listen to Jack.”
JACK: That’s nice, but she might have mentioned me before the socks.
MARY: Quiet. “There has been a lot of excitement at the house lately. Your Uncle Herman was here to spend the Fourth. He arrived December 24th. Your Brother Hilliard is home for the summer from Barber College, and last night while your Uncle Herman was asleep, he shaved off his mustache and upper lip.”
JACK: Oh!
MARY: “Your Uncle Herman says that as soon as Hilliard comes down from the flagpole he is going to give him a once-over with a baseball bat.”
JACK: I don’t blame him.
MARY: “I forgot to tell you in my last letter that Junior had to stop taking piano lessons. The teacher couldn’t tell when his fingers were on the black keys. No more news at present, except that your father just came in and wants me to tell Don Wilson not to worry as we have Jell-O every night. Your father always asks for the big red letters on the box even though he can’t read.”
JACK: That’s a very nice letter. Mary . . . Say — er — I’ve been wondering. Don’t they have a ship’s concert on this boat?
DON: I don’t know — why?
JACK: Oh, just wondering. I hope they don’t, because if they do they’re sure to want me to be in it, and I’m just too tired.
PHIL: Oh, sure, they’re going to have a ship’s concert tonight. I just saw the captain a few minutes ago and he asked me to sing.
JACK: He did, did he? That shows how much he knows about singing. Well, listen, Phil, you didn’t tell him I could play the violin, did you?
MARY: You can’t.
JACK: Is that so? Well, I certainly can. I could even play “The Bee” when I was ten years old— a very difficult number. And I can prove it. I’ve got a photograph of myself right here, taken when I was ten, playing “The Bee”.
MARY: I’m glad it’s not a sound picture.
DON: But, Jack, how can we tell what number you’re playing?
JACK: If you were a musician, you’d know. Let me tell you something! I played violin in concert halls long before I knew anything about Strawberry, Cherry, Orange, Lemon and Lime.
DON: You left out Raspberry.
MARY: I’ll bet the audience didn’t.
PHIL: Let me see that picture a minute, will you Jack?
JACK: Yeah, look at it, Phil, you’re a musician. That picture proves conclusively that I’m an artist.
PHIL: Well, Jack, anybody can have a picture taken with a violin.
JACK: Yes, Phil, but can’t you tell from the way I’m holding it that I can play?
PHIL: You’re holding it upside down.
JACK: Well, it’s much harder that way. Besides, I had a small chin and I couldn’t put the fiddle under it.
MARY: Now you can put a cello under it.
JACK: Is that so? Well, I’ll just prove I can play the violin. Phil, you go see that captain and tell him that as a great favor to him I’ll play the violin at the ship’s concert.
PHIL: Here he comes now. Ask him yourself — I should stick my neck out for trouble.
JACK: Oh, good morning, Captain I understand you’re arranging a ship’s concert.
THE CAPTAIN: That’s right, Mr. Benny.
JACK: Of course I’m on my vacation, but I thought, just to be a good fellow and give the passengers something really good — I’m willing to offer my services playing my violin.
THE CAPTAIN: (Terribly embarrassed) Why— as a matter of fact— Mr. Heifetz is on board, and we’d already asked him to play, so—
JACK: Oh, of course, I wouldn’t want to show him up. After all, it’s his livelihood, isn’t it? Well, perhaps you’d like to have me sing?
THE CAPTAIN: No—
JACK: Or do some card tricks?
THE CAPTAIN: No—
JACK: I could take tickets.
DON: Why don’t we do a play, and then we would all be in it?
JACK: (Disgusted) Oh, all right, if that’s the way you feel about it!
(A few bars of music, and the chimes, then your local station gives its call letters. Even your home-town station gets in on this broadcast. Now we hear Don Wilson again:)
DON: Here we are in the concert hall of the good ship Jelloa, and Jack Benny’s ready to tell you about the play we’re going to do.
JACK: Tonight, folks, we are going to offer something unusual in the line of a play. First, we tried to get “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, but we couldn’t get in touch with the author. Then we tried to get “Rose Marie”, but Rose wasn’t home and Marie wasn’t interested. Then we tried to get “Three Men on a Horse”—
MARY: But the horse complained.
JACK: Quiet! So tonight we are offering an original drama of the backwoods, called “The Code of the Hills.” The locale is the Blue Grass Country, two hundred miles south of Louisville. The action takes place in the home of the Jake Bennys, just within shooting distance of the Bestor-Parker home. And the feud is on. (There’s a burst of gunfire, then a long whistle and a single shot.)
MAW BENNY: Put that gun away, Jake, supper’s a-waitin’, A-shootin’ and a-killin’ . . . a-shootin’ and a-killin’. When is it gonna stop?
JACK: We ain’t a-gonna quit till those Bestor-Parkers are wiped out! By gum and by Jell-O, there ain’t room in these hills for the both of us!
KENNY: You said it, Pappy!
JACK: Git away from that door, Ken.
MAW: Say Paw, what have you-uns got agin the Bestor-Parkers?
JACK: That’s jes’ it, ah never did git the Bestor Parker. Remember when he-uns and we-uns was a-workin’ on the same programmey?
MAW: Yes-uns.
JACK: Well, one night ah asked him how many hairs on a monkey’s face and he sayed: the next time you shave, count ‘em. He knew I couldn’t count. I ain’t keerin’ fer that kind of talk, and ah ain’t never fergittin’!
MAW: Reckon he ain’t neither. But the Bennys and the Bestor-Parkers have been scrappin’ for two hundred yars.
JACK: Yes, Sarah, two hundred yars of a-fightin’ and a-scrotchin’ and a-killin’ each other!
MAW: Looks like it’s leadin’ up to a feud!
JACK: Wouldn’t be surprised. (More gun-shots.) Hey, Ken, barricade that double door!
KENNY: Oooh, Pappy! They got me. Pappy, they got me! (There is the sound of his body hitting the floor)
MAW: What was that, Paw?
JACK: Sarah, they-uns got our boy Ken . . . Shot him right through the door.
KENNY: Oooh, ah’m a-goin’, Pappy . . . G’by, Pappy. . . . g’by, Maw.
JACK And MAW: Good-by.
JACK: You reckon ah ought to take him out and bury him?
MAW: Better have your supper first. It’s a-gittin’ cold.
JACK: So is Ken. Shucks, ah’m so hungry right now ah could eat a horse.
MAW: Well, that’s what we got.
KENNY: Oooh, ah’m a-goin’ Pappy . . . still a-goin’.
JACK: Take your time, son.
KENNY: Shucks, and ah wanted to be President.
JACK: Well, don’t worry, you can be Vice President.
KENNY: What do you mean?
JACK: You’re a Garner.
KENNY: Oooh, that done it. (More gun-shots, and the sound of a breaking bottle)
MAW: Lands-sake, thar goes that jug of corn likker!
JACK: That’s a-goin’ too fur! Thar ain’t nothin’ sacred! {The door opens.)
PHIL: Howdy, Uncle Jake.
JACK: Hullo thar, Phil.
MAW: Where you been? You shouldn’t be a-walkin’ round with your left arm shot up like that.
PHIL: Ah’ve been a-seekin’ some cord to tie it up with. ... It keeps a-fallin’ off.
JACK: You know, Phil, ah don’t like the way that arm of yours keeps a-droppin’ off. It might be ailin’. What’s that you got under your other arm?
PHIL: Mah right leg.
MAW: Oh! Well, put it in the umbrella stand and come to dinner.
JACK: Where’s our daughter Mariah?
MAW: Here she comes now.
MARY: Hullo, Pappy, hullo Maw. Who’s that on the floor?
JACK: That’s your brother Ken. They-uns killed him daid . . yore poor brother.
MARY: Gee, ah’m hungry.
JACK: Don’t take it so hard, Mariah, ah know you loved him.
MARY: Yeah. . . . What have we got for supper, Maw?
MAW: Nothin’ fancy, just a horse.
MARY: Ah hope ah don’t git the leg agin. (More shots.)
MAW: Watch out, Jake.
JACK: They missed me.
MARY: That’s all right, they got Kenny again.
KENNY: Yup, they got me. Pappy, they got me.
JACK: Ah told you we should have buried him. But I’ll make they-uns pay for this or my name ain’t Jake. (Another shot.) Heh heh, missed me again.
MARY: Oh yeah? Where’s your ear?
JACK: Dawggone it, and ah wanted to hear Phil Baker. Hand me that other gun. (There is a rapid burst of shots, finally dwindling away.)
JACK: Well, I guess they-uns a-gittin’ tired, Sarah, they’ve stopped a-shootin’. (A long whistle and a shot.)
MARY: What was that, Paw?
JACK: Just an echo.
MARY: Well, the echo got Phil.
MAW: Feud, feud! Ah’m gittin’ sick of it!
JACK: Why, Sarah!
MAW: Feud only plow the fields — feud only tend the crops — thar wouldn’t be no feud.
DON: And speaking of feuds, you will find that Jell-O is the most delicious feud in the world, and it has that new extra rich fresh fruit flavor — (A lot of shots.)
DON: Strawberry! Raspberry! Cherry! Orange, Lemon, and —
JACK: Limey outta here! Play, Phil! (Phil plays “She’ll be Comin Round the Mountain When She Comes.” When the music stops, Jack says:)
JACK: That was the last number of our special Radio Mirror Summer Broadcast. We’ll be with you next month in these same pages.
MARY: Oh, Jack! I’ve just written a poem. I think I’ll send it into Radio Mirror for them to publish.
JACK: What is it?
MARY: Lives of great men oft remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
JACK: Wait a minute, Longfellow wrote that.
MARY: Funny, how our minds run together.
JACK: Goodnight, folks. Get ready now for another laugh! Next month, the second of Jack Benny’s READIO-broadcasts, as packed with guffaws as one of his programs. Even though Jack and Mary and all the gang will still Be on their vacation, there’s no need for you to miss the swell humor they bring you on the air. So watch for the October issue, on sale August 25th.
Many stars have been immortalised by having their footprints squished into cement on various Walks of Fame. Only one may have had his ear preserved for the future that way.
It was Gary Owens.
We’ll let this newspaper story (likely from an NBC press release) from March 4, 1971 fill us in.
Gary Owens Earmarked In Cement
The ear over which Gary Owens has been cupping his hand these years as the zany announcer on NBC Television Network’s “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In” has been put in cement.
All this happened alongside the outdoor entrance to the new commissary on the NBC Television Network’s Burbank lot before an array of dignitaries — Dan Rowan, Dick Martin, the “Laugh-In” cast and Dr. Jarvey Gilbert, the mayor of Burbank. Also on hand was NBC nurse Julie Baquet on a remove-cement-from-ear-assignment.
This was the first of what hopefully win became historic displays of TV stars’ famed physical characteristics — such as Jimmy Durante’s nose and the claw of the Andy Williams bear.
Ceremonies were brief and simple in keeping with the occasion. Gary arrived at the appointed minutes, precisely between the times when the cement would be too soft or too hard. Gary, with Dan and Dick at his side, knelt on a red carpet that had been rolled out for the event, and gingerly placed his ear to the ground.
Dan decided that Gary never would make much of an impression that way. So he pushed Gary’s head into the cement. It was Dick who pulled Gary’s head out of the cement.
The nurse went to work on the car with a damp towel, Dan and Dick with a chisel.
A couple of policemen watched. Gary commented “My hearing comes up next week—I hope.”
Gary signed his name in the cement and added the date. The moment left his mark in history — and cement.
Gary Owens was an announcer who played an announcer. But that’s not altogether accurate. Owens was more than an announcer. He was an entertainer. He was part of a great era of radio we will never see again. Music radio in the ‘60s wasn’t some guy saying the call-letters seven times in one breath and reading a card with some trite slogan like “More variety, less repetition” before playing the same consultant-approved song that had already been heard six times that day. Disc jockeys picked their own music. They came up with their own routines, as long or short as they wanted. Los Angeles radio was full of creativity, awash with people you wanted to listen to because they were funny. Gary Owens was one of them. And “Laugh-In” made him internationally famous when it became a sudden hit in 1968.
“Laugh-In” debuted when I was 11. I loved the show. It was fast and silly. There was one joke that struck me as so funny I couldn’t stop laughing. I have no idea now what it was, but I’ve never laughed as long since. I loved Gary Owens’ nonsense and non sequiturs. It sounds like his radio show was full of them so his hiring for “Laugh-In” (in a restaurant washroom in Burbank, as Owens once told columnist Jay Sharbutt) couldn’t have been more appropriate.
I’d written a post about Owens called “Who Was That Drelb, Anyway?” and banked it for a few months from now, but with his death I’ve dredged it up, ripped it apart, and will leave you with this remaining portion, a reprint of a United Press International column from June 14, 1969. It answers a question I never asked. I wasn’t all that concerned what a “drelb” was as a pre-teen “Laugh-In” viewer. As far as I knew, he had made up a silly word and that was plenty for me. But it’s nice to know.
Gary Owens of ‘Laugh-In’ a Man With Revenue-Making Talents
By VERNON SCOTT UPI Hollywood Correspondent
HOLLYWOOD (UPI)—Gary Owens is the nut on “The Rowan and Martin Laugh-In” who stands in front of a microphone, holding a cupped hand to his ear, and opens the show by announcing “Morgul as the friendly drelb.”
There is no Morgul. A drelb is a furry, sick-looking abominable snowman. But Owens is real enough and even shows flashes of sanity.
In addition to his playing straight man to the resident dingalings on the show, Owens is a disc jockey for radio station KMPC in Hollywood from 3-6 p.m. daily.
When he isn't taping the "Laugh-In" or spinning records, the South Dakota native is doing commercials. Last year his voice was heard in no fewer than 350 commercial pitches in addition to providing the vocal cords for cartoon characters "Space Ghost" and "Roger Ramjet."
Owens is married to a pretty girl named Arleta whom he met on the campus of Dakota Wesleyan University. They exchanged vows in 1956.
They are the parents of Scott, 9, and Christopher, 5.
Their Encino estate in the San Fernando valley is complete with swimming pool, a full-time maid and three dogs: two dachshunds, Julie and Rosebud, and a terrier who answers to Skoshi.
Owens is proud of the fact that he began broadcasting in the Dakotas when he was only 16. He did his first announcing job with another Dakotan, Lawrence Welk.
The many-faceted Owens has three offices, one at home, another at KMPC, and a third in a Hollywood office building which is filled with filing cabinets of gags, trivia and information for his radio show.
At the moment he is completing his first book. "Gary Owens Looks at Radio," a tome on humor scheduled for publication in September.
Arleta is a brilliant amateur decorator and has furnished each of the rooms in their home in a different era and color scheme. One room is French regency, another early Greek, another modern.
She also rules the kitchen, and specializes in a variety of hamburger dishes because they are Gary's favorites.
Owens manages to juggle his new busy schedule because the producers of the NBC-TV comedy sensation allow him to "wild-track" his "Laugh-In" bit on tape Tuesday mornings. He returns Wednesday evenings—after his radio show—to tape scenes with other members of wacky staff.
To relieve the tensions of his fast-paced life. Owens plays basketball on a regulation outdoor court flanking his home.
Weekends he packs the family up and heads for Laguna Beach and the languid life in the sunshine there. He hopes to buy a home overlooking the surf as a hideaway Sunday mornings are devoted to private karate lessons. Not that he plans to defend himself except against the wild men on "Laugh-In."
Owens recently had three suits made. "They are in the 1930 George Raft style that I wear on the show," he explains. "They are so far out of style that they're becoming fashionable again."
Owens' only real eccentricity is Morgul. Sometime, somewhere, he is sure, he will track the elusive down the elusive drelb.
Gary Owens went from playing an announcer on an NBC show to being an announcer on NBC (he freelanced reading promos and liners for the network). He was a sometime host for “The Gong Show” which, despite his love of the off-beat, never really quite fit him. He did much more, of course. He was loved and respected by everyone, from what I can tell. He made people laugh and feel better as a result, including a little boy miles and miles away from Beautiful Downtown Burbank. Thanks, Gary.
How can you have an animated cartoon without animators? A twosome named Whinny and Bo almost answered that question.
Theatrical cartoons were a huge hit on TV in the mid-1950s, but there was one problem. There was a finite number of old theatricals. The solution was obvious—make brand-new cartoons for kids. But that resulted in another problem and the solution was not so obvious—how to do it on a shoestring budget as full animation was too expensive. By mid-1957, a handful of companies, TV Spots (“Crusader Rabbit”), Soundac (“Colonel Bleep”), and Sam Singer Productions (“Pow Wow the Indian Boy”) had given limited animation a try and managed to syndicate their cartoons. There were other firms that weren’t so lucky.
One of them was Illustrated Films, Inc. It had an unlikely connection to the Three Stooges through Moe Howard’s son-in-law, Norman and his brother. Norman spent the later part of his career as a writer at Hanna-Barbera (“Speed Buggy,” various incarnations of Scooby-Doo), but in 1957 he had developed a method to animate without animators.
Here’s Variety from April 8, 1957:
New Process Offers Automation Animation
A new process of animation without the use of animators has been developed and is said to reduce the cost of animated subjects to one-fifth the present cost. It is planned for use both in tv spots and theatrical presentation. Invented by Norman Maurer of L.A., process is called the Artiscope, and is animation by automation. First test subject was Friday by Illustrated Films, Inc., which is sponsoring the new system and of which Maurer is prexy. Moe Howard, one of the Three Stooges, is veepee and Leonard Maurer secretary-treasurer. Electronic Etching
Process involves a totally new concept of getting animation on film, according to inventor, which practically eliminates the need for artists drawing a frame at a time, as per the present method of animated films. Result is attained electronically, with up to 90% of all artist hand labor scrapped, Maurer said, “proving the practicability of automatic animation.” A combo live action-animation technique, live action is converted into animation action on cells, to get the smoothness and realism of live action in drawings. As an example of the savings to be effected, Maurer said that what now would cost $200,000 to produce as an animated subject could be brought in for $85,000 by use of Artiscope. Process uses only 720 cells per minute, as against the standard 1,440 cells with other processes, he declared. Lacks Refinements To Date
Subject screened in demonstration was a short animated film consisting of 2,000 separate drawings, without the labor of a single animator. The first to be made, it thereby lacks the refinements which can be added to process, it is claimed. Process, no longer calling for artists, does away with the animator, assistant animator, in-betweener and inker, and requires only the painter, Maurer stressed, who says company is now prepping another subject.
In his book Beyond Ballyhoo, Mark Thomas McGee explains how the process worked:
Performers wore white makeup and were photographed in black and white. The dark areas of the negative were removed with acid and supposedly went through four separate printings with [Norman] Maurer’s Artiscope lens. The result, printed in red, was a burned out effect more easily achieved through solarization.
It took a while to figure out how to use the Artiscope. And that’s where our friends Whinny and Bo come in. The folks at Illustrated Films set up a cartoon studio. Motion Picture Daily announced on September 4, 1958 that a Whinny and Bo series was in the works. Broadcasting magazine expanded on it in its edition of October 27, 1958.
Animated Package in Production As First Offering by Westworld
Westworld Artists Productions, recently formed New York animation studio, is making pilots for a 15-minute syndicated cartoon series to be released to stations in the fall of 1959. The package will consist of two six-minute units, Whinny and Bo and Deadly Dudley, each with a complete story line and with openings for commercials at beginning, middle and end of the package. Officials said several 90-minute programs also are being prepared for production. These include "Adventures of Paul Bunyan" and "Rumpelstiltskin, a Musical Fairytale." Len Maurer, Westworld production head, said all filming will employ the most advanced wide-screen and dimensional animation techniques available. Techniques to be used include Artiscope, new electrochemical process for converting a live-action film into animation [FILM, June 30], Scanimation and Animascope. Jack Silberlicht, former electronics engineering of Hazeltine Research Corp., will be in charge of technical direction and development of the new processes, Mr. Maurer said.
So who or what were Whinny and Bo? A horse and a bum? (See Animascope drawing at the top). A couple of humans? Creatures from outer space? And what about Deadly Dudley? (See Animascope drawing below). The answer may be out there somewhere. Whatever they were, the Broadcasting story apparently was the last mention in the trade press of Whinny and Bo. Jeff Lenberg’s The Three Stooges Scrapbook states that by the end of 1958, Norman Maurer was proposing using his Artiscope to make a half-hour animated series starring Moe Howard and the other two Stooges. “Stooge Time” never sold. Artiscope was later dubbed Cinemagic and utilised in the 1959 epic “The Angry Red Planet” starring former radio actors Gerry Mohr and Les Tremayne.
Whinny and Bo may have been finished, but Westworld Productions wasn’t. It announced “a new process of color animation which is shot directly on film without the use of cells through the use of costumed actors, puppets or models to produce the drawings of cartoon characters.” Said Variety of April 9, 1962:
The technique, called Colormation, supplements Westworld's Animascope process which eliminated hand animators and inkers but required cells and opaquers for color after the initial shooting.
Leon H. Maurer, president of Westworld, said the new process can produce color cartoons for about one-tenth the cost required by conventional techniques because of the elimination of hundreds of hand animators, inkers and painters.
He estimated that production costs for an Animascope cartoon feature ranges from about $1,800 to $3,600 a minute and that the new Colormation technique is expected to cut these costs in half. Westworld is currently planning the production of several Colormation cartoon tv features using comic strip characters, Mr. Maurer said.
Whether any footage exists or was made of the “cartoon tv features” is unknown.
Leon Maurer announced yet another process called Electronimation (Variety, March 31, 1965) and that Westworld had been granted patents for it the U.S., Canada and Japan. It apparently was an electronic version of the earlier processes.
In the process of putting together this post I, once again, found I was cutting a path where one already existed. Jerry Beck wrote about Animascope here and linked to a promotional video for it. We’ve embedded it below.
You’ve all seen the extended-eyed, jaw-dropping takes that cartoon characters make, something that was a specialty of Tex Avery. All sorts of studios tried doing the same thing until it became passé. One of the most unexpected places you’ll find it is in one of those odd Gene Deitch Tom and Jerry cartoons, none other than “Dicky Moe” (1962). It comes in the scene where Tom is scrubbing the deck of a ship, Jerry substitutes tar for water, and Tom eventually realises what’s happened and reacts. Some drawings.
Unfortunately, Deitch doesn’t borrow timing from Avery. Tex would make sure you saw the take by letting it hang there for a bit. Deitch lets the jaw stay on the ground for about ten frames (less than a second), bounces it up with a kettle drum sound effect and then when the jaw’s back in place, Deitch cuts away to an unmatching closer shot of the cat and mouse. The take doesn’t sink in a well as it could.
Mind you, that’s the least of the problems with “Dicky Moe,” which is full of Deitch’s patented camera shakes, boings, mouths not moving when characters are yelling (I swear Allen Swift’s dialogue was recorded after the cartoon was made), overused jagged impact lines and butt-ugly, jerky animation. I’ll take Tex Avery any day. Deitch can give me the much more fun Sidney the elephant instead of this.
How can a skeleton have a ghost? Isn’t a skeleton dead already? Ah, it’s pretty easy to ignore stuff like that and just enjoy the fun and creative morphing in “Minnie the Moocher,” one of the greatest Fleischer cartoons.
Skeletons, watched by Betty and Bimbo, drink (presumably illegal) liquor. Their bones turn to black, then white again as they die. Ghosts arise and resume singing the title song.
Willard Bowsky and Ralph Somerville are the credited animators.
The boy squirrel gathers nuts for winter by playing craps in “Now That Summer is Gone” (1938).
The title theme is sung by a female vocal groups throughout the first two minutes or so. After winning at craps, the squirrel (played by Mel Blanc) comes up with his own specialty lyrics—before being slapped by father squirrel (played by Billy Bletcher).
Director Frank Tashlin pans over to a trio of male squirrels with their own specialty lyrics, warning the boy squirrel of the dangers of gambling. There are overlays aplenty in this cartoon, sometimes two in the same scene. The male vocal squirrels are framed by two trees on an overlay (the overlays jump around a bit in this cartoon as well.
There are no credits on the cartoon, but it’s possible the animators included Bob Bentley, Joe D'Igalo, and Volney White. I’d love to know who Tashlin’s background artist was.
There are two things you’ll notice in any newspaper interview with Jimmy Durante—all the quotes are in Durante dialect, and he launches into a monologue that sounds just like one of his acts.
Here’s a good example from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 30, 1940. You can probably hear Durante’s voice as you read this. By the way, the Schnozz was born on today’s date in 1893.
CANDID CLOSE-UPS
Jimmy Durante Discovers Acting Preferable to Sleuthing; Decides to Stick To ‘Keep Off the Grass’ By ROBERT FRANCIS
"I got nothin’ to say," announced Jimmy Durante, eyeing us severely in his dressing room at the Broadhurst. "You newspaper guys made me enough trouble already."
We never take a statement like that from the Durante seriously. He always has plenty to say. And usually gets in the last word.
"Everybody should mind his own business," he went on. "A butcher should cut meat, a banker should cut coupons, an’..."
"And you should stick to cutting capers in "Keep Off the Grass," we suggested.
"Ha," he snorted, indignantly, "everybody wants to get in the act! Stand back! I make the gags!"
"Listen, I read in the papers all about this ‘Fifth Column.’ Somethings got to be done! ‘Jimmy,’ I says, ‘we organize a Gessepo of our own.’ ‘How do I start?’ I asks me.
"I goes into the Astor Bar for a buttermilk. I greets a guy next to me. ‘How dy ye do, Mr. Durante?’ he cracks. Right away I am auspicious. I ask him to cash my check. He does. I am more suspicious.
"He tells me he is a baker. ‘Do you own a car?’ I queries. ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘an I got a chauffer, too.’ What effrontery! Now I knows I’m on the scent! Like a dog after a frankfurter!
"I slips out and phones the F. B. I. This is too big to handle alone. They investigates, shadows, wire-taps. What a catastrophe! They discovers he is a Harvard man with money left him!
"So he sues me in Supreme Court for inflamation of character! I tries to camouflage the details, but the judge has a congested mind. He fines me a hundred dollars. Politics! I considers taking it to the Epaulet Division, but I thinks the matter has gone far enough!"
The ever-present Durante cigar stump twisted furiously.
"You’d think that learnt me a lesson, but last week I tries again. Gluttony! I see a suspicious character in . . . (this is for the ‘Eagle,’ ain't it?) . . . in Brooklyn. I trails him through the Park Slope, through Flatbush, into Bay Ridge. What a sleut! He ducks into a house, an’ I waits diligently. I holds my breath an’ watches for him to come out. He don’t. I am breathless.
"All of a sudden a big guy is next to me. We discovers each other siniustaniously! He is a cop. I have claustrophobia! ‘What are you doin’ here?' he barks ominiously. ‘I’m on a suspicious case,’ I ups to him, bold. '‘You look suspicious to me,’ he comes back, frisking me, ‘an’ wearin’ a disguise, eh?’ An’ before I knows it, he grabs me by the schnozzle an’ yanks. The ignominy of it!
"So I’m in court again. I explains to the judge I’m an actor. “Why don’t you work at it?’ he says. ‘I do work at it,’ I replies, ‘Right now I'm in ‘Keep Off the Grass’ at the Broadhurst Theater, New York City.’ ‘Then I fine you ten dollars,’ he retorts, ‘for being nosey an’ not stayin’ where you belong.’ The brutality of it! Durante fined ten bucks for nosetalgia!"
Il Schnozzola waggled his bare toes which were getting an alcohol rub from Tiny, that 200-pound fixture of the Durante menage.
"You guys are responsible for it all," he sighed, plaintively. "You write all that stuff in the papers about ‘boring from within’ and ‘fronts.’ It gets a guy like me all steamed up. I can’t knit, but I wants to do somethin’. But from now on I leaves sleuthin’ to the sleuts. The butcher should cut meat, and the banker. . . ."
"We know, Jimmy," we interrupted, firmly, "and you should stay on 44th St. where you belong. However, there isn't a word of truth in any of this."
The Durante grin appeared around the stub of the cigar.
"Well," he drawled, "it might make a good song lyric, at that. And anyway, I told you I had nothin’ to say. You guys have made me trouble enough already."
In any event, that fictitious magistrate may have been gifted with second sight, for "Keep Off the Grass" takes a Summer vacation, begun last night and lasting until mid-August. Jimmy goes to the Coast to make a picture in the interim. He can practice his "sleuthing" for the next six weeks in Hollywood.
Bobby-soxers love Frankie, whether they’re hens (“Swooner Crooner,” Warner Bros., 1944) or rabbits (“Little 'Tinker,” MGM, 1948).
Here’s one rabbit blowing kisses at the ersatz Frank Sinatra and the skunk dodging them. I like the little addition of the final, huge kiss dripping down the stage curtain.
The credited animators in this charmer from Tex Avery are Bill Shull, Grant Simmons, Walt Clinton and Bob Bentley. Louie Schmitt designed the characters.
Some cartoon fans are stuck in a Land of Childhood TV pining for a time that, frankly, was in one way inferior to today. Back then, an awful lot of old theatrical cartoons were never or rarely seen emanating from your box in the living room. Today, the internet (or a disc you can purchase) allows you to look at animated shorts you may never even have known about when you were a child.
Steve Stanchfield deserves everyone’s lasting gratitude for labours of love that have brought us works of the Van Beuren studio as well as the adventures of Pvt. Snafu. He’s got cleaned-up shorts from Ub Iwerks coming. That’s only to name three.
Other than the output of the Mintz/Columbia studio, the most difficult-to-find Golden Age animated shorts may be the Terrytoons. They’ve been denigrated in some corners as extremely repetitious and poorly animated. They were released by a distributor (20th Century Fox) that didn’t care what they looked like as long as they filled screen time and showed up at exchanges on time. Terrytoons’ owner Paul Terry was quite happy to oblige. 20th’s attitude saved him money. Saving money seems to have been one of Mr Terry’s goals in life.
Fortunately, a pseudonymous Paul Terry has begun posting his collection of Terrytoons on-line, which gives everyone a chance to make their own judgments about them. Unfortunately, some prints are chopped up for TV. Don’t expect DVD quality, either.
I’ve pooh-poohed the idea of DVD sets of cartoons in chronological order, but have to eat my words a bit. I’ve watched the posted series that way and it’s been an interesting exercise. I haven’t studied them to any great depth but the studio definitely evolved during the ‘30s. The cartoons started out in the early ‘30s much like any other studio’s—characters joyfully singing and dancing, with gags tossed in, in the first half; boy-rescues-girl-from-villain in the second half, with animation a step up from the silent era. Within in a few years, Terry added an operetta element which finally wore out its welcome—when it began, The Film Daily gurgled in delight about it—and then ran into the same problem as other studios in the middle part of the decade: finding a new starring character. Eventually, Terry settled on a watered down version of Daffy Duck. Gandy Goose doesn’t woo-hoo like Daffy but he constantly laughs. Both engage in a lot of silly stuff. Frankly, I find Gandy’s constant laughing annoying and his story elements are weak in a lot of places. By the late ‘30s, Terry seems to have fallen in love with Arthur Kay’s celebrity impersonations and dialects. There are an awful lot of Greek-accented wolves and Bert Lahr soundalikes. Like Warners cartoons, radio catchphrases are tossed in on occasion as funny-because-it’s-familiar gags (one cartoon includes a character briefly launching into an Elmer Blurt routine, a couple make reference to Jell-O’s “six delicious flavours,” others have the NBC chimes, and still more toss in Joe Penner-inspired reactions).
But if anyone thinks all Terry animation is mediocre, they haven’t watched the cartoons. There’s some really nice, expressive animation of a mother mouse singing the hi-de-ho blues in “Lion Hunt” (1938) that Milt Knight tells me is by Ralph Pearson, just to name one example. And there are some inspired gags, too, some that predate routines at other studios. “The Last Indian” (1938) is a little disjointed, but has a great climax where the nutty native is speeding in a touring car on roads shot in live action, just like Porky Pig did a few years later in “You Ought To Be In Pictures.”
My favourite Terry cartoons (until Heckle and Jeckle came along in the late ‘40s) still have to be the early sound era ones. I really like every studio’s cartoons made around 1930. There isn’t much point to them, but everything in them is alive—hot dogs, pianos, clouds, trees, cars, outhouses—and having fun. And there are some images that are downright bizarre. Take this one from “Hungarian Goulash” (June 1930). Who’d think up such a thing? I love it. As a bonus, there are Felix-style cats found in a bunch of studios in the silent era that stuck around for the first few years of sound cartoons. (Sorry the picture quality isn’t a little better).
Yes, the ‘30s output of the Terry studio isn’t as slick-looking as Warners, let alone Disney. And, yes, there are too many character-accidentally-backs-into-something-and-hilarity-ensues cartoons. But the studio did have some craftsmen. Any problems with the Terrytoons seem to rest at the feet of Paul Terry himself. He lost quality people because he was incredibly cheap; they went elsewhere. As Izzy Klein once noted, he considered himself “Mr. Story Department.” I can’t help but believe, judging by the neat gags in some of the shorts, the stories would have been better had he left the story department alone. And composer Phil Scheib could have created more imaginative scores had be not be hamstrung by Terry’s directive to have all the instruments heard at all times whenever possible (in the ‘50s, Scheib was using still using saxes skipping up and down the scale in the same tempo as he was in the ‘30s). But 20th Century Fox didn’t want quality; it only wanted cartoons because exhibitors had a contract to play them. That’s what Terry delivered. But the cartoons on the whole weren’t, and aren’t, a total loss. Occasionally, some creativity came through. It’s bound to happen when you have creative people.
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