Coping With the Storm

Gags within gags in a sequence of Doggone Tired, a 1949 Tex Avery cartoon about a rabbit trying to keep a hunting dog awake so he’ll be too tired to hunt rabbits.

In one portion of the cartoon, the wily rabbit creates a phoney and noisy storm.



Cotton in the ears doesn’t drown out the noise.



Neither do toilet plungers.



But a pillow works.



The rabbit has to do something.



So he swipes the pillow. That works. Avery provides us with a cycle of takes to end the scene.



Bobe Cannon, Mike Lah, Grant Simmons and Walt Clinton are the animators. Character designs by Louis Schmitt.

Unbothered Benny

To hear the fan magazines talk, Jack Benny lived a pretty unexciting life. Sure, he had huge house parties with the stars milling about. Sure, he travelled all over, giving benefit shows during the war and benefit concerts afterwards. Sure, he had more money than he knew what to do with (though his wife had a few ideas). But, no, there were no huge scandals (other than buying into a con man’s smuggling scheme in the late ‘30s), no stories in the papers about unseemly behavior, no tell-all gossip by Hollywood insiders or biographers, and no serious marriage woes. Jack got along with his in-laws (Mrs. Esther Marks is with him in the photo to the right).

Here’s a feature story from one of those fan mags, Radio Stars, from its June 1936 edition. At that point in Jack’s career, he had pretty much decided to use Hollywood as his base of operations instead of New York. And while the story puts on a faux mantle of investigative journalism, the responses are pretty milquetoast. Not all of them are candid. The story leaves the impression that Jack was all lovey-dovey with his writer, Harry Conn, when Conn would walk out on him a few months later. And Jack did have trouble with sponsors; Canada Dry tried interfering with Benny’s writing and a “he-goes-or-I-go” ultimatum ended with the soft drink company cancelling the show. And then there was Chevrolet, with a company boss who wanted symphonic music instead of a, ugh, comedian. Even Benny’s switch was General Tire to General Foods was a little unusual.

However, these are all minor things. It’s interesting to read Jack’s sole annoyance was listener complaints that were ridiculous. He might be pleased to know that hasn’t changed in 80 years.

The RCMP show referred to in the story can be found on-line. It aired February 9, 1936.

NOTHING EVER HAPPENS
Everything's all right with Jack Benny! Maybe he just doesn't know trouble
By JACK HANLEY
WHEN the listening public, made up of a vast number of differing individuals, gets together and agrees on one performer as the top in his field, that, dear radio friends, is something. And when radio critics across the country pool their likes and dislikes and rate a performer first place, that, again, is something. But when critics and lay public together, with remarkable unanimity, place a well-sponsored laurel wreath on the same program—that program has an odd way of turning out to be Jack Benny's.
You probably are aware by now that this is the third consecutive year Jack Benny has won first place in the National Radio Editors' Poll, as a comedian. And it's the second consecutive year the Jello program has won first place, as a whole.
In the Crosley Poll—which is a canvass of listeners—the Benny program took first place among half–hour shows, first place among comedy shows and second place in the whole radio field. After five years in radio that's not only reaching the top, hut, what is more important, staying there.
Looking closely at the Benny brow, there are no evident signs or scratches visible from the laurels that have been heaped thereon. His hats, too, I believe, still fit. "Naturally," Jack Benny says, "it's gratifying to come out first on the poll. It's nice to feel that the critics agree on you and your show as the leader. But what we're most interested in is not so much winning the poll as in staying among the top few. And that's pretty tough."
Saying so, Jack didn't look particularly dismayed at the prospect. "With several comedy shows running close together, just one slip, one performance a little under par, puts you second. And that's bound to happen occasionally. And then, if at the same time your show slips a little, another program improves, you're third. So we don't worry about trying to keep in first place; we try to keep the general level high enough to see that we're included in the leading three or four."
Jack shook his head. "I feel terrible," he said with the same calm, affability you hear on the radio. He says practically everything that way. My guess is that if the building were on fire Jack Benny would greet the fire department with the same blend amiability, saving : "Jell-O folks—come right in and bring your hose," and make his quiet exit, first, of course, seeing that Mary—Mrs. Benny—and their beloved baby Joan, were safe.
"You have a cold?" I suggested shrewdly.
He nodded. "I was wondering whether I ought to go out tonight or not. We've got tickets for the theatre and Mary was sort of figuring on going."

"If she knew you didn't feel well," I said, as much like the Voice of Experience as possible, "she probably wouldn't want to go."
"That's just it. She won't let me go if she knows. And then suppose want to go after all?" He grinned disarmingly with unaffected naïveté. As a matter of fact Jack Benny is the only celebrity I can think of who could truly be called boyish without its sounding sickening.
"We get to see so few shows," he explained, "being out on the Coast so much, we like to take in as many possible when we're in New York."
"By the way," I asked, "how do you like the Coast?”
"Fine," Benny nodded. "We're very happy out the ... like it fine."
"Of course," I suggested. "you had the usual trouble in Hollywood. . . ."
"Trouble?" Jack looked blank.
"The exasperations everyone meets making pictures ... you know ... Once in a Lifetime...." Jack being fresh from Hollywood, thought your reporter, here was a chance to get an earful of new horrible movie adventure.
"No, we didn't have any trouble out there."
"You mean you like Hollywood?"
"Sure. Making pictures is all right."
And there's one of the outstanding features of the Benny makeup. Practically everything is all right with Jack. Without being a rubber-stamp or a yes-man, Jack Benny hasn't a mad on with anything in the world.
"You know, there's so much money tied up in the picture business," he said, "and so many variables involved, they can't do things very differently. They work under terrific pressure, paying enormous salaries and overhead. Personally, I think they do a pretty good job, all considered."
Another dream shattered. Another illusion gone! I tried a flank attack.
"You were about the first radio comedian really to `kid' your sponsor," I said. "I suppose you had plenty of sponsor trouble." Show me a radio artist who hasn't ! Benny did show me.
"Well—just a little, at first," he admitted. "But as soon as they saw it wasn't a bad idea they were swell about it. On the whole, I'd say we've never had any sponsor trouble." What can you do with a guy like that? There was no use talking about comedy material difficulties. tarry Conn has been writing the Benny shows for five years, in collaboration with Jack, and Jack not only admits it, but paid him tribute over the air the night he was awarded first place the radio poll.
He pays his writer perhaps a bigger salary than any other comedian on the air and is a firm believer in the fact that the success of a comedy show depends upon a close collaboration between writer and comedian.
"I don't care if George Kaufman, Morrie Ryskind and a dozen others write a show," Jack says, "it still won't be right unless the writer and comedian build it together. We're lucky in that our comedy is more a matter of personalities than just gags. I've found that the listeners like built-up characters and that one funny line, in character, is worth a dozen planted gags."
Jack Benny can call it luck. The record shows, however, that he has been one of the few headline acts to encourage the build-up of other characters on his show. Frank Parker, Don Bestor, Don Wilson and many others have had their chances at being comedians as well as doing their own specialties. And I don't think it's "luck" that makes personality the main ingredient of Benny's program. Jack's personality is definitely his own; he sounds friendly, unassuming, bland and affable. As a matter of fact, he is the same way off-mike. It's not something he adopts for the air. Jack Benny was doing just the same type of comedy, in the same style, when he was playing vaudeville with his fiddle under his arm and when he was a featured comedian in Broadway revues.
But drama? Where was the drama—the fierce struggle for a place in the radio firmament? The battle for recognition?
"Tell me about the time you first started in radio," I suggested. "You were out of the Vanities—with no job—determined to make a place for yourself on the air ..." Jack grinned apologetically as he rejected my prompting.
"Well," he said, "it wasn't just that way. I left the show with twenty weeks still to go."
"But wasn't it a zero hour for you? Didn't you stake everything on the hope of landing a radio spot?"
"Uh ... well ... you see I was getting $1,500.00 a week with Vanities," he amended regretfully. "I had appeared on Ed Sullivan's show one night as a guest performer. And I figured there was no reason why I shouldn't do all right on the air. We went down to Florida for a couple of weeks and thought it over When we came back we signed up with Canada Dry. No drama again. That doesn't mean of course, that Jack Benny just walked into things, always. The real reason is that his rise to fame was no overnight sensation. It was built upon years of work in the theatre. As Jack puts it: "After you've been playing around for twenty-odd years, you've got a certain feeling of security." And a well-earned sense of security too. It's true that Benny wasn't facing starvation when he left a $1,500 job to try for the radio. It's also true that without the gradual and steady upward climb of those twenty-four years he probably would have gone the way of most overnight successes—a skyrocket rise and fall. I gave up in despair. "Hasn't anything exciting ever happened to you?"
He shook his head, mildly sorrowful. "I've had less excitement than anybody in show business," he confessed. "It's been a steady pull. When we went on the air (He almost always says "we", even if Mary Livingstone wasn't then with him in the show). "When we went on the air, at first nobody paid very much attention to us. We went right along, sneaking up gradually. But nothing much happens."
"There must be some things that get your goat."

"Well—we had a touch of annoyance with listeners who resent perfectly harmless gags. There was the time a girl sang : 'Canada be the spring . . .' you know, to the tune of Love in Bloom. Well, several Canadians wrote in, objecting to it. Lord knows why! So, not long ago, we were going to do a travesty bit on the Northwest Mounted Police. We were afraid that would bring some more 'resenting' letters in. So we worked it out to let Mary apparently be writing the script, right while we were doing it."
You've probably heard it . . . the type-writer would tap, and then they would play a five -minute scene Mary had "written" in half a minute.
"To make doubly sure, we set the scene in Alaska, instead of Canada, and put in a line to cover it. I said to Mary: ‘There aren't any Mounties in Alaska!’ And Mary said: ‘I know—but it's colder there!’"
"Did it spoil the scene ?" I asked hopefully. Jack grinned.
"No . . . it was done to prevent any squawks, but it turned out funnier that way than it would have been otherwise."
"Then there's nothing," I sighed, "that you have to complain about?"
"Well," he said, grinning again, "back in the old days, in the theatre, when you made two thousand a week it was your’s."
But he didn't look very upset about it. And there you have Jack Benny—the man to whom nothing ever happens, except a steady climb to success, a busy life, a happy home and an adopted daughter he's quite screwy about. Their best friends are Burns and Allen. When the Bennys are in New York they live at the Burns and Allen apartment, and use the Burns and Allen car. And George and Gracie use the Benny car, out in Los Angeles. I didn't go into what happens when both couples are at the same place.
Mary and Gracie get together and swap stories about their babies and make gifts to the youngsters; gifts that are much alike, as each of them have the same toys."
Jack likes New York, he likes Los Angeles, he likes stage and screen and radio work. He likes playing to a studio audience and figures it helps a comedy show. But he'd give it up if the other comedians did. He likes being head man in comedy, but he'd be satisfied if he were second or third. He's easy -going, pleasant and affable as he sounds. It's not very thrilling, but what can you do about it?
Well, you can listen to his show and laugh at his comedy and like him.
It isn't difficult.

Alvin Might Have Been a Rabbit

If it weren’t for Herb Klynn, we might only know the Chipmunks today as novelty characters in an old gimmick record heard around Christmas time.

Klynn was the owner of Format Films and worked out a deal in 1961 to put the Chipmunks in an animated cartoon series. The Alvin Show may have lasted only one season in prime time, but it showed the characters were valuable as animated properties and that eventually led to today’s Chipmunk empire.

Not bad for taking someone’s voice and speeding it up electronically.

The voice in question didn’t belong to Klynn or anyone on his studio’s staff; their involvement ended after producing the original cartoon series (the characters were designed by Bob Kurtz). It belonged to Ross Bagdasarian, who was not only an actor and songwriter but proved to be a pretty canny businessman. He wasn’t content with making a quick buck by jumping on the silly record bandwagon. He knew he had something bigger, and he (and after his death, his family) ran with it and built it, step by step.

Prime time animated shows were the hot thing in 1961, thanks to the success of The Flintstones. Networks wanted them. Producers and animation studios sprung into action. Thus, The Alvin Show was born. There was some irony in this—the series came after the creation of a syndicated cartoon show starring the Nutty Squirrels. The Squirrels were a sped-up voice novelty record group invented after the first Chipmunks LP. Do you follow all that?

There was plenty of publicity at the start of the fall 1961 TV season for the various cartoon shows that made it to air. Here’s what is supposed to be a publicity piece for The Alvin Show in the October 1961 edition of TV Radio Mirror magazine. But it reads more like a publicity piece for Ross Bagdasarian himself. Still, he tells the story of the non-simultaneous invention of David Seville and of the Chipmunks.

DAVID SEVILLE: Brings Alvin to TV
By ENID FIFE
"Anyone who thinks my songs are nuts," says David Seville (in real life, Ross Bagdasarian), "is only half right. Raisins had just as much to do with the success of my musical concoctions." In these words, the composer of such weirdies as "Witch Doctor" and "The Chipmunk Song" refers to the fact that he was born January 27, 1919, in the grape (and raisin) country of Fresno, California. His father was in the vineyard business and, for a while, it looked as though Ross would follow in his dad's footsteps.
Two things saved him for show business: The first, of course, is talent. The second, being the cousin of playwright William Saroyan. "Through Bill, I got to play the pinball maniac (type casting, if there ever was any) in his 'Time of Your Life' hit on Broadway. Then came the war."
After four years in the Air Corps, Ross returned to Fresno, met a local lovely named Armen, and settled down to raising a family and grapes—with the customary by-products of wine and raisins. He had three lean years, then, in 1949, produced a real bumper crop. Alas, it was then he discovered the bottom had fallen out of the grape market. "That's when I decided grapes were for the birds. I took my wife, two children, $200 and an unpublished song, 'Come On-A-My House,' and headed for Hollywood."
Ross had composed this song almost ten years before, with the help of cousin Saroyan, when they were driving from New York to Fresno after the closing of Bill's play. Both had forgotten about it until Ross came across the manuscript while packing. Columbia Records decided it was right for Rosemary Clooney. It was a smash hit.
"But you don't get rich on one song, so I kept acting," Ross explains. His movie parts got bigger, better. He appeared in "The Proud and the Profane," Hitchcock's "Rear Window," and "The Deep Six." He kept writing songs, too—among them, "Hey, Brother, Pour the Wine," "What's the Use" and "Gotta Get to Your House." In 1956, he decided to record some of his own work under another name. Listening to his version of "Armen's Theme" (written for his wife), the name David Seville simply popped into his head. "It seemed to fit the mood," he recalls.
For some time, he had been casting about for a wacky novelty number. One afternoon in January, 1958, he glanced up from his desk and saw a book entitled "Duel with the Witch Doctor." Ross says. "Since many of the top records at that time had the craziest sort of lyrics. I figured it might be fun to have the Witch Doctor give advice to the lovelorn in his own gibberish." Having recorded the orchestra track, he spent two months trying to get a "witch doctor's voice." One day, he sang the words at half-speed into his tape-recorder, then played it back at normal speed. Before the first "wallah-wallah-bing" had sounded. Armen and children were in the room, fascinated and tickled. Ross knew he'd struck gold. At Liberty Records, president Si Waronker flipped over the piece. It sold close to two million.

No story about Seville-Bagdasarian can be complete without some mention of the chipmunks. Trying for a Christmas novelty, Ross was whistling melodies into his tape recorder (his method of remembering tunes, since he can neither read nor write music). His idea was to depict the ringers as animals or insects, "just to be different." Finally, he taped a song, the introduction in his normal speed voice, and the rest in his half-speed "little voices." His "little voices" came out, he thought, like mice or rabbits, but his children disagreed. They heard them as chipmunks.
Still, something was missing for a real click. He spent months searching for the answer. Finally, Si Waronker and Al Bennett of Liberty, along with Mark McIntyre, a long-time friend, suggested his having an argument with the chipmunks. Thus, Simon (after Waronker), Theodore (after engineer Ted Keep) and Alvin (after Bennett) came to fame and fortune. Moreover, they've become such hams, they have insisted on squealing and squawking through several new songs and now will be seen over CBS-TV every Wednesday night in The Alvin Show.
Ross, who signs fan mail and pictures as David Seville, lives in Beverly Hills with Armen and their three children, Carol, 14; Ross Jr., 12; and Adam, 7.

Bagdasarian must have realised what a goldmine the cartoon series could be if it took off. Not only did he get paid for voicing the characters, and not only did he get paid for the theme song (which, at the end, spelled out his name musically), but he could use the show to cross-promote other Chipmunks records he was making for Liberty. Things didn’t quite work out that way. CBS announced the cancellation of the series by January 31, 1962, less than four months after it debuted. But since the network had rights to rerun the show, it moved Alvin to the Sunday ratings wasteland where it wouldn’t eat up valuable prime time air.

Format Films went on to other projects; among other things, it received a contract to make Roadrunner cartoons for Warners theatrical release. And, as we know today, the Chipmunks carried on, too.

Wayward Pups Backgrounds

Furious movement highlights the MGM cartoon The Wayward Pups (1937). There are perspective drawings, too (it is a Harman-Ising cartoon, after all), though the cat at the centre of the story has a neck that’s way too long at times and a voice that sounds like Donald Duck.

It also has some very nice and effective backgrounds. Here are some from the night scenes in the second half of the cartoon where the guilt-ridden cat goes looking for the title characters and eventually protects them from a pack of vicious dogs.



Was this the work of Bob Gentle? It could be. He was at Harman-Ising at the time. Unfortunately, none of the artists are credited, other than Hugh Harman and Rudy Ising. Gentle’s the only person I can identify in a list of H-I employees for 1937 as a background artist. He deserted the studio that year when Fred Quimby decided to open up his own animation operation on the MGM lot.

An-udder Joke

Teats are funny. So (apparently) thought Walt Disney, who made them the butt of jokes in a number of his early cartoons. Steamboat Willie was among them.

Mickey Mouse attempts to have a cow hoisted onto a steamboat. The drawings below tell the gag.



This is the same cartoon where Mick plays the teats of a pig as a musical instrument. Nothing like farm humour.

Ub Iwerks rightfully gets a “By” credit as he animated almost all of the cartoon.

Goldfish, Church Bells, a Sea Gull and Fred Allen

Fred Allen and his wife Portland kept a huge scrapbook of newspaper and magazine clippings from his broadcasting career. It was huge because Fred constantly seemed to be giving interviews, even when he was secluded along an almost inaccessible beach in Maine every summer. When he wasn’t giving interviews, he was writing letters. A collection of some of his letters was published in book form in 1965.

Allen’s observations about flea’s navels and California oranges and molehill executives came from newspaper interviews and he seemed to like to quote his favourites to more than one reporter. That was in the 1940s. But he was reviewed and interviewed going back to his original radio show for Linit in 1932. He may have been a little less pithy but was still entertaining.

The following story from the Associated Press comes from the scrapbook and is passed on thanks to Kathy Fuller Seeley, who spent hours taking photo shots of the water-stained, brownish-yellow clippings as well as invaluable pages of Allen radio scripts as submitted to the network or sponsor or its ad agency or all of them. Allen’s collection rests in the public library in Boston, his place of birth. The photo with this article was with another story on the same scrapbook page. As a side note, the wire service writer was later the science editor for Saturday Review for 17 years and a Pulitzer Prize nominee.

I appreciate Allen’s cleverness but the concept of him being in an aquarium is more odd than funny.

HOSPITAL WILL GET JOKE BOOKS WHEN DIES
Comedian Gives Interview, He Insists, In Fish Tank At Museum
By JOHN LEAR
New York, Nov. 14.—(AP)—The library of 4,000 books through which Fred Allen rummages for some of his quips is going to be willed to Bellevue hospital, he said today, "so they can set it up for the psychopathies."
Sitting in a tank in the aquarium, Allen described the library as "the most amazing collection of useless information" in the world, including "everything that's not worth anything."
Among his most prized volumes he listed these pamphlets:
"The Art of Making Bibs for Country Babies."
"How to Grow Dewberries."
"How to Keep a Due Bill Dry."
He keeps the books in two closets, “to give the bookworms a change of pace.”
He was under water in the aquarium, he explained, “to have lunch with Dr. Beebe and some old friends.”
Dr. Beebe wasn't visible. In fact, there wasn't any water, and the room didn't look like the aquarium, but Fred insisted it was so. All his interviews, he said, took place in the aquarium, under water, so his public couldn't find him.
And the radio funny man sat there, in what he swore was a fish kennel, brooding over the news of the day.

"What a world!" he moaned! "It's even an uphill pull to the poorhouse." Suddenly he grew morose.
"Be careful," he whispered. "Be careful how you pass up hitchhikers in the next few days. It may be your congressman thumbing his way home from his last campaign speech."
Fred acknowledged he had been thinking a lot about the farm problem. He suggested a solution: "Farmers could save themselves the bother of plowing under their crops—by planting their seeds up-side down."
The political campaign made him think of air races.
“A man flies around the world in 19 days,” he exclaimed. “For what?
“A sea gull could have made the trip in two days, and no one would have said anything about it.”
The biggest pests in a comedian's life, in Fred's opinion, are the people who ask: "What is your funniest story?"
"When you kick around a couple of hundred jokes a week, you don't have time for thinking which is best," he asserted, but here are two recent favorites:
(1) The boy who wanted to learn to be a bell ringer. The only way he could practice was to break into belfries. No one caught him at that, but he got into trouble when people walking down the street heard the chimes in Trinity Church playing "Chopsticks."
(2) The woman who lived in a town where water was so scarce she had none for the goldfish bowl. She put casters on the fish, so they could get around the bowl by themselves.
Fred says he gets most of his laughs out of people he knows or has heard about. Some of them:
"The shy business executive who was always grabbing his stenographer's notebook. He wanted to hold her shorthand."
"The Sunday driver who decided to save time. He got up in the morning and drove straight to the hospital."
"The Scottish tavern keeper who saw a Neon sign and started to teach glow worms to spell 'bar and grill."
"The gambler who always went to bed with a penny in one hand in case he tossed in his sleep."
"The man who was thrown out of a community sing after the first practice. They sang in E flat and he was a G-man."
If you want to know the story of his success since he began as an amateur juggler in New England twenty-five years ago, hunt Fred out sometime.
"Tell them," he concluded, "that they can see me in my main office on bench No. 2 of Central Park."

Dog Skid Stop

Was Tedd Pierce on a bender when he came up with this story idea? A father possum dresses up in an ill-fitting dog costume to try to scare his son into staying awake in Sleepy Time Possum (released 1950).

Dad skids to a stop, looks around, then comes the take.



Bob McKimson’s animation crew in this cartoon was John Carey, Emery Hawkins, Rod Scribner, Chuck McKimson and Phil De Lara.

I'm Being Followed by a Moon Collar

Jokes suggesting dog urination seem be littered all over Tex Avery cartoons (Dog! Litter! Get it?). I don’t know how many of his cartoons included a dog/tree gag. His variation was a dog/fire hydrant gag. He uses it in the first Droopy cartoon and he fits it into his panic-paced stream of gags in The Cat That Hated People when the title character rockets to the moon.

The cat’s continually roughed up by objects that have a connection (such as a hammer and a nail). After one abuse gag, he looks off camera and sees the next gag coming. The second and third drawings below are consecutive. Avery didn’t waste time in this cartoon.



Avery maintains the take, but not by exaggerating the drawing. He simply slides it around on the background to indicate fright.

The cat jumps out of the scene and the gag runs into view.



Heck Allen wrote the story. Bill Shull and Louie Schmitt joined Walt Clinton and Grant Simmons to animate it.

Not 40!

Jack Benny was known for, among many things, his perennial age of 39. The full-stop before he could hit 40 came comparatively late in the radio career, February 15, 1948 to be precise. On the air, it took him about a dozen years to gain three years of age prior to that.

A first-person, tongue-in-cheek feature story bearing Jack’s name was published in Collier’s Weekly of February 19, 1954. We’ve given a sidebar portion of it in this post. Now here’s the full article. Unfortunately, I don’t have good copies of the photos that accompanied it (they were from various photo services) so what you see attached to the post are substitutes from my files.

After 39 Years—I’m Turning 40
By JACK BENNY
THE day started like any other in Beverly Hills. The sun forced its way through the early morning smog, the birds in the trees began to cough and I tumbled out of bed, happy, carefree and ready for the next 24 hours—like any healthy young animal.
Early rising is a ritual with me. Unlike my nocturnal brethren in show business, I am matutinal by nature. (I have always been matutinal, but never knew how to say it until I made an appearance on the Omnibus television program with Alistair Cooke. He slipped me the word, as he put it, "as a lagniappe." I don't know what lagniappe means, but the next time I see him I intend to ask.)
Anyway, the morning to which I refer began normally enough. I flung open the bedroom windows and started my daily dozen. I had just gotten around to the knee-bending exercises when I heard the stairs creaking and I knew that Rochester was on his way up with orange juice and coffee. Then I remembered that this was Rochester's day off. Suddenly I realized it wasn't the stairs that were creaking. It was my knees.
The shock straightened me up. I tried the knee-bending exercise again to make sure I had heard right. There was the same creaking—only this time louder, like somebody scraping a fiddle string. I winced. I can't stand bad violin playing.
I've always expected that sooner or later I'd start showing signs of wear. But I never expected the signs to be audible. I stood there, listening, and my eyes settled on the wall calendar, as they frequently do: it was a gift from Marilyn Monroe. After a moment or two, I glanced down at the date. It was February 1, 1954! In less than two weeks, on February 14th, I, Jack Benny, would be forty!
Forty! I shuddered, and my eyes fogged. The clock on the dresser seemed to be ticking faster, in a deliberate effort to hasten the fateful date. Cold chills and hot flashes coursed intermittently through my body. In a sort of hazy stupor, I could visualize myself sitting on a park bench with Barney Baruch, feeding the pigeons.
As reason slowly returned, 1 realized that Father Time had been waving his scythe under my nose, and 1 had been too comfortably ensconced in the sage and durable age of thirty-nine to heed the closeness of the blade. Trifling occurrences that I had dismissed as unimportant came back now to plague me with their full significance.
Lately, I had noticed that the Martinis were getting stronger, the hills on the golf course steeper, flirtations scarcer. Perhaps I had been cutting too fast a pace for a man on the brink of forty. I would have to change my habits. No more carousing with the boys. From now on. Charlie Coburn, Guy Kibbee and Lionel Barrymore would have to fun around without me.
In the following days, I underwent a transformation. I brooded and fretted, found fault with everything. I changed from a bright, lovable young man to a bitter, churlish, middle-aged curmudgeon. Rochester was on the verge of quitting. Polly, my parrot, wouldn't talk to me. I insulted the people on my radio and television shows. I even began to hate myself—and I was the last person in the world I thought I'd ever hate.
Finally I decided I would have to adjust. After all, it isn't a crime to be forty. A pity, maybe, but not a crime. I got a grip on myself and went to see my doctor. That is, I didn't exactly go to see him. I invited him over to my house for dinner. It was friendlier than going to his office . . . and much less expensive.
After a modest meal, I led the conversation around to the state of my health and my impending birthday. The doctor was reluctant to talk business at first, but a couple of quick ponies of brandy loosened his tongue.
"When most men reach forty," the doctor said, "they find themselves up against a psychological block. Forty is considered the gateway to middle age and nobody wants to make the trip."
I refilled his glass and he continued his dissertation:
"A man seems to feel, and with some reason, that while he's in his thirties he's within shooting distance of his youth, but when he hits forty he's all shot." He helped himself to some more cognac.
"That all depends on the health of the individual," he went on. "Now, I'm forty-eight and I'm far from shot. Why, I can outdrink two twenty-four-year-olds put together."
I hastily put away the cognac bottle.

I had drawn some cheer from the doctor's observations. But I still was not satisfied. I yawned in his face a couple of times so he could get a look at my tongue. I saw his quick professional glance, and his lack of comment was reassuring.
I took the little wooden hammer out of the nut bowl and casually put it down on the table within easy reach of his hand. Then I crossed my legs and waited. Sure enough, he took the bait. He picked up the hammer and tapped me on the knee. I hadn't realized my reflexes were so fast. If he hadn't pulled his head back just in time, I would have punted his teeth into the kitchen.
The doctor remarked that he hadn't seen such knee action since Nijinsky. If I took care of myself, he said, I could live to be a hundred and forty. Keeping the doctor's visit on a social basis, I said, "Doc, if you had a patient like me, what kind of diet would you put him on?"
He told me everything I wanted to know and it didn't cost me a quarter (including the price of the cognac). However, the diet he prescribed was disquieting. I was limited to expensive steaks and chops, lean cuts of meat, fowl and a few green vegetables. Bread and gravy, potatoes and rice, the old standbys that regularly graced my table, were taboo. Under my tutelage, Rochester had become proficient at preparing some wonderfully economical dishes . . . braised beef hearts, fried pork livers and country gravy, breaded fishcakes and the hundred different kinds of hash that help the housewife stay within her budget. I was loath to discontinue this fare, especially since my freezer was full of beef hearts and fishcakes. Besides, Rochester was now so expert at preparing this type of food it would be a pity to make him stop.
Rochester Offers an Ideal Solution
After turning the problem over in my mind, I finally found a way out of the dilemma. Rochester was not on a diet. There was no reason why he couldn't go on eating beef hearts and fishcakes, even though I was stuck with steaks and chops.
As I walked the doctor to the door, I felt reassured. Still, I had been unable to think of a way for him to take my basal metabolism. I began toying with the idea of inviting him to dinner again. I could make the invitation for two and ask him to bring his machine with him. As we shook hands, I held the grip, and fed the doctor one more leading question.
"So you think I'm in good shape, eh, Doc?"
"Yes," he said, struggling vainly to get his hand loose, "but I think you ought to drop by the office for a checkup in a week or so."
"Another checkup?" I asked, taken off guard.
"But you just gave me one."
"Well, you can't be too safe," he grunted, tugging at his hand. "Besides, a man of your age can change overnight."
All my old fears overwhelmed me again. In fact, I was so staggered that my grip turned to mush, and the doctor, released suddenly, went flying out the door.

The doctor's pessimistic remark left me frustrated and disappointed. But I was able to find consolation in the fact that even though the body was beginning to sag a little as birthday number forty crept closer, mentally my faculties were never sharper. I still retained all my old cunning and guile. Besides, I decided, even though I might change by tomorrow, I was still in good shape tonight, so the money expended on food and drink for the doctor had not been entirely wasted.
When the Plumber Comes to Dinner
Feeling a little better, I checked my supply of cognac and was pleased to find there were still a few pints left. Not that I drink myself, but I like to keep some in the house for my guests. Next week, I'm having my plumber over for dinner. There's an annoying leak in the kitchen drainpipe, and I'm sure that after Herman imbibes a few samples of the grape, he'll be under that sink like an old firehorse, I'm counting on quite a saving, because the plumber's fee is usually higher than the doctor's.
The next morning I could find no perceptible change in my health, in spite of the doctor's dour warning. Nevertheless, I bathed and dressed carefully to avoid taxing my strength, and, wary of my protesting knees, I had Rochester help me with my socks and my shoelaces. Then, after a cautious breakfast of orange juice and hot vitamin-fortified milk, I set out on my program of readjustment.
First I dropped in to see my old friend and colleague, Eddie Cantor. Eddie had long since endured the experience I was now undergoing, and I hoped to acquire a few tips on how a man should dress, behave and adapt his philosophy when he reaches forty. Eddie proved to be a disappointment. He beat around the bush and seemed reluctant to discuss the subject.
Finally, I put it to him point-blank. "Eddie," I said, "did you feel that your whole psychological structure changed when you became forty?"
Cantor answered that he wouldn't know; he never had been forty and he never intended to be.
You see, Eddie went from thirty-nine to sixty overnight, and the only one who ever suspected it was Ida.
After lunch, I left Cantor's house, still groping for a panacea to restore my confidence and bolster my shattered morale. As I walked down Sunset Boulevard, I felt that everyone was staring at me. I could almost hear people saying to themselves, "Look at him. He must be forty if he's a day."
I decided a few holes of golf might help my frayed nerves. I was going to take a taxi out to my club, but it was such a pleasant day I chose to walk. It was only seven miles and I knew a short cut, most of it paved. The only bad stretch was a half mile through a beanfield, but I knew the terrain like the back of my hand.
I started out briskly enough, but after a few blocks (he pace began to tell. My strides were slower and my breathing was faster. I thought a cup of coffee might pick me up, so I dropped into Romanoff's. Not Mike Romanoff's. This place is owned by a man named Joseph Romanoff. Joseph claims he is the real prince, and Mike is a phony. But Joseph is a very sweet fellow and doesn't want to make trouble, so he doesn't even use the name Romanoff's for his restaurant. He calls it Joe's Place.

As I sat on the stool sipping my coffee, the thought occurred to me that Joe was about forty, and his views on the subject of middle age might be worth hearing. "Joe," I said, "would you credit a man of thirty-nine with having a lot more stamina than a man of forty?"
"Mr. Benny," Joe answered, "in my place, I give credit to nobody and I don't care how old he is. Besides, we got no stamina here. If he don't want a hamburger, let him go someplace else."
Naturally, this answer was of no help to me, although I couldn't dispute the soundness of Joe's business acumen. I left Romanoff's considerably refreshed, but I decided against walking the rest of the way to my club. There was no point in expending my waning energy just to save a few cents. I took a bus.
All my life, I meditated as the bus weaved its way through the traffic, I'd been saving my money for my old age. Well, there was no point in saving for it any more. It was here.
I almost changed my mind when I looked up and saw an attractive young girl smiling at me. I smiled back, my spirits soaring at this evidence that I had not lost my great appeal for the other sex. Then, as she moved closer, my world collapsed again: she was merely after my seat! I settled back, and her smile changed to a dirty look. But a man of forty is obliged to conserve his strength, even at the expense of his manners.
Youthful Comic Worried Too
I was very much depressed as I entered the club. A lot of the boys were there, and I sat down and chatted with Jerry Lewis, hoping that he would cheer me up with some of his usual zany antics. But it turned out that Jerry, too, was in a somber mood. He confided that he was going to be thirty soon and he was worried about it. I found that 1 was unable to summon up any sympathy for this kid. There he was, a full 10 years younger than I; what did he have to worry about?
I was about to give up and go home when George Burns walked in and pointed his cigar at me. I broke up with laughter. George has a way of pointing a cigar that nobody else can top. At least, it seems that way to me. As everyone in Hollywood knows, I am George Burns's best audience. As a matter of fact, there's a rumor around the club that if George Burns were playing a date, I'd even pay to see him. Well, anyway, that's the rumor.
I invited George to join me for a little golf. By the time we teed off, I was in much better spirits. All during the game, George kept me in stitches. He really has the greatest sense of humor in the world.
George was wearing a big diamond ring and he called the caddy over and showed it to him. As the caddy looked at the stone admiringly, a stream of water shot out of the ring and hit him in the eye.
I had seen the trick work before, but the way George did it was so funny I became hysterical. The caddy didn't appreciate the humor until George gave him a dollar. Then the boy laughed louder than I did.
Make-Up Caused Healthy Look
After the game. I had a steam bath and a massage, and, thanks to George Burns, I set out for CBS in a much better frame of mind. We were rehearsing a TV show, and everyone in the cast remarked how healthy I looked. I didn't bother telling them that I had just spent an hour with the make-up man. It was a few days before the show went on, but I always like to look my best. You can never tell who might drop in to watch the rehearsal.

I apologized to Mary Livingstone for my petty griping of the past several days. She tried to be kind and said she hadn't noticed any difference. Then I explained that the cause of my mental stress was the sudden realization that I would shortly be forty.
Mary burst into that infectious laugh of hers. She said she just couldn't believe that was my right age. I wasn't surprised. No matter how often I tell people I'm thirty-nine, some of them refuse to believe I'm that old.
It was Mary who finally straightened me out. by reminding me of others in my age bracket who were carrying on with the vim and vigor of teen-agers. Georgie Jessel, for one, was never concerned about age, either his own or that of whoever happened to be his date.
As Mary spoke, I thought of Bob Hope, whose case was so similar to my own. Maybe he was even a year or two older. But Bob was as frisky as a two-year-old colt, and covered a lot more ground. And what's more, the ground he covered had oil in it.
Then I thought of Bing Crosby. Bing had hurdled the forty-year barrier without drawing a long breath or a wrong note. His popularity had increased with the years, both here and abroad. In Germany, I understand, they still call him Der Bingle. I remember talking to my press agent once about giving me a build-up in Germany, finding a nickname for me comparable to Bing's. He started publicizing me as "Der Jackal." For reasons I don't remember, we were forced to abandon the campaign.
At home that night, I reflected on Mary's words and decided she was right. Aside from a pair of noisy knees, I had never felt or looked better. Oh, there were a few tiny signs of age. The brown hair that used to tumble over my forehead now tumbles all the way to the floor. And of course, there's the pitter patter of little crow's-feet around my eyes. But I'm lucky they're little; some crows have bigger feet than others. Anyhow, I don't mind having a few lines in my face. I think it gives me character.
I walked over and looked into the mirror. My eyes were just as blue as they ever were. And no matter what anyone says. I've never dyed them. I smiled, and noted with satisfaction that they were my own teeth smiling back at me. I tried to look at myself objectively, and after a few minutes I came to the conclusion that it was not by accident or camera trick that I projected so handsomely on the television screen.
I was now reconciled to the idea of being forty, although I knew it would be quite a while before I got really used to it. If seemed, in retrospect, that all my life I'd been thirty-nine. I suppose it's because so many things happened in that one year.
When Rochester called me downstairs for dinner, I was the old Jack Benny once more: gay, carefree, and bubbling over with the joy of living. I had shed my gloomy cocoon and emerged as a radiant caterpillar . . . fuzzy, but free.
Rochester had noticed the change in me and by way of celebration he had whipped up an elaborate dinner. He presented the menu to me with a flourish. I had decided to wait until my freezer was depleted before embarking on my new diet of steaks and chops, so there was a fishcake cocktail, pork liver de fois gras, salade de la plain lettuce, and for the entree, braised hearts of beef, with a new invention of Rochester's which he called city gravy. As I attacked the savory fare, I contemplated the new pattern of behavior I was to adopt as a man of forty.
A Generous Gift for Rochester
I would have to be a trifle more conservative in my dress. I called Rochester in to make him a present of my green plaid suit, but found he was already wearing it. I told him he could keep it without charge, but that the alterations would have to come out of his salary. I was in good shape for the transition so far as the rest of my wardrobe was concerned. True, I had two or three ties that were a little on the loud side, but I could have them dyed.

Rochester then suggested a birthday party. At first I was against the idea. The fuss and bother didn't appeal to me; besides, real friends should give presents whether they're invited to a party or not.
But then I reconsidered. The best way to handle an unpleasant situation is to face it squarely. Why not have a party? Why not announce to the world that Jack Benny, star of stage, screen, radio and television, was forty?
Secretly, I had been entertaining the thought of fibbing a little. I could always say I was thirty-nine and get away with it. Yes, I actually considered that. But fibbing goes against my grain. And so I made my decision: a party it would be.
Rochester volunteered to contribute the cake, provided I paid for the forty candles. I told him that was satisfactory. I knew I wouldn't have to buy forty candles. I could get ten and cut them in quarters.
As I pen these words, the invitations to the party in celebration of my birthday are already in the mail, and I stand exposed to the world as a man of forty.
I hope the revelation will not come as too great a shock to my millions of fans who, as fans will do, have cloaked their idol with the mantle of perennial youth.
Today I face the future fearlessly, convinced that, after thirty-nine years of the best fruits of life, my next thirty-nine years will be just as fruitful—and will last just as long.