Ray Abrams, Ed Love and Preston Blair are the credited animators in this Tex Avery cartoon for MGM.
Tuesday, 16 May 2017
Coy Pitcher
“McGrip starts his wind-up, and here’s the throw,” announces the play-by-play man (John Wald) in Batty Baseball (1944). The pitcher shows off his coy side after tossing the ball.
Ray Abrams, Ed Love and Preston Blair are the credited animators in this Tex Avery cartoon for MGM.
Ray Abrams, Ed Love and Preston Blair are the credited animators in this Tex Avery cartoon for MGM.
Monday, 15 May 2017
Angry Adolf
Herr A. Hitler is so angry about a newspaper headline showing Daffy Duck's scrap pile has helped beat the Axis buddy Mussolini that he jumps on the newspaper and then starts chewing his carpet.
Art Davis gets the only animation credit in Frank Tashlin's stylish Scrap Happy Daffy. The music over the opening credits is "This Is Worth Fighting For" by De Lange and Stept.
Art Davis gets the only animation credit in Frank Tashlin's stylish Scrap Happy Daffy. The music over the opening credits is "This Is Worth Fighting For" by De Lange and Stept.
Sunday, 14 May 2017
How To Sign a Guest Star
Jack Benny had a well-earned reputation of handing many of the laughs on his show to everyone else. It served him in good stead. It’s how he got Marilyn Monroe for his TV show at a time when heads of movie studios were sticking pins in voodoo dolls of television sets. Benny’s shrewdness helped him land movie stars, too. He coaxed Jack Warner and Sam Goldwyn to appear with him on radio and showcased them as funny, sympathetic guys who suffered by miscasting him in movies. Ego stroking never hurts in Hollywood.
Guest stars can be a good thing or a bad thing. I’ve always felt a show that starts relying on guest stars is one that’s run out of gas and needs a gimmick. The Benny show, on radio, rarely had them in the first decade with the main notable exception of Fred Allen. In the ‘40s, Benny used them pretty well. The writers found a logical reason for them to be there—Ronald and Benita Colman were neighbours, Eddie Cantor, Al Jolson and Bob Hope were vaudeville buddies, Lauren Bacall was rehearsing a movie part with him and so on. In the ‘50s, some of the hook-ups seemed strained or existed solely to plug a movie. A show with Sarah Churchill strikes me as contrived, and a two-parter with Deborah Kerr just doesn’t work for me.
Jack went for guest stars on television and, in some cases, used safe, familiar routines. Jimmy Stewart and Gary Cooper had appeared with him on radio. They showed up with their wives on TV, basically doing the Colman schtick—they were the “normal” Hollywood stars uncomfortable with, and aghast by, the boorish and socially awkward Benny. The Colmans handled the roles much better.
Here’s a story from the New York Herald Tribune of March 13, 1960 talking about how Benny treated his guest stars. And he again gripes about interviewers asking about his Maxwell and “being 39.” To me, the “39” question is a logical one and the Maxwell is an ice-breaking joke, but perhaps Jack heard them so many times (he was constantly giving interviews, it seems), that he was tired of it.
Jack Benny:
Still Fiddling Around
By Joe Hyams
THE other day I was sitting at lunch with Jack Benny, trying to puzzle out what it is about his shows that make them almost consistently good entertainment. Mr. Benny was being modest about it all, but finally when the conversation got on to his next spectacular, he gave me what I think is the key to his success. “It’ll be different,” he said, “otherwise I’d go nuts and get in a rut.”
The point is, Jack Benny’s show, more than any other on television, seems to be tailored to his personality and his likes and dislikes. I guess that’s a formula of sorts, and as long as it is successful and good, I doubt that Jack will change it.
The show, as most any viewer must know, consists of Jack and a couple of carefully chosen guests. On the coming CBS-TV spectacular, for example, the guests will be Phil Silvers and Polly Bergen, making a balance Jack likes: another man and a woman, preferably a singer.
Generally Jack has an idea which he presents to his guests in advance, rather than getting the guest and then the idea. For instance, one of Jack’s favorite guests was Gary Cooper.
A Coup on Cooper
“Three years ago Coop’s wife, Rocky, came to me at a party,” Jack recalled. “She said Gary wouldn’t mind being on the show. Well, who wouldn’t jump to have Gary Cooper, so I thought of a way of presenting him. At lunch a few weeks later I outlined the idea to him, then realized it wouldn’t come off. Two years later I had a terrific idea and asked him to come on with Rocky. He did, and it was one of our best shows.
“Then from the time Jimmy Stewart first said he’d come on the show, it took me almost three years to find the right idea—but when we did, the show worked out fine.
“The point is, I hurt myself if the guest doesn’t look right. In the first place, I don’t ask someone to appear until I have the right idea. With the right idea you can go to a star, but it’s bad to go to them first, then have to scramble for an idea to fit them.
“I had Mr. and Mrs. Ronald Colman on dozens of times, but I remember calling them off one Saturday because the skit we planned just didn’t fit the show. We postponed them for a couple of weeks and then, when they fit the show, we invited them back, and it came off perfectly.”
Jack said he likes to use off-beat guest stars, people like Harry S. Truman, Mrs. James Stewart and Mrs. Edgar Bergen—people one doesn’t normally expect to see on a television show. “I must say that as a rule it is easier to write comedy scripts for dramatic actors than comedians,” Jack said. “The surprise impact is greater. But it’s fun having another comedian on too. Generally they come off well, because I don’t mind a bit being the straight man, as long as it’s on my own show.”
Jack has played the straight man to some of the great comics of our day, something rare in show business, where everyone likes to be the “top banana.” But his formula of making the “guest look good” is one that pays off handsomely.
I guessed that in “payment” for Phil Silver’s [sic] appearance on his show, Jack would guest on Phil’s show, and I was right. This practice of lend-lease among stars is getting more prevalent these days, and Jack gave me a good reason for it.
“Money doesn’t mean much to entertainers any more,” he said. “There’s only so much they can keep, and the prices of top talent are prohibitive. Since I’m not interested in taking money, but I am interested in getting top guests—and they’re in the same situation—we exchange visits. It seems to be working out all right all around. You just have to pick your spots as well as your guests.”
A Vote For Paar
In line with this, I asked Jack which shows he liked to be a guest on.
“It’s easy to be good on the show Jack Paar had,” he said. “Jack was sensitive and asked nice leading questions you could talk about. It’s not hard to ad lib when you’re talking on sensible subjects. But interviews I hate are when someone starts out by asking, ‘Did you drive over in your Maxwell?’ ‘How long are you going to stay 39?’ ‘Are you really that stingy?’
“Steve Allen is good to work with, too, because he asks sensible questions. As a rule, when I go on a George Burns show I don’t have to worry, and Danny Thomas comes up with good ideas and good jokes. Bob Hope is a good guy to exchange with, but there are some I really worry about. When I know I’m going on their show I bring in my writers too and we all sweat.”
Guest stars can be a good thing or a bad thing. I’ve always felt a show that starts relying on guest stars is one that’s run out of gas and needs a gimmick. The Benny show, on radio, rarely had them in the first decade with the main notable exception of Fred Allen. In the ‘40s, Benny used them pretty well. The writers found a logical reason for them to be there—Ronald and Benita Colman were neighbours, Eddie Cantor, Al Jolson and Bob Hope were vaudeville buddies, Lauren Bacall was rehearsing a movie part with him and so on. In the ‘50s, some of the hook-ups seemed strained or existed solely to plug a movie. A show with Sarah Churchill strikes me as contrived, and a two-parter with Deborah Kerr just doesn’t work for me.
Jack went for guest stars on television and, in some cases, used safe, familiar routines. Jimmy Stewart and Gary Cooper had appeared with him on radio. They showed up with their wives on TV, basically doing the Colman schtick—they were the “normal” Hollywood stars uncomfortable with, and aghast by, the boorish and socially awkward Benny. The Colmans handled the roles much better.
Here’s a story from the New York Herald Tribune of March 13, 1960 talking about how Benny treated his guest stars. And he again gripes about interviewers asking about his Maxwell and “being 39.” To me, the “39” question is a logical one and the Maxwell is an ice-breaking joke, but perhaps Jack heard them so many times (he was constantly giving interviews, it seems), that he was tired of it.
Jack Benny:
Still Fiddling Around
By Joe Hyams
THE other day I was sitting at lunch with Jack Benny, trying to puzzle out what it is about his shows that make them almost consistently good entertainment. Mr. Benny was being modest about it all, but finally when the conversation got on to his next spectacular, he gave me what I think is the key to his success. “It’ll be different,” he said, “otherwise I’d go nuts and get in a rut.”
The point is, Jack Benny’s show, more than any other on television, seems to be tailored to his personality and his likes and dislikes. I guess that’s a formula of sorts, and as long as it is successful and good, I doubt that Jack will change it.
Generally Jack has an idea which he presents to his guests in advance, rather than getting the guest and then the idea. For instance, one of Jack’s favorite guests was Gary Cooper.
A Coup on Cooper
“Three years ago Coop’s wife, Rocky, came to me at a party,” Jack recalled. “She said Gary wouldn’t mind being on the show. Well, who wouldn’t jump to have Gary Cooper, so I thought of a way of presenting him. At lunch a few weeks later I outlined the idea to him, then realized it wouldn’t come off. Two years later I had a terrific idea and asked him to come on with Rocky. He did, and it was one of our best shows.
“Then from the time Jimmy Stewart first said he’d come on the show, it took me almost three years to find the right idea—but when we did, the show worked out fine.
“The point is, I hurt myself if the guest doesn’t look right. In the first place, I don’t ask someone to appear until I have the right idea. With the right idea you can go to a star, but it’s bad to go to them first, then have to scramble for an idea to fit them.
“I had Mr. and Mrs. Ronald Colman on dozens of times, but I remember calling them off one Saturday because the skit we planned just didn’t fit the show. We postponed them for a couple of weeks and then, when they fit the show, we invited them back, and it came off perfectly.”
Jack said he likes to use off-beat guest stars, people like Harry S. Truman, Mrs. James Stewart and Mrs. Edgar Bergen—people one doesn’t normally expect to see on a television show. “I must say that as a rule it is easier to write comedy scripts for dramatic actors than comedians,” Jack said. “The surprise impact is greater. But it’s fun having another comedian on too. Generally they come off well, because I don’t mind a bit being the straight man, as long as it’s on my own show.”
I guessed that in “payment” for Phil Silver’s [sic] appearance on his show, Jack would guest on Phil’s show, and I was right. This practice of lend-lease among stars is getting more prevalent these days, and Jack gave me a good reason for it.
“Money doesn’t mean much to entertainers any more,” he said. “There’s only so much they can keep, and the prices of top talent are prohibitive. Since I’m not interested in taking money, but I am interested in getting top guests—and they’re in the same situation—we exchange visits. It seems to be working out all right all around. You just have to pick your spots as well as your guests.”
A Vote For Paar
In line with this, I asked Jack which shows he liked to be a guest on.
“It’s easy to be good on the show Jack Paar had,” he said. “Jack was sensitive and asked nice leading questions you could talk about. It’s not hard to ad lib when you’re talking on sensible subjects. But interviews I hate are when someone starts out by asking, ‘Did you drive over in your Maxwell?’ ‘How long are you going to stay 39?’ ‘Are you really that stingy?’
“Steve Allen is good to work with, too, because he asks sensible questions. As a rule, when I go on a George Burns show I don’t have to worry, and Danny Thomas comes up with good ideas and good jokes. Bob Hope is a good guy to exchange with, but there are some I really worry about. When I know I’m going on their show I bring in my writers too and we all sweat.”
Saturday, 13 May 2017
Mighty Mouse the Money Mouse
There isn’t a lot to be said about Terrytoons that hasn’t already been said. The studio had popular characters in Mighty Mouse and Heckle and Jeckle; in fact, they were the only ones I had ever heard of when I was a kid in the ‘60s. By the time Terry talked to the Trib his cartoons were the least polished in all of theatrical animation and had been for many years. They filled time and, to be honest, that’s all cartoons were meant to do in movie houses by the early ‘50s. Distributors didn’t care. And kids seemed to like them.
Here’s the Tribune article, published November 13, 1955, about six weeks before Terry closed the deal to sell everything to CBS.
Mighty Mouse Invades 10-Million-a-Year Class
By David Steinberg
Forty years ago Paul Terry “spoiled some good movie film by drawing all over it” and produced his first animated cartoon. Today Mighty Mouse is a Money Mouse and Terrytoons have become a $10,000,000-a-year business.
Terrytoon characters appear on motion picture and TV screens, in books and comic books, as foam rubber toys, puzzles and games and as designs for children’s clothing, jewelry and playing cards.
Farmer Al Falfa, Dinky Duck and the rest of the Terrytoon family make their home in New Rochelle, N.Y., “to be near the city where the major decisions of the movie industry are made.” In the studio Paul Terry and his staff of animators, photographers, tracers, writers, composers, engineers, sales personal and office help produce an average of twelve wide-screen cartoons a year to be distributed by Twentieth Century Fox.
The average seven-minute Terrytoon reel today costs $60 a foot, or $40,000, to produce excluding prints. In 1915 Mr. Terry recalls working around the clock for a month—“a privilege accorded to the self-employed”—to produce his first animated movie, “”Little Herman.” He spent almost as much time trying to find a buyer and finally settled for $1.35 a foot, slightly more than the cost of the raw film.
Mr. Terry asserts that he has never worked a day in his life. As he puts it, “if you’re doing one thing when you would rather be doing something else, you’re working. There’s nothing I’d rather do than make cartoons.”
According to Mr. Terry, cartoons are more popular today than ever. On a global basis he reports that the best markets outside of the United States are England and France. He attributes part of the increased interest to television, which he says, “makes people more picture-minded.” One phase of the Terrytoon operation is the Barker Bill TV show on C.B.S. twice a week. Plans have been formulated for a new TV program, the Mighty Mouse Playhouse, also slated for C.B.S., to begin after Jan. 1.
The latest enterprise of Terrytoons, Inc., is a reversion to the nickelodeon, spiced with modern gadgetry. When the Mighty Mouse Playhouse hits the streets, the nation’s small fry will be able to hear and see in three dimensions any one of four different Terrytoon stories in each machine for only a nickel.
Friday, 12 May 2017
A Lantz Cow
People love laughing at yokels. Universal discovered that with The Egg and I, a 1947 film stolen by Percy Kilbride and Marjorie Main as Pa and Ma Kettle (the leads were actually Fred MacMurray and Claudette Colbert). The studio decided to build a series of films around the supporting players, which proved to be a very profitable decision.
Universal distributed cartoons by Walter Lantz, who decided what was good enough for feature films was good enough for him. So he came up with a Maw and Paw series in 1953, with Dal McKennon sounding more like Parker Fennelly’s Titus Moody than Kilbride.
Unfortunately, the Lantz cartoons, with very few exceptions, stopped being funny in the ‘50s. The first Maw and Paw short may have had laughs in Homer Brightman’s story meeting, but there probably weren’t many in theatres. The presence of a “smart pig” in the cartoon brings to mind comparisons with the later TV series Green Acres. The difference is Green Acres had surrealism and subtle satire. This cartoon had Brightman and Paul J. Smith.
Here are some of the drawings of a take by a cow which sees it’s about to be run over by a modern, streamlined car driven by the pig.
Ken Southworth, Gil Turner and Bob Bentley are the animators in this cartoon.
Universal distributed cartoons by Walter Lantz, who decided what was good enough for feature films was good enough for him. So he came up with a Maw and Paw series in 1953, with Dal McKennon sounding more like Parker Fennelly’s Titus Moody than Kilbride.
Unfortunately, the Lantz cartoons, with very few exceptions, stopped being funny in the ‘50s. The first Maw and Paw short may have had laughs in Homer Brightman’s story meeting, but there probably weren’t many in theatres. The presence of a “smart pig” in the cartoon brings to mind comparisons with the later TV series Green Acres. The difference is Green Acres had surrealism and subtle satire. This cartoon had Brightman and Paul J. Smith.
Here are some of the drawings of a take by a cow which sees it’s about to be run over by a modern, streamlined car driven by the pig.
Ken Southworth, Gil Turner and Bob Bentley are the animators in this cartoon.
Thursday, 11 May 2017
Just Order Two Seidels
3.2 beer doesn’t really strike me as much of a beer, but when you’ve lived through almost 12 years of Prohibition, it was something to celebrate. So on April 7, 1933, 3.2 beer became legal in the United States.
Many cartoonists of the 1930s, as I understand it, enjoyed their alcohol, so it’s only natural that the repeal of Prohibition ended up in animated cartoons. One such effort was Van Beuren’s Doughnuts (1933), starring Tom and Jerry at a bakers convention, where the attraction is 3.2 pretzels.
Poor Tom and Jerry can’t attract any customers. The quality of animation is pretty inconsistent in this cartoon but our heroes are pretty well drawn here. And you can easily read the expressions, helped along by radiating lines and a question mark that appears out of nowhere.
Musical director Gene Rodemich dredges up the 1902 beer drinking song “Down Where the Wurzburger Flows” for the soundtrack. The chorus goes:
Take me down, down, down
Where the Wurzburger flows, flows, flows.
It will drown, drown, drown all your troubles
And cares and woes.
Just order two seidels of lager or three.
If I don't want to drink it, please force it on me,
The Rhine may be fine
But a cold stein for mine,
Down where the Wurzburger flows.
The cartoon ends in a drunken mess. I suspect there were Van Beuren animators who could relate to that, too.
Many cartoonists of the 1930s, as I understand it, enjoyed their alcohol, so it’s only natural that the repeal of Prohibition ended up in animated cartoons. One such effort was Van Beuren’s Doughnuts (1933), starring Tom and Jerry at a bakers convention, where the attraction is 3.2 pretzels.
Poor Tom and Jerry can’t attract any customers. The quality of animation is pretty inconsistent in this cartoon but our heroes are pretty well drawn here. And you can easily read the expressions, helped along by radiating lines and a question mark that appears out of nowhere.
Musical director Gene Rodemich dredges up the 1902 beer drinking song “Down Where the Wurzburger Flows” for the soundtrack. The chorus goes:
Take me down, down, down
Where the Wurzburger flows, flows, flows.
It will drown, drown, drown all your troubles
And cares and woes.
Just order two seidels of lager or three.
If I don't want to drink it, please force it on me,
The Rhine may be fine
But a cold stein for mine,
Down where the Wurzburger flows.
The cartoon ends in a drunken mess. I suspect there were Van Beuren animators who could relate to that, too.
Wednesday, 10 May 2017
The Human Joke Machine
Allen may not have been far from the truth. At one point in 1948, Amsterdam was doing two shows on WHN radio and “Stop Me If You’ve Heard This” on both NBC radio and TV; it was the network’s biggest television show at the time it began airing that March. He was performing in a nightclub he had a part interest in and was about to launch a revue called “Hilarities of 1949” (It never reached 1949. It closed after 16 performances in 1948).
That was kind of the second phase in his career, which also included writing some popular songs. People are generally familiar with the third phase of his career, when he was a regular on The Dick Van Dyke Show in the first half of the 1960s.
The first phase of his career goes back into the 1920s when he appeared on the vaudeville stage, and while in San Francisco, connected with comedian Al Pearce, becoming part of his gang around 1930. He, his wife Mabel Todd and orchestra leader Tony Romano left Pearce in summer 1936 and soon had their own radio show. Naturally, because Amsterdam was everywhere, the show was broadcast out of Los Angeles on the NBC Red network one night and the Blue network another night. Along the way, the three of them ended up in New York and took up residence on WOR/Mutual by the end of November 1939.
The corny jokes Amsterdam spouted on the Van Dyke show were a good indication of the kind of humour he used on stage and on radio. Critics’ feelings about him were mixed. The ones who didn’t like him dismissed him as being loud, hokey and unfit for the big time. Audiences evidently disagreed or Amsterdam wouldn’t have been as ubiquitous. Still, when the 1950s came, his stardom was eclipsed by others, despite a quick wit and a bottomless barrel of laugh material.
Let’s pass on a few clippings about the man once known as the Human Joke Machine. The first is a profile in the Los Angeles Times of October 14, 1934. Among a number of things, it confirms his age. In later years, he shaved a few years off it.
Ether EtchingsAmsterdam and Todd broke up but he kept plugging away in New York City. He was part owner of a trade rag there (the Broadway Reporter) as well as a nightclub, in addition to his radio work. He received a visit from columnist Earl Wilson and radio writer Hal Block in 1947. Wilson wrote about it in his column in the Post of July 1st that year.
Morey Amsterdam is short in stature and long in satire . . . has a good memory for bad jokes . . . never remembers their source . . . never tells the same joke twice—on the same program . . . is one of Al Pearce’s favorite comics . . . helps routine Al’s daily operas . . . has a flair for high-waisted trousers and low-brow humor . . . does everything on a big scale . . . insisted that Al use six people in the quartet from Rigoletto.
Was born in Chicago (no reason given) December 14, 1908 . . . his father a musician with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra . . . has two brothers—one a pre-possessing pianist—the other a repossessing auto financier.
BOY SOPRANO
Went through San Francisco schools . . . entered university at age of 14 (an inspection tour) . . . did his first broadcast in 1922 as a boy soprano; then his voice changed . . . which was a lucky break—for the listeners.
Singing and playing his ‘cello, he was booked for vaudeville dates around California with his piano-pounding brother . . . first time his parents heard him they brought him a one-way ticket to Chicago and told him to get the ‘cello outa here!
THEY SHOT HIM
Mastered the ceremonies in a lot of Middle West “hot spots” and theaters . . . was shot by gangsters in Milwaukee (after they heard him) but he insisted on continuing to sing . . . returned to California and to more receptive radio audiences.
“You Lucky People” was phrased around this time . . . after a period on a local rebel radio station went to San Francisco for a year’s engagement at the Warfield . . . met Al Pearce and did several programs for him . . . returned here and did some movie work.
Met Mabel Todd and lost his heart as well as his voice . . . now writes most of the material used by Mabel . . . directs and coaches her . . . every time he remembers a good joke he tosses a coin in the air . . . if it stays up he lets Mabel use it (the joke) . . . If the coin falls—he uses it . . . if it stands on its edge---it’s original (the joke.)
A Call on Amsterdam Finds Him Master of the SwitchNetwork television was still very small in fall 1948 when Milton Berle became a phenomenon—for NBC. CBS must have thought it needed its own version of Berle, so it looked around on its talent roster, found Amsterdam, then gave him a variety show it ended up cancelling after four months. Du Mont must have thought it needed its own version of Berle, so it hired Amsterdam. That’s where he was on November 8, 1949 when this story hit the news wire.
By Earl Wilson
Morey Amsterdam, the One-Man Gag Factory, screams out his yaks every night in a cellar cafe that I hereby name "The Jokebox."
"Welcome to our saloon, under a saloon," he says, in his little coal mine, the Playgoers Club. "Eighty-five per cent of the people get in here by mistake thinking it's the subway. Have you ever been to the Copa-cabana? Lousy liquor. Stinkin' ventilation. Outrageous prices. Just like this place, only larger." Comedy Writer Hal Block and I stumbled down there and told Amsterdam we'd come to study his type of humor. This meant we'd come to steal it.
"You guys talk so much," he said, "my voice is flat from trying to get a word in edgewise."
* * *
His rapid-fire delivery can make you laugh in the middle of a yawn. He mentions a house without plumbing—"it's uncanny." He introduces the 2 ½-piece band. ''Here's our band," he says. "They need no introduction. They know each other very well."
Block and I decided Amsterdam, one of the funniest men alive, is a master of the switch or surprise joke.
Morey wrote "Rum and Coca-Cola," "Tucson," also "Wyoming," and he won't let you forget it. Starting to sing "Rum and Coca-Cola," he says, "I'm sure you all know the words, so when I come to the chorus, kindly keep your damn mouths shut."
* * *
Another sample is "Did you see a guy in here with a bad eye named Joe?” . . . “I don’t know. What was the name of his good eye?”
Morey doesn't use puns—even famous ones like Ed Wynn's when he heard a man ordering some lamb chops and cheese and called out to the chef, "Cheese it, the chops!"
* * *
He avoids most of the "I had a hotel room so small that" jokes but don’t worry, he doesn’t discriminate against hotels. "In my hotel they change the sheets every day—from one bed to the other."
He works effectively with absurdities such as "Joe Louis hit me so hard that they counted me out while I was still in the air. My wife's so troublesome that she'd give an aspirin a headache. When they gave her penicillin, it got sick."
* * *
"Summer is here—this morning I found a Blue Jay sitting on my corn," he announces. He had to tell about a golfer who chose the wrong club every time against the advice of his caddy, managed to get on the green in 20 strokes, and then, insanely using a driver, put the ball in the cup from the force of the wind stirred up by his swing.
Turning to the caddy, he said, desperately, "Now I'm stuck. I don’t know what club to use."
I sat around in Lindy's with Amsterdam while he ordered a Monte Cristo sandwich—a ham, cheese and chicken between white bread, dipped in egg batter, and fried like French toast. Even Lindy hadn't heard of it. In fact, Lindy asked him, "What kind of bicarbonate of soda you want?"
But it was right good! Lindy had made a special effort to listen to Barry Gray's radio spot, to see how he sounded with his new nose. Amsterdam was guesting. "You were foolish to pay to get your nose fixed," he told Gray. "I know 18 guys who would have broken your nose for nothing. You look like a fellow who fell in front of a steam roller side-ways." According to Amsterdam also, "an education is something you get so you can work for guys with no education," while California, to combat the influx of unwelcome people, will post signs, "Bums not allowed, except those who have contracts in pictures."
So there you are—a funny funnyman. It may be corny but the best humor is the kind people laugh at.
Free Advice Out, Says Funny Man
By HAL BOYLE
Associated Press Staff Writer
New York—"I grew up," said Morey Amsterdam, "the day I discovered you can't give people good advice—you have to charge them for it."
Amsterdam is one of the top funny men of television and radio. This is the new Amsterdam. The old Amsterdam was just a gag writer for other comics.
As a youthful vaudeville performer Morey — he joked and played a cello—used to try to suggest to the stars he hero-worshiped ways they could improve their routine.
HE GETS ADVICE
"They just laughed me off," he said. "Then I went into professional gag writing. And five years later they were paying me $3,000 to $5,000 for the same material I had tried to give them for nothing."
He himself got an excellent bit of advice from one star for whom he wrote movie dialogue — Will Rogers.
"Don't offend anyone," the genial cowboy wrote on one of about 1001 postal cards he mailed Morey over the years. "I get by because no matter what I say about anyone I always wind up saying something good about him also."
At 37 Morey, one of the best ad libbers in the trade, figures he has coined himself some 10,000 gags.
200 JOKES A DAY
“For a while I was doing 78 shows a week and had to throw 200 jokes a day,” recalled Amsterdam, who now has his own program on the Du Mont television network. “I believe I really know a million jokes. Some comedians keep a file. I don’t. It’s a waste of time.
“I think it’s easier to make up a new joke or remember one that fits the situation than it is to dig through a file.”
Morey likes ridiculous humor—but humor that also carries a thought behind it. His best gag?
“I like the one I wrote for a Bob Benchley movie short. Benchley picks up the phone and says:
“ ‘Hello, honey. Get the kids off the street—I’m driving home.’”
CONFIDENCE COUNTS
Morey has a theory that what defeats most comedians is a lack of confidence in their own jokes.
“You have to tell them like you think they’re funny yourself,” he said.
“Old material alone never really killed a comedian. No matter what joke you tell—it’s new to a large part of your audience.
It wasn’t like Amsterdam was destitute. There was plenty of club work and a few films. And then came the phone call from Carl Reiner. The Human Joke Machine was back on TV again.
Tuesday, 9 May 2017
Eyes of a Stuttering Pig
Porky Pig makes a take when he realises he’s holding the hand of a monster instead of Petunia in The Case of the Stuttering Pig (1937).
The take gets a little lost because director Frank Tashlin not only has the monster (streamlined in this particular scene) dominating the frame, but Porky is animated behind him.
Volney White gets the animation credit on this Tashlin effort.
The take gets a little lost because director Frank Tashlin not only has the monster (streamlined in this particular scene) dominating the frame, but Porky is animated behind him.
Volney White gets the animation credit on this Tashlin effort.
Monday, 8 May 2017
Pedestrian of Yesterday
The heartwarming and close relationship between car drivers and pedestrians is explored in Tex Avery’s Car of Tomorrow.
“These new bumpers were billed with pedestrians in mind,” says narrator Gil Warren.
The camera pulls back. “Just let ‘em try to get away,” he adds.
There’s a crash (indicated by different coloured cards flashing on the screen. The shot changes to an overhead view of the car. “This same model has a glass bottom,” he tells us. “When you hit a pedestrian, you can look down and see if it’s a friend of yours.”
Disney vet Roy Williams assisted Rich Hogan with the story on this one. By the time the cartoon was released in September 1951, both were gone from MGM.
“These new bumpers were billed with pedestrians in mind,” says narrator Gil Warren.
The camera pulls back. “Just let ‘em try to get away,” he adds.
There’s a crash (indicated by different coloured cards flashing on the screen. The shot changes to an overhead view of the car. “This same model has a glass bottom,” he tells us. “When you hit a pedestrian, you can look down and see if it’s a friend of yours.”
Disney vet Roy Williams assisted Rich Hogan with the story on this one. By the time the cartoon was released in September 1951, both were gone from MGM.
Sunday, 7 May 2017
Jack's Babe
Do you have a salt shaker? Take a grain from inside and apply it to the story below.
Anyone who is familiar with the radio version of the Jack Benny show knows there were endless jokes about Mary Livingstone’s sister Babe, generally making her out to be manly, boorish or unattractive. Mary really did have a sister Babe, and Babe appeared as herself on several episodes of the show.
However, the tale that Movie Mirror magazine attempts to tell is a little far-fetched. For one thing, it keeps referring to “Mrs. Marks” and that Babe had a “Mr. Marks.” Marks was her maiden name; she was married to Al Bernovici in the 1920s. Secondly, Mary and Babe didn’t sound alike; Babe sounded more like Bea Arthur than anyone. And while Jack and Mary had an unusual courtship and fairly sudden wedding (yes, she was engaged to someone else), the details mentioned below are unique to this particular gossip magazine.
However, the story is correct in that Jack was close to Babe and the rest of the Marks family (brother-in-law Hilliard was his producer, for one thing). And daughter Joan felt she could talk to Babe much easier than her own mother.
This was sent to me by Kathy Fuller Seeley from a scan she made of the Benny archives. She didn’t provide a date, but as the Benny home on Roxbury Drive was under construction in 1938, the story would be around that time. The photos accompanied the story.
The Merry Mary Mix-Up In Jack Benny’s Life
By CAROLINE SOMERS HOYT
Jack has a lot of fun,
Though he leads a double life
With Mary Livingstone
And Babe, his stand-in wife!
A LOT of novelties are to be found in this uniquely crazy town of Hollywood, but one of the most extraordinary and amusing situations which has ever existed here is the strange case of Jack Benny and his stand-in wife. As everyone knows, Jack is married to Mary Livingstone, but what few people know is that Mary has a sister who is practically her double. Not only do they resemble each other, but since they share the same taste in clothes, they are often dressed alike, and so it frequently happens that they are mistaken for each other, not only by admiring throngs, but even by news cameramen who make it their business not to be fooled by look-alikes. The Bennys do not purposely make use of this similarity, quite the contrary. It is even more of a nuisance and a strain to them than it is to the photographers who occasionally smash one of their own flash-bulbs in plain ordinary annoyance when they discover that the picture they have taken is of Mrs. Babe Marks, instead of the desired one of Mary Livingstone.
Jack Benny himself came near to smashing a pink and white rattle which he was holding one day several years ago, as he and Mary and Mrs. Marks crowded around the cradle which contained the most prized Benny possession, young adopted Joan Benny, aged at that time only a few months. The baby was cooing and grinning and looking up at them with bright sparkling eyes. “She’s trying to say something,” said Jack, eagerly and proudly. “What do you want to be she says ‘Daddy’ first?”
“Oh, go on. She’ll say ‘Mama’ first,” said Mary. “Say ‘Mama,’ darling. Say ‘Mama’!”
And Joan did say “Mama,” but it was not to Mary that she reached out her chubby fingers. It was toward Mrs. Marks that she turned her baby stare; it was to her that she reached her arms; to her that she pouted the first words which she had ever spoken in all her small life. “Mama, Mama!”
It was then that the pink and white rattle came down near to being broken. “Well, not, if that isn’t a pretty howdydo!” shouted Jack. “That’s right, Babe—you’d better run for the door!”
Pretending great fear and hiding behind the door draperies, Mrs. Marks peeked out: “Never mind,” she said, “you’ll be glad about it all right, sometime when you want to stay with Joan and keep her amused. It can work both ways you know!”
And eventually, they were to find that Mrs. Marks was right. Today’s it’s pretty difficult to drag Mary away from the baby, and of course now that little Joan is three and a half years old she certainly knows the difference between her mother and her aunt, but still when Mary does have things to attend to elsewhere—there’s the weekly broadcast and recently she made a picture at Paramount, called “This Way, Please”—Joan most agreeably accept Mrs. Marks as a substitute. And when Mrs. Marks takes Joan walking through Beverly Hills, the neighbours in their windows shake their heads and marvel that a career woman such as Mary Livingstone Benny should still find so much time to attend to her young progeny.
If the neighbors can be easily fooled you can imagine what happens when Jack steps out with Mrs. Marks in public, anywhere where autograph fiends may be hanging around. This doesn’t happen very often, as Mary usually accompanies her husband, but it does happen occasionally that she can’t go, or that she must come along later, and since Jack likes to go nowhere alone, Mrs. Marks stands in on such occasions. This was the situation not long ago when Jack was invited to be guest of honour at one of the annual shindigs of the Beverly Hills Chamber of Commerce. Honor-guesting meant that he had promised to converse, cut up and quip with them, and otherwise wave and fleck his cigar from the speakers’ platform. The evening was to start with dinner, and being one who never misses a meal, no matter how long and drawn out it may threaten to be, Mr. Benny determined to be there on time. But Mary had other things to do, notably bedtime prayers and rituals with Joan, so she said she would follow him a little later. He and her sister Babe could go on alone.
Thus it was that as these two entered they were greeted effusively on all sides as Mr. and Mrs. Benny. Several of the women, the Commerce wives, got hold of Babe and hustled her off to dispose of her wraps somewhere. “Oh, Mrs. Benny, it was so sweet of you to come. We’ve looked forward to meeting you for so long. And we’re so glad you could come with your husband tonight.”
“But I’m not Mrs. Benny,” said Babe a bit wearily, since she had been going through this in one form or another all her sister’s married life, and was by now a bit worn by it. “I’m Mrs. Marks. Mrs. Benny is coming a little later.”
But they were too kind to allow her to explain even. “Please don’t apologize, Mrs. Benny. We understand perfectly!
Then, swept along by this perfect understanding and also a few crowding elbows, Mrs. Marks suddenly found herself returned to the outer hall where Jack was waiting for her. She managed somehow to get close to him. “Jack, listen! What am I going to do? They’re at it again. Oh, good heavens, see what’s happening now!”
And before he could advise her, he saw. The front door had been burst open by a large group of young autograph hounds who had apparently eluded the doorman. They crowded around, shouting and screaming and proffering autograph books. “Oh, Mr. Benny! Miss Livingstone! Give us a break, won’t you? We heard you were going to be here!”
Jack turned her way, saw the situation and grinned. With a wave of his cigar and in that peculiar voice of his which is almost beyond description, he drawled over to her, “Aw, go ahead and be Mary this once!”
ACTING upon his suggestion, Mrs. Marks now began putting pen and pencils to paper, in rapid succession. “Mary Livingstone, Mary Livingstone,” and under each signature was a tiny scrawl which, if you looked closely, would have revealed itself to be a small “per B.M.” But none of the kids did look that closely, and they all went away happy and satisfied. It was better to have it like that, than to have them scowl back to their homes living Mary Livingstone had been too high hat to give autographs. Fortunately, the doorman had whisked them all out by the time the real Mary arrived.
Not only does Mrs. Marks play a part in the present day Benny set-up, but it was through her that the romance came about, and it was one of the craziest courtships on the movie record. It was twelve years ago and Jack was playing in vaudeville at the time—“A Few Minutes with Jack Benny” as the listing outside referred to him—and in spite of the act’s prosaic calling Jack claims that it was distinctly high class. At this particular time you could have had your few minutes with him at the Los Angeles Orpheum, where he was headlining. Jack hadn’t been in California very often or very long, but there were several of his vaudeville cronies whom had had known in New York who were out here and among them was a Mr. Marks and his wife, Babe. In the evenings after the performance he usually met them somewhere, and the three of them went out together. This threesome had its handicap, however, as all of the dancing was concentrated on Babe’s feet, and so to give her a break for once at least, they planned to make it a foursome for one evening at the Montmartre. Jack was to bring along Nora Bayes who was also on the same bill. But at the last minute Nora backed out, and so Jack called Babe to tell her that she’d still have to put up with two dancing partners unless she could dig up somebody else for him.
But Jack didn’t get Babe on the phone. He thought he had Babe, but it was Mary who answered; however, the voice seemed to be Babe’s, and he wasted no time in explaining the situation. “Well look, Jack,” Mary said, after he had finished. “I’ve got a younger sister, Mary. You’ve never met her, but how about my bringing her alone? She’s a pretty cute girl!”
“Yeah, I can imagine,” said Jack. “Well, don’t bother. If there’s anything I don’t get along with it’s kid sisters. If one girl in a family has any brains—and I’ve always claimed you have—then the other is sure to be minus on something. Never mind, we’ll have some fun, just the three of us.”
That, as you can imagine, was a challenge, and Mary accepted it at once. When Jack exited at the saeme door that evening there were two girls in the taxi instead of one. Jack found himself seated beside the strange one. “I hear you don’t like kid sisters,” she said.
“Did you tell her that, Babe?” Jack asked. “I never said such a thing in my life.”
“You said it to me,” Mary replied calmly, “just about an hour ago.”
“Oh!” And this oh began their friendship.
AFTER that they saw each other frequently and had a marvelous time together. They began going out alone, but that soon offered complications, because several of Jack’s men friends around the theatre began to ask questions. “What’s happened between Babe and her husband? You seem to be cutting him out—is that right, Jack?”
“It’s not Babe you’ve seen me with,” Jack would explain patiently. “It’s her sister.” But always the friends smirked and smiles and said that they had heard that gag before, so they reverted to the foursome.
Then Jack had to go back East, and apparently the two quite forgot about each other. Months passed, but it never occurred to either of them to write. Came Christmas time, however, and Jack was wandering down Fifth Avenue in New York, when it suddenly dawned on him that he hadn’t bought any Christmas presents and that there certainly ought to be someone to whom he should send a gift. He paused before a jeweler’s window. A wrist watch; yes, that would be a nice present, and he went in and asked to look at them. Without the slightest idea of whom he would send it to, he picked one out and asked that it be packaged for Christmas. When the salesman handed him a card to be inscribed and enclosed, Jack dawdled a few minutes longer, then on a sudden inspiration quickly wrote:
“To Mary, with best wishes, from Jack.” His only hope was that she’d at least remember who Jack was. Then he decided that perhaps he’d better make sure of it. He asked the salesman to give him the card again, and this time he added a plainly written “Benny.”
Crazy? That’s what the salesman thought, but then, as we have said, the whole thing was that way.
More months passed and Jack was playing in a musical show in Chicago, when suddenly Mr. and Mrs. Marks appeared again—they were there on business, they said. One look at Babe and the vision of Mary was before him. “How is Mary, anyway?” Jack asked.
“Why didn’t you know? She’s engaged to be married,” Babe told him.
And that—that was where the serious thinking began. “That’s crazy,” he said quickly. “How can she do that?” Doesn’t she know she oughtn’t to marry anybody but me?” He was joking, but underneath the joking he was really considering it. As Jack has admitted since, it was a situation where he didn’t particularly care about getting married himself, but he didn’t want her to marry anyone else, either.
“Well then, why don’t you write her and tell her that?” Mrs. Marks suggested.
GUESS I will,” and a few hours later, he did. It was a kidding, humorous letter, but in it he suggested that if she did have her heart set on getting married why didn’t she come to Chicago first anyway, as a kind of last vacation, and see the sights of the big city. Two weeks later he was greeting her at the station. Two days after that, he was proposing to her, and three days after that they were married.
“I guess I had the nerve,” he says now, looking back on it, “because she was really engaged, and I mean engaged, with a ring and the wedding date set and everything. And she was engaged to a man who had money and a steady business, and here was I, without a nickel saved, and never knowing when the she would close, or what town I’d hit next. But Mary had the same kind of daring herself. I remember I proposed to her on Tuesday as we decided that we’d get married on Sunday. But about Thursday Mary began to get a little nervous; she was worried about telling the family, and breaking the news to the boy back home, and she was thinking that maybe she wouldn’t fit into show business after all, and naturally I had the same fears. So we both looked at each other and decided that we’d better get it over in a hurry, or we’d never get married at all. Mary was very frank about it. She said ‘Yes, I’m afraid if we wait till Sunday I’ll feel different entirely.’ So that was Thursday and we got married the next morning. Of course there isn’t a marriage in a thousand years, started off like that, that ever takes. But we were lucky. It’s been eleven years now. There’s one thing, though, that I’ve never been able to find out, and that was whether Babe came to Chicago specially to tell me about Mary’s engagement. I have a hunch—only she’s never been willing to admit it. Anyway I give her credit that she did—that she knew my preference and Mary’s, even before we knew it ourselves. And that’s one of the reasons she’s always welcome around our place.”
Some men have their hands full with one woman in their life, but even with two who are so much alike, it’s plain to see that Jack is not only not annoyed, but that he enjoys it. But perhaps it’s because these women are not the usual fussy, meddling kind. He minds his business and they mind theirs, which most recently has chiefly been the construction and decoration of a new home.
Regarding the plans for this new home, a funny thing happened last summer before the house had been started and while Jack and Mary were in Europe. Mrs. Marks had remained in Hollywood and it was to her that the architect delivered some blue prints of the Benny house. She forwarded them at once to Jack and Mary. Shortly after receiving the plans they started out on a motor trip which was to take them into Jugoslavia, but at the border, patrolmen, examining their luggage, held them for questioning. They were suspicious that Jack was carrying secret military drawings. Even when Jack explained that these drawings were only blue prints of a house the officials said they could see that, but just what was that inferno-looking thing drawn and indicated there at the side? Jack said he’d be darned if he knew, but anyway he could prove who he was and they’d have to let him through. Eventually, to their satisfaction, he identified himself as a harmless comedian, and they went on. But not Jack was even more puzzled than the officials had been. What was that extra drawing that did look like some kind of dangerous machine? Unable to figure it out for himself. he dispatched a cable to Mrs. Marks. The answer came back in four words.
“Garbage incinerator, you dope.”
But Jack didn’t think it was so funny, being almost imprisoned in his own garbage can, and it’s one small item which he is not likely to let Babe Marks forget. Traveling in a foreign country isn’t as simple as it used to be, and when one has drawings of trick incinerators, they should be labeled as such.
Now before this recountal can be completed there is one more female finger to be noted in the Jack Benny pie. Not only is his life pretty well wound around and mixed up and salted to taste by Mary and Mary’s sister, but there is now little Joan to have her say as to what he shall do, and how he shall behave, and more pertinent to this episode, how he shall dress. Some time ago Jack make the mistake of asking Joan to pick out for him, from his tie rack, the tie she liked best, saying that he would wear it. Joan, partial to red, finally found one violent enough to suit her taste. But it was an old one, badly worn, and at first Papa Benny demurred.
“But you said you’d wear it,” Joan pouted, “and you’ve got to. You’ve got to wear it every day.”
This was several months ago, and even to this day Mister Benny is still wearing the red tie. That is, he leaves it when he leaves his house in the morning, and not until he gets several blocks away does he exchange it for the other more preferable one which he carries in his pocket.
Usually one career fills all a man’s life, but such is the Benny capacity that he moves from radio to screen to personal appearances and back again with perfect facility, sometimes managing all of them at once. In the same way neither are three women too much for him. Such are his heart and his humor and his patience that he has enough for all!
Anyone who is familiar with the radio version of the Jack Benny show knows there were endless jokes about Mary Livingstone’s sister Babe, generally making her out to be manly, boorish or unattractive. Mary really did have a sister Babe, and Babe appeared as herself on several episodes of the show.
However, the tale that Movie Mirror magazine attempts to tell is a little far-fetched. For one thing, it keeps referring to “Mrs. Marks” and that Babe had a “Mr. Marks.” Marks was her maiden name; she was married to Al Bernovici in the 1920s. Secondly, Mary and Babe didn’t sound alike; Babe sounded more like Bea Arthur than anyone. And while Jack and Mary had an unusual courtship and fairly sudden wedding (yes, she was engaged to someone else), the details mentioned below are unique to this particular gossip magazine.
However, the story is correct in that Jack was close to Babe and the rest of the Marks family (brother-in-law Hilliard was his producer, for one thing). And daughter Joan felt she could talk to Babe much easier than her own mother.
This was sent to me by Kathy Fuller Seeley from a scan she made of the Benny archives. She didn’t provide a date, but as the Benny home on Roxbury Drive was under construction in 1938, the story would be around that time. The photos accompanied the story.
The Merry Mary Mix-Up In Jack Benny’s Life
By CAROLINE SOMERS HOYT
Jack has a lot of fun,
Though he leads a double life
With Mary Livingstone
And Babe, his stand-in wife!
A LOT of novelties are to be found in this uniquely crazy town of Hollywood, but one of the most extraordinary and amusing situations which has ever existed here is the strange case of Jack Benny and his stand-in wife. As everyone knows, Jack is married to Mary Livingstone, but what few people know is that Mary has a sister who is practically her double. Not only do they resemble each other, but since they share the same taste in clothes, they are often dressed alike, and so it frequently happens that they are mistaken for each other, not only by admiring throngs, but even by news cameramen who make it their business not to be fooled by look-alikes. The Bennys do not purposely make use of this similarity, quite the contrary. It is even more of a nuisance and a strain to them than it is to the photographers who occasionally smash one of their own flash-bulbs in plain ordinary annoyance when they discover that the picture they have taken is of Mrs. Babe Marks, instead of the desired one of Mary Livingstone.
Jack Benny himself came near to smashing a pink and white rattle which he was holding one day several years ago, as he and Mary and Mrs. Marks crowded around the cradle which contained the most prized Benny possession, young adopted Joan Benny, aged at that time only a few months. The baby was cooing and grinning and looking up at them with bright sparkling eyes. “She’s trying to say something,” said Jack, eagerly and proudly. “What do you want to be she says ‘Daddy’ first?”
“Oh, go on. She’ll say ‘Mama’ first,” said Mary. “Say ‘Mama,’ darling. Say ‘Mama’!”
It was then that the pink and white rattle came down near to being broken. “Well, not, if that isn’t a pretty howdydo!” shouted Jack. “That’s right, Babe—you’d better run for the door!”
Pretending great fear and hiding behind the door draperies, Mrs. Marks peeked out: “Never mind,” she said, “you’ll be glad about it all right, sometime when you want to stay with Joan and keep her amused. It can work both ways you know!”
And eventually, they were to find that Mrs. Marks was right. Today’s it’s pretty difficult to drag Mary away from the baby, and of course now that little Joan is three and a half years old she certainly knows the difference between her mother and her aunt, but still when Mary does have things to attend to elsewhere—there’s the weekly broadcast and recently she made a picture at Paramount, called “This Way, Please”—Joan most agreeably accept Mrs. Marks as a substitute. And when Mrs. Marks takes Joan walking through Beverly Hills, the neighbours in their windows shake their heads and marvel that a career woman such as Mary Livingstone Benny should still find so much time to attend to her young progeny.
If the neighbors can be easily fooled you can imagine what happens when Jack steps out with Mrs. Marks in public, anywhere where autograph fiends may be hanging around. This doesn’t happen very often, as Mary usually accompanies her husband, but it does happen occasionally that she can’t go, or that she must come along later, and since Jack likes to go nowhere alone, Mrs. Marks stands in on such occasions. This was the situation not long ago when Jack was invited to be guest of honour at one of the annual shindigs of the Beverly Hills Chamber of Commerce. Honor-guesting meant that he had promised to converse, cut up and quip with them, and otherwise wave and fleck his cigar from the speakers’ platform. The evening was to start with dinner, and being one who never misses a meal, no matter how long and drawn out it may threaten to be, Mr. Benny determined to be there on time. But Mary had other things to do, notably bedtime prayers and rituals with Joan, so she said she would follow him a little later. He and her sister Babe could go on alone.
Thus it was that as these two entered they were greeted effusively on all sides as Mr. and Mrs. Benny. Several of the women, the Commerce wives, got hold of Babe and hustled her off to dispose of her wraps somewhere. “Oh, Mrs. Benny, it was so sweet of you to come. We’ve looked forward to meeting you for so long. And we’re so glad you could come with your husband tonight.”
“But I’m not Mrs. Benny,” said Babe a bit wearily, since she had been going through this in one form or another all her sister’s married life, and was by now a bit worn by it. “I’m Mrs. Marks. Mrs. Benny is coming a little later.”
But they were too kind to allow her to explain even. “Please don’t apologize, Mrs. Benny. We understand perfectly!
Then, swept along by this perfect understanding and also a few crowding elbows, Mrs. Marks suddenly found herself returned to the outer hall where Jack was waiting for her. She managed somehow to get close to him. “Jack, listen! What am I going to do? They’re at it again. Oh, good heavens, see what’s happening now!”
And before he could advise her, he saw. The front door had been burst open by a large group of young autograph hounds who had apparently eluded the doorman. They crowded around, shouting and screaming and proffering autograph books. “Oh, Mr. Benny! Miss Livingstone! Give us a break, won’t you? We heard you were going to be here!”
Jack turned her way, saw the situation and grinned. With a wave of his cigar and in that peculiar voice of his which is almost beyond description, he drawled over to her, “Aw, go ahead and be Mary this once!”
Not only does Mrs. Marks play a part in the present day Benny set-up, but it was through her that the romance came about, and it was one of the craziest courtships on the movie record. It was twelve years ago and Jack was playing in vaudeville at the time—“A Few Minutes with Jack Benny” as the listing outside referred to him—and in spite of the act’s prosaic calling Jack claims that it was distinctly high class. At this particular time you could have had your few minutes with him at the Los Angeles Orpheum, where he was headlining. Jack hadn’t been in California very often or very long, but there were several of his vaudeville cronies whom had had known in New York who were out here and among them was a Mr. Marks and his wife, Babe. In the evenings after the performance he usually met them somewhere, and the three of them went out together. This threesome had its handicap, however, as all of the dancing was concentrated on Babe’s feet, and so to give her a break for once at least, they planned to make it a foursome for one evening at the Montmartre. Jack was to bring along Nora Bayes who was also on the same bill. But at the last minute Nora backed out, and so Jack called Babe to tell her that she’d still have to put up with two dancing partners unless she could dig up somebody else for him.
But Jack didn’t get Babe on the phone. He thought he had Babe, but it was Mary who answered; however, the voice seemed to be Babe’s, and he wasted no time in explaining the situation. “Well look, Jack,” Mary said, after he had finished. “I’ve got a younger sister, Mary. You’ve never met her, but how about my bringing her alone? She’s a pretty cute girl!”
“Yeah, I can imagine,” said Jack. “Well, don’t bother. If there’s anything I don’t get along with it’s kid sisters. If one girl in a family has any brains—and I’ve always claimed you have—then the other is sure to be minus on something. Never mind, we’ll have some fun, just the three of us.”
That, as you can imagine, was a challenge, and Mary accepted it at once. When Jack exited at the saeme door that evening there were two girls in the taxi instead of one. Jack found himself seated beside the strange one. “I hear you don’t like kid sisters,” she said.
“Did you tell her that, Babe?” Jack asked. “I never said such a thing in my life.”
“You said it to me,” Mary replied calmly, “just about an hour ago.”
“Oh!” And this oh began their friendship.
AFTER that they saw each other frequently and had a marvelous time together. They began going out alone, but that soon offered complications, because several of Jack’s men friends around the theatre began to ask questions. “What’s happened between Babe and her husband? You seem to be cutting him out—is that right, Jack?”
“It’s not Babe you’ve seen me with,” Jack would explain patiently. “It’s her sister.” But always the friends smirked and smiles and said that they had heard that gag before, so they reverted to the foursome.
Then Jack had to go back East, and apparently the two quite forgot about each other. Months passed, but it never occurred to either of them to write. Came Christmas time, however, and Jack was wandering down Fifth Avenue in New York, when it suddenly dawned on him that he hadn’t bought any Christmas presents and that there certainly ought to be someone to whom he should send a gift. He paused before a jeweler’s window. A wrist watch; yes, that would be a nice present, and he went in and asked to look at them. Without the slightest idea of whom he would send it to, he picked one out and asked that it be packaged for Christmas. When the salesman handed him a card to be inscribed and enclosed, Jack dawdled a few minutes longer, then on a sudden inspiration quickly wrote:
Crazy? That’s what the salesman thought, but then, as we have said, the whole thing was that way.
More months passed and Jack was playing in a musical show in Chicago, when suddenly Mr. and Mrs. Marks appeared again—they were there on business, they said. One look at Babe and the vision of Mary was before him. “How is Mary, anyway?” Jack asked.
“Why didn’t you know? She’s engaged to be married,” Babe told him.
And that—that was where the serious thinking began. “That’s crazy,” he said quickly. “How can she do that?” Doesn’t she know she oughtn’t to marry anybody but me?” He was joking, but underneath the joking he was really considering it. As Jack has admitted since, it was a situation where he didn’t particularly care about getting married himself, but he didn’t want her to marry anyone else, either.
“Well then, why don’t you write her and tell her that?” Mrs. Marks suggested.
GUESS I will,” and a few hours later, he did. It was a kidding, humorous letter, but in it he suggested that if she did have her heart set on getting married why didn’t she come to Chicago first anyway, as a kind of last vacation, and see the sights of the big city. Two weeks later he was greeting her at the station. Two days after that, he was proposing to her, and three days after that they were married.
“I guess I had the nerve,” he says now, looking back on it, “because she was really engaged, and I mean engaged, with a ring and the wedding date set and everything. And she was engaged to a man who had money and a steady business, and here was I, without a nickel saved, and never knowing when the she would close, or what town I’d hit next. But Mary had the same kind of daring herself. I remember I proposed to her on Tuesday as we decided that we’d get married on Sunday. But about Thursday Mary began to get a little nervous; she was worried about telling the family, and breaking the news to the boy back home, and she was thinking that maybe she wouldn’t fit into show business after all, and naturally I had the same fears. So we both looked at each other and decided that we’d better get it over in a hurry, or we’d never get married at all. Mary was very frank about it. She said ‘Yes, I’m afraid if we wait till Sunday I’ll feel different entirely.’ So that was Thursday and we got married the next morning. Of course there isn’t a marriage in a thousand years, started off like that, that ever takes. But we were lucky. It’s been eleven years now. There’s one thing, though, that I’ve never been able to find out, and that was whether Babe came to Chicago specially to tell me about Mary’s engagement. I have a hunch—only she’s never been willing to admit it. Anyway I give her credit that she did—that she knew my preference and Mary’s, even before we knew it ourselves. And that’s one of the reasons she’s always welcome around our place.”
Some men have their hands full with one woman in their life, but even with two who are so much alike, it’s plain to see that Jack is not only not annoyed, but that he enjoys it. But perhaps it’s because these women are not the usual fussy, meddling kind. He minds his business and they mind theirs, which most recently has chiefly been the construction and decoration of a new home.
Regarding the plans for this new home, a funny thing happened last summer before the house had been started and while Jack and Mary were in Europe. Mrs. Marks had remained in Hollywood and it was to her that the architect delivered some blue prints of the Benny house. She forwarded them at once to Jack and Mary. Shortly after receiving the plans they started out on a motor trip which was to take them into Jugoslavia, but at the border, patrolmen, examining their luggage, held them for questioning. They were suspicious that Jack was carrying secret military drawings. Even when Jack explained that these drawings were only blue prints of a house the officials said they could see that, but just what was that inferno-looking thing drawn and indicated there at the side? Jack said he’d be darned if he knew, but anyway he could prove who he was and they’d have to let him through. Eventually, to their satisfaction, he identified himself as a harmless comedian, and they went on. But not Jack was even more puzzled than the officials had been. What was that extra drawing that did look like some kind of dangerous machine? Unable to figure it out for himself. he dispatched a cable to Mrs. Marks. The answer came back in four words.
“Garbage incinerator, you dope.”
Now before this recountal can be completed there is one more female finger to be noted in the Jack Benny pie. Not only is his life pretty well wound around and mixed up and salted to taste by Mary and Mary’s sister, but there is now little Joan to have her say as to what he shall do, and how he shall behave, and more pertinent to this episode, how he shall dress. Some time ago Jack make the mistake of asking Joan to pick out for him, from his tie rack, the tie she liked best, saying that he would wear it. Joan, partial to red, finally found one violent enough to suit her taste. But it was an old one, badly worn, and at first Papa Benny demurred.
“But you said you’d wear it,” Joan pouted, “and you’ve got to. You’ve got to wear it every day.”
This was several months ago, and even to this day Mister Benny is still wearing the red tie. That is, he leaves it when he leaves his house in the morning, and not until he gets several blocks away does he exchange it for the other more preferable one which he carries in his pocket.
Usually one career fills all a man’s life, but such is the Benny capacity that he moves from radio to screen to personal appearances and back again with perfect facility, sometimes managing all of them at once. In the same way neither are three women too much for him. Such are his heart and his humor and his patience that he has enough for all!
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