Jack Benny's Gift to War Vets

Christmas is a time of giving, the cliché goes, and one person who knew that was Jack Benny.

It seems every time I look up what Jack was doing over the holiday season, he was performing, often for charity.

75 years ago, he was one of a number of entertainers who went to San Francisco in December to perform for wounded veterans. He told columnist Herb Caen “When I saw then, I could have cried—except that I was supposed to make them laugh.”

Caen’s paper, the Examiner, sponsored the shows. This story appeared in the Dec. 22, 1950 edition.

Wounded Vets Cheered By Jack Benny, Troupe
Comedian Joins Examiner Fund Show For Bay Region War Hero Patients
The kid in the wheel chair didn't feel much like smiling.
None of the guys lying on beds, or sitting in wheel chairs, in the ward at Letterman Hospital yesterday felt much like smiling.
They were all just back from Korea. And they were all amputees, some with one, some, like the kid in the wheel chair, with two legs missing.
They were waiting, their expressions solemn, yesterday afternoon, to see the Examiners War Wounded Fund Show. Jack Benny, they had heard, was coming, and Constance Moore, the musical comedy star, and a lot of other top entertainers.
FAMILIES THERE
The wives and children of some of the wounded men were there. A tall blond sergeant who lost his right leg in the battle near Yongdang on September 24, sat quietly on his bed, his arm around his 4 1/2 year old daughter. The pretty blonde little girl sat gingerly on the big hospital bed, looking from time to time to her father for reassurance.
Suddenly, somebody shouted, "here he comes" and the wounded soldier applauded as Jack Benny stepped to the microphone in the center of the ward.
"Hiya, fellas," Benny said and the show was on.
Slowly the atmosphere of tension, of solemnity, began to break. The kid in the wheel chair rolled himself up closer to the entertainers, a small smile on his face.
ALL LAUGHING
Before long Benny had the whole ward shouting with laughter.
And when Constance Moore invited her audience to join in on the chorus of "Harvest Moon," they did, even the kid in the wheel chair.
It was a big show. Besides Benny and Miss Moore there was the impressionist, Arthur Blake; singers Katy Lee, Bob Hamma, Russ Byrd and Harry "Woo Woo" Stevens; dancers Charlie Aaron, Tony Wing, Toy and Wing, and Earl "Happy Feet" Burrows with the Four Naturals. The wounded soldiers cheered for more.
SHOWS TODAY
Benny and The Examiner troupe played the wards at Letterman yesterday afternoon, then gave an evening performance at the Letterman Theater for ambulatory patients last night with Walt Roesner and his band joining the show cast.
Benny will journey this morning to the Travis Air Force Base at Fairfield for a 10 a. m. show. He will entertain at 2 p. m. at Matte Island Hospital and will give a third performance at the Marine Hospital tonight. His final performance with The Examiner troupe will be tomorrow afternoon at the Oak Knoll Naval Hospital at 2 o'clock.
Harold Peary, "The Great Gildersleeve," and Movie Starlet Marylou Gray will join the troupe for an extra noon show tomorrow in the wards and the theater at Travis Air Base.
Benny was met on his arrival here yesterday by Col. John S. Mallory, special service officer of the Sixth Army; Lt. Cmdr. William G. Palmer of division of welfare of the Twelfth Naval District, and George Heinz, producer-director of The Examiner shows. Also with Benny are Charlie Bagby and Frankie Remley of his CBS radio show.

Benny and his troupe whirled through three more performances the next day, cheering audiences at the Travis Air Force Base, Mare Island and Marine Hospitals. The next afternoon, on December 23, he put on his act at the Oak Knoll Naval Hospital.

Out of curiosity, I looked up what Jack was doing 100 years ago at Christmas. That week, he was appearing at the Orpheum in Kansas City. Among the other acts was Benny Rubin. The Journal-Post reviewed him on Dec. 20, 1925.

A few minutes with Jack Benny are as many minutes of hearty humor. His comedy is of a lingering kind. There is so much real humor and such a variety of fun in his work that the result is not merely passing laughs but laughs his audiences take home with them.

As for charity work, sure enough, I found this in the Star of December 24, 1925:

Actors from various Kansas City theaters will join tonight in an entertainment for the United States veterans hospital. The entertainment, which will begin at 6:30 o’clock, will be preceded by a dance and the distribution of gifts given by patriotic organizations associated with the veterans’ hospital.
Among the actors who will entertain the veterans are Jack Benny, who is appearing at the Orpheum theatre, and the Marcell Sisters from the Pantages theatre, Ray Stinson’s orchestra will play. The Red Cross at the hospital is in charge of the program.

The next day, the Kansas City Times reported he “jested and played the violin.”

(Did Rubin appear? I dunno).

After K.C., Jack was off to Madison, Wisconsin for another vaudeville stop—and more of a long career that included giving morale to those who needed it.

SIDE NOTE:
Jack was mentioned in Dorothy Kilgallen's Christmas column of 1954. Oddly, fellow What's My Line? panellist Fred Allen was omitted.

Cartoons on TV, Christmas 1965

60 years ago, Christmas fell on Saturday. And you know what that meant in 1965. Cartoons on TV!

Christmas cartoons fell into two categories, from what I recall. There were the prime-time specials earlier in December. In 1965 that meant Magoo’s version of “A Christmas Carol” (didn’t see) and the new A Charlie Brown Christmas (which I watched after anticipating it with excitement). And then there were old theatricals, some set during Christmas, others with Christmas gags. Included in this would be the touching and gentle classic Mice Meeting You with Herman and Katnip.

I don’t recall any others, but my memory is mistaken, or there were shows I didn’t watch. CBS sent a release to newspapers outlining its programming plans that morning. There were Christmas cartoons on shows made for TV.

A host of Christmas-morning presents will be offered on the CBS Television Network and WHBL-TV [Columbus, Georgia] today in the form of Christmas cartoons, Christmas stories and Christmas songs. The network is presenting five and one-hall hours of daytime holiday fare starting at 8 a.m.
There's a song-filled Christmas in (Captain Kangaroo's) Treasure House, from 8 until 9 and a jolly Christmas with “Tennessee Tuxedo” at 9:30. The precocious penguin and his walrus pal Chumley cut some hilarious Christmas capers in "Tree Trimmers," a cartoon created especially for the occasion.
Those who prefer a whimsical Christmas can watch 'So Hi's Nite Before Christmas" on “Linus the Lionhearted,” which presents the loveable Chinese boy in a charming Yuletide tale at 10:30 a.m.
At 11 a.m. the cat-and-mouse team of “Tom and Jerry” take over not only to deck the halls with fun and frolic, but also to turn halls, trees, walls and Santa himself topsy-turvy.
On a more serious note, "The Mighty Mouse Playhouse" at 10 a.m. offers a poignant story that expresses the true meaning of the day. Boris Karloff narrates the award-winning cartoon, "Juggler of Our Lady," based on the classic French fairy tale, "The Juggler of Notre Dame."

There were other TV Christmas cartoons. A week before Christmas, ABC advertised an hour-long special featuring “the yuletide adventures of Hoppity Hooper, Commander McBragg and Dudley Doright.” Hoppity was involved in a four-part holiday sequence. I never had a lot of interest in the frog and the cartoon series is the only one produced by Jay Ward I stopped watching. McBragg was even less entertaining.

Newspaper listings include the generic title Christmas Cartoons with no specifics. You have to wonder if the stations got their hands on syndicate-packaged chestnuts like The Shanty Where Santy Claus Lives, the Fleischer’s Christmas Comes But Once a Year with Grampy, or public domain shorts like Iwerks’ Jack Frost, or any cartoon with a flake of snow in it. Today, whole playlists of these can be found on the internet.

While I have a strong affection for that bygone period before endless bombardment of cartoon cable channels, I admit that there are probably more animated cartoons made up to 1965 available to watch today than back then, thanks to companies of all sizes restoring them. We can only hope that continues in the new year.

To Get to the Other Side?

Why is a chicken carrying an umbrella on a frozen pond?

No, this isn’t a joke. And there isn’t really a joke in this scene from the Terrytoon The First Snow. It’s just an oddity.

The hen is run down by a tobogganing dog. Then, as it staggers out of the way, its eggs are run over by another sledding dog. They skate around (without wearing skates) in a figure 8 and the scene’s over.



Here’s an incongruous character I quite like. A giraffe sucking on a pipe?



It would seem Phil Scheib is into his Silly Symphonies mode as he gives us several original songs. Young dog-lettes hold hands and frolic around a snowman. The female chorus sings:

Building up a snowman out of snow and ice.
When we’re all finished it’ll look mighty nice.
Coal for his eyes and a carrot for his nose.
He’s all dressed up in his Sunday clothes.

Then the snowman with the usual Terry tenor voice happily warbles:

I’m all dolled up like a Christmas tree.
Look what you kids have done to me!
Let’s get together and offer in rhyme
Good old winter time!

There’s a dramatic rescue on a waterfall at the end; Scheib’s music is quite effective. The cartoon ends in song:

This little pig fell in the lake
Upon a winter’s day.
And these little doggies saved her life
Let’s shout hip-hip-hooray!

There’s cycle animation aplenty. Some characters crash through the ice into the lake but silently. The beloved Terry Splash™ hadn’t been invented yet.

The cartoon was released on January 11, 1935. The studio was still churning out a new Terrytoon every two weeks.

What'd He Say?

Barney Bear matches wits with a silent snowshoe rabbit in The Bear and the Hare, a 1948 MGM release from the Mike Lah/Preston Blair unit.

One gag has the rabbit juggling snowballs then batting them at the bear with his ears.



Barney responds. Evidently it was not a family-friendly response as the voice has been replaced with a trombone. The last word is “you.” We’ll leave it for you to look at the mouth movements of the first two frames below to figure out the first word. (Please, no foul language in the comment section in response).



Don Patterson, Ray Abrams, Irv Levine and Gil Turner are credited with animation. There’s no story credit. I had always thought Jack Cosgriff wrote for the Lah/Blair group. Cosgriff was a UC Berkeley grad who returned to MGM after the war; he had been a chief specialist for the Navy based in San Diego.

This was the second of three cartoons completed by the Lah/Blair unit. Thad Komorowski found two other shorts were assigned titles and production numbers but not completed. Producer Fred Quimby decided it was cheaper releasing propaganda cartoons from John Sutherland Productions than paying for a third unit.

Piousness in the Alley

Allen’s Alley is what comes to mind when Fred Allen’s radio show is discussed. But the programme evolved over the years and the Alley was a comparatively late addition.

Allen had many regulars over the years, but through almost all of it was Minerva Pious. She was there at the start of the Alley and was there at the end as John Brown, Alan Reed and Charlie Cantor moved on to other shows.

Pious is known to radio fans as Mrs. Nussbaum (during her brief absence after Allen returned to radio, Cantor played Mr. Nussbaum and Elsie Mae Gordon was the female denizen of the Alley) but she performed an array of characters for Allen, including snooty society ladies and hillbillies.

Just as Allen had problems as he half-heartedly tried to adjust to television, Pious concentrated more on stage work after the death of prime-time network radio. Here’s an unbylined story from the Toledo Blade of April 19, 1959.

What Ever Became of ...
MRS. NUSSBAUM—one of the sidesplitting comic characters on the late Fred Allen's Sunday night radio show? Listeners eagerly anticipated the inevitable point in the program when she opened her door, said "Nu!," then proceeded to outjoke Allen himself. In real life, Mrs. Nussbaum was a skilled dialectician named Minerva Pious, who learned different accents working at a department store in one of New York City's "melting pot" neighborhoods. She was with Allen from 1933 to 1952. Today, Minerva Pious lives in Manhattan, writes photo stories for syndication overseas. She has been out of radio and TV since the end of 1958, when she ended a series of character portrayals on the Robert Q. Lewis show. Minerva thinks comedy on radio and TV "has gone backwards. I don't find any bubbling clowns in comedy. I find it static."



What did Pious think of Allen? She had some remembrances for a syndicated columnist promoting a rare special on NBC radio. This is from October 25, 1965.

NBC Will Salute Late Fred Allen
By PHYLLIS BATTELLE
Distributed By King Features Syndicate
NEW YORK — Fred Allen —the golden-hearted grouch, the writer - comedian with bellhop eyes ("they carry up to four bags") — died on an icy New York street nearly 10 years ago.
Comedy has not been the same since. There is sick comedy now and satirical wit. But no one dares to sneer and growl, cleverly and brilliantly, at the hierarchy as Allen did; a man who was infinitely smarter than most of his confreres, he could sink verbal pins into the stuffed shirts of the men he worked for, businessmen and vice presidents, and make millions of Americans laugh.
"He was the model man," said novelist Herman Wouk reverently. Wouk had worked as a script writer for Allen. "He was the greatest satirical wit in America. All any of as on staff did was to try to imitate him, but he was the best writer in the lot."
How did he "get by" with biting the hands that fed him —with announcing to a nationwide audience, for example, that "within the hierarchy of the little men there is no man who can outlittle the executive in a large corporation who treats his authority as he treats a tight suit; in a tight suit he is afraid to make a move"?
HAD NEAT TRICK
"Well, he had a neat trick," says Miss Minerva Pious, who became famous as "Mrs. Nussbaum" and a variety of other personalities on Allen's long-enduring radio show. "He abhorred censorship and, since he couldn't defeat the censorship department, he simply outwitted it. In every script he, would put in four really wild, outrageous jokes that couldn't possibly get by. He did this so that when the censors would get to the fifth joke the one he really wanted to keep — it would seem so lame they left it in."
Miss Pious, who stands a neat five feet and is still laden with gracious charm, is one of several long-time associates of Fred's who will comment on the late, great comedian next month (Nov. 14) when NBC-Radio presents an hour-long "Salute to Fred Allen."
The show will revolve around tapes from Allen's radio shows which for 17 years were among the highest-rated in the medium. The only disappointment, for his fans, is that such a show could not be presented on television—which could certainly use an hour of intellectual, sardonic wit.
ALLEN HATED TV
"But I guess that wouldn't be a good idea," says Miss Pious. "The chief hated TV, as we all know, and I can't blame him. He went to battle on censorship there, but he couldn't beat it."
He once said of TV — "It's not worth it. People get 10 per cent of everything except my blinding headaches."
Minerva Pious remembers him as an infinitely kind man whose growly exterior frightened the great even more than the small. "There never was such a boss. I never realized how he impressed other people, however, until Charles Laughton came on the show as a guest.
"He arrived at the studio 45 minutes before air time and he was shaking. He asked me, 'Where can I get a drink?' I knew Laughton wasn't that kind of man, so I took him down the street, and he drank down two straight shots fast. Then he said, 'How do you know when you're doing all right with Fred?'”
SHOW A SUCCESS
Miss Pious laughs. "Of course, the show went beautifully, but I don't think Allen congratulated Laughton afterward. That wasn't his way. His way was to give everybody, whether it was a big, star or a little codger, respect.
"He never opened his mouth to direct an actor unless the actor had misread a line for the fourth time. This was a great rarity. I could name you the great comedians — but I’d better not, because many are still alive — who had to tell an actor how to handle every line.
"I didn't care that Fred didn't smile and pat me on the back. He showed his respect and appreciation by leaving everybody alone. Once you knew him, you could never feel insecure with that man."
Fred Allen's generosity is legendary. He was never without a large roll of bills, which he would peel off at the first sight of a panhandler.
REGULAR PANHANDLER
"There was one old codger who used to come to Fred's hotel room at 4 p.m. every Sunday, while the chief was in his writing conferences. He did it for years, always wanting a handout.
"One Sunday Fred got furious. He said, 'You bum—you never even try to get a job ' But he gave him the money anyway. On a later Sunday, during the writers' conference, Fred began pacing the floor, glaring at the writers and at' his watch. Finally he said. 'That SOB—he hasn't shown up yet."
When Allen died, so suddenly of a heart attack, something wonderful went out of the laugh business. He will return, briefly, on Nov. 19. If you listen, don't stifle your laughs. Remember the words of the master: "My friends, a stifled laugh does not die when you push it back in your throat. It lives in your lower colon to laugh at the food as it passes through .."

Pious died March 16, 1979, almost a month before Peter Donald, who was Ajax Cassidy, the man next door in the Alley.

Of Dog and Jowls

Tex Avery said (paraphrased) that if you gave him an idea and a string of gags, he could make a cartoon.

That certainly describes what he did in later years (think of The Legend of Rockabye Point), but he also had some nice cinematography and interesting layouts in his earlier shorts.

In several cartoons, he engages in a slow pan across one of Johnny Johnsen’s background paintings, with something in the foreground on a cel moving at a different frame rate to simulate depth without resorting to a multiplane camera (Disney) or sets (Fleischer).

One of a number of examples is Of Fox and Hounds, 1941 Warners release. It has been nicely restored so you can see the cartoon opening. The sign and stone fence are on a cel.



The scene fades into what I can only presume is rotoscoped action. There are no gags here, and these shots don’t really set up a gag (not like the opening of, say, Screwball Squirrel at MGM a few years later).



Even the next scene when Willoughby slides into the frame is Disney-esque in the way it handles follow-through and overlapping action as the dog shakes his head.



The cartoon is basically Avery (and writer Rich Hogan, I guess) doing a different take on the Bugs Bunny-Elmer Fudd relationship. Bugs and Elmer are stronger characters; the fox is far more casual. The difference is the dopey character wins in the end. I always liked that watching this over and over as a kid 60-some-odd years ago and I still like it today.

Newfoundland?

Charlie Dog had a routine where he was “50%” various kinds of dogs and enthusiastically went into cliché gags about different breeds (Often An Orphan, 1949).

There were earlier cartoons which foisted the same doggie puns on theatre audiences. One of them was The Pooch Parade, a 1940 spot-gag short from Columbia.

The puns in this one really make you cringe, and you can probably guess the punch lines before they happen. There’s a Spitz, a watch dog, a Mexican hairless, a bird dog, Doberman Pinchers, everything except the “setter” gag. But there’s one I don’t get.

The film cuts a couple of times to a Newfoundland dog, except he’s not there. The narrator wonders where he could be. A hand pulls down a map of Newfoundland. The map morphs into a barking dog. “Thanks a lot,” responds the narrator.



Someone is going to have to explain this one to me.

Allen Rose was responsible for the story on this one. Harry Love and Lou Lilly are the credited animators, but there’s no director mentioned on screen. Mel Blanc supplies his dullard voice and his falsetto/lady voice. The narrator is Jack Lescoulie-esque, but it’s not him.

Rob Reiner

If you, 60 years ago, were at the Priscilla Beach Theatre in Massachusetts and watched a teenager on stage in the play “Enter Laughing,” you might have been thinking less about seeing a star in the making and more about nepotism.

The play was based on a novel by Carl Reiner. And the teenaged actor was his son, Rob.

By now, I’m sure you’ve read about the shocking and unbelievable deaths of Reiner and his wife in their California home.

Rob Reiner will always be associated with that breakthrough situation comedy All in the Family as Mike Stivic, son-in-law of Archie Bunker, despite his later successes directing This is Spinal Tap (and its recent sequel) and When Harry Met Sally... (and other films).

As improbable as it sounds, Reiner hoped, at least for a while, to be a stand-up comic. Even more improbable: he teamed in 1967 with Larry Bishop, the son of Joey.

Jeanne Miller of the San Francisco Examiner thought they were a bit green. Her review, published in December 28, 1967 partly read:

Larry Bishop, son of comedian Joey Bishop and Rob Reiner, son of Carl Reiner, a Renaissance man of the theater, are making their night club debut this week at the hungry i. The youngsters, both 20, are articulate, charming and attractive, with a strong determination to make their own way.
QUIET YOUTH
Bishop, a rather quiet, long-haired youth, said that his father had discouraged him right from the start.
"He knows how tough it is to get a foothold in show business," young Bishop said. "I know how he wishes that I had some other bent. We feel very differently about the war and a lot of other important things."
Reiner, on the other hand, said that his novelist-playwright-actor father had been extremely encouraging about his venture into the precarious world of show business.
COMPETITIVE THING
“My father wants me to do just what I need to do to be happy, even if it doesn't work out the way I want," he said. "Larry and I write all our own material. And we prefer to be known as comedy actors rather than comedians. We feel that the world we live in supplies enough material for the tragi-comic approach which is important today. There is no need, as far as we are concerned, for a competitive thing with our fathers."
The youngsters have a style and stage presence which is both appealing and magnetic. And perhaps, with time and experience, they will be able to captivate an audience.
UNEVEN
But at the present time, their presentation is so un-even in its delivery and so sophomoric in its content that one must regretfully admit that the youngsters' last names are their saving grace professionally.



The partnership didn’t last. This publicity story found its way into the Lansing State Journal of Dec. 21, 1968:

Rob Reiner: Off To Early Start
"He has his talent, I have mine. They're not the same. I'm not trading on his name."
So says Rob Reiner of himself and his talented father, writer-producer-actor-comedian Carl Reiner.
Young Reiner is a new addition this season to the 12-man writing staff of "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour."
Though only 21, Reiner already has been "paying his dues," as they say in show business, for several years. Following his graduation from Beverly Hills High School, he took a summer apprenticeship at the Bucks County Playhouse in New Hope, Pa. For three months, he built scenery and painted backdrops without pay —not even room or board. His total acting experience was performing one line in one play.
The next summer, after a year at UCLA, he joined the resident company of the Priscilla Beach Theater in Plymouth, Mass. There, his acting exposure was somewhat better. Reiner appeared in seven of their 12 plays and received the grand salary of $15 a week plus room and board.
After a second year of college, Reiner and five of his contemporaries, including Joey Bishop's son, Larry, formed "The Session," a comedy improvisation group. They performed together for one year in nightclubs and on network television.
Following the group's breakup, Reiner and Larry Bishop formed an act and played at the famed “hungry i” in San Francisco and on numerous television shows.
During his nightclub exposure, Reiner met Tommy Smothers, and later, when he developed an idea for a television pilot, he submitted it to the comedian.
Smothers was sufficiently impressed to give Reiner a writing job on the summer replacement series for "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour." When the summer show ended, Reiner was added to the staff of the fall show.

Reiner made his film debut in Halls of Anger (1970). Despite that, and having a key role in an historic television show, acting doesn’t seem to have been his goal, as we read in Dan Lewis’ syndicated column. This appeared in the Shreveport Times on Feb. 20, 1972:

Rob Reiner’s Enjoying Success
Nice things are happening to Rob Reiner, even if Archie Bunker calls him a "Meathead."
For one thing, people recognize Rob on the street. He went into a theater in New York and caused quite a stir. "I signed more than 300 autographs," Rob said proudly.
For another thing, when he thinks he has a worthwhile television project, networks listen to him. As a result, he's writing a script for a new series for which ABC and Metromedia have forked up $15,000 development money. The series would be titled "The Super" and focuses on a superintendent in a small (maybe 20 units) apartment in New York. Richard Castellano, who got an Oscar nomination for "Lovers and Other Strangers" last year, will star in the series if it goes.
Rob is faced with decisions on movie scripts, ("One would be shot in Rome this summer," Rob confided).
And he also gets requests for civic endeavors such as the one which brought him to New York this trip. "I came East to tape a program about venereal disease for the Community Relations project," said Rob, whose Saturday night encounters with the bigoted Archie Bunker in "All in the Family" have made him one of the big heroes of young people today, and also a big star in the eyes of 62 per cent of TV viewers who tune in their sets on Saturday.
He repeated, "62 per cent watched our last show — more than ever watched a single half-hour situation comedy show in TV history."
He enjoys the success. "Hey, look, I'm staying here (the new ultra fashionable Park Lane Hotel on Central Park South)," he said, rolling his eyes around the room, and looking out over Central Park. “The last time I stayed in a New York hotel, I hate to tell you what it looked like. And I'm paying my way, except for two nights CBS is picking up."
The show's incredible success this year doesn't mystify Rob ("Everybody calls me Bob, and I hate it," he complained). He acknowledged that he didn't give the show much chance to last beyond the first 13 weeks when it went on in midseason last year. "As it turned out, people we thought would like it — the liberals — don't like it. These people are very protective of minorities. They talk about attitudes of the show.
"But I get angry when people ask about attitudes. Who cares? People are enjoying the show — a lot of people judging from the ratings. The big thing is that Archie is living in a prison — his own — and the more prejudices he has the more imprisoned he becomes. The hoity-toity liberals don't like it."
But, Rob contended, "All in the Family" is real, and that's what makes it work. "Everybody who tunes in either IS the family, or knows people like this family," he declared.
There has been some criticism that many people like the show because they agree with Archie and see in him a vehicle in which these feelings are projected to the masses. "People who agree with Archie are too close-minded to see what we're really doing with Archie. We make him a buffoon every time."
Ironically, Rob Reiner was first offered the role five years ago, when two pilots were made for ABC. Both were rejected and the series was tabled. When CBS agreed to pick it up, producer Norman Lear recalled Rob.
In the intervening five years, Rob did a number of things. He came out of high school with a taste for show business after acting in a school play. "That was the first time in my life I had friends," Rob recalled "The family (his father is Carl Reiner, sometimes actor, mostly writer and creator of the "New Dick Van Dyke Show," director and producer) kicked around for years and we never really settled anywhere long enough for me to make friends until we got to California. The friends I made were in this play."
That summer he studied acting and met Larry Bishop, son of comic Joey Bishop, and a young man named Phil Mishkin. The three started an improvisation theater, the first in the Los Angeles area. Later, Rob and Bishop broke away and formed a night-club act. Tall, stoop-shouldered, Rob fussed with his Fu Manchu mustache as he recounted his life history. "Larry decided he didn't like to work clubs, so we broke up, too," Rob recalled.
From then, Reiner, showing the same writing interest his father, has joined "The Committee." another improvisational group, and also wrote for Glen Campbell and the Smothers Brothers television shows.
He also appeared in about 20 situation comedy segments on television series, a number of them for shows produced by Gary [sic] Marshall. He started going with Gary's sister, Penny.
"We lived together for a year and a half," he revealed. "Then we got married about a year ago."
He considered the writing stint with the Smothers Brothers the big thing in his career until "All in the Family." Along the way, he also reteamed with Mishkin. "Phil had a project called 'An Evening of Dirty Movies,' a theatrical production which I directed and co-produced. It was an Equity company and got incredible reviews. But financially, it was a bust."
Just before "All in the Family," Rob was writing for Andy Griffith's new series, "Headmaster." and starred in one segment as a 23-year-old psychology teacher. "Norman (Lear) saw it and called me when CBS decided to go ahead with 'All in the Family."'
The name of that segment, which Rob wrote, was "Valerie Has an Emotional Gestalt for the Teacher."
Rob claims he wants to keep his hand in acting, but he really plans to concentrate on writing, directing and producing. "The Super" television project is being coscripted with Mishkin.
"I'd like to act in one picture a year to make the kind of money that will then permit me to produce my kind of pictures," he explained.
But he had one word of caution. "Everything I said about what's coming up is all 'maybe.' If nothing develops, you'll see me on the unemployment line during hiatus."

The Super wasn’t, as one critic put it. And Reiner finally walked away from All in the Family in 1978. At the time, wife Penny told Chris Stoehr of the Knight-Ridder papers: “He didn’t know what else to do with Mike, as a character” and “Rob, for a while, got depressed about playing the same role. It was all okay until about the fourth or fifth year, I think, and he went through a time of really wanting to get out of the series.”

When he did get out, he continued his string of successes. But if he had done nothing else than play an iconic character like Mike Stivic, the other side of the coin of conservative bigot Archie Bunker, that would have been enough to rank him with a rather small group of select actors.

Tralfaz Sunday Theatre: Now You're Talking

Although Felix the Cat is my favourite silent film star, the work of the Fleischer studio in that era is creative and enjoyable.

I’m not referring just to the entertainment films, but advertising ones as well.

In My Merry Oldsmobile (1932) from the sound era is probably the best known, but the studio made several others. A number were for A. T. & T. Finding His Voice (1929) is a sound cartoon, but before that came the silent Now You’re Talking (1927), following the Out-of-the-Inkwell formula of live action interspersed with animation.

It’s a basic phone manners short; the Bell system made these for more than three decades. This one stars an abused candlestick phone. A very good piano score has been added.

The Departure of Phil Harris

It took the better part of a decade for the Jack Benny radio show to settle down with the main cast we remember best. If you think of Benny’s announcer and bandleader, you don’t think of Howard Claney and Frank Black.

Benny debuted on May 2, 1932. By the start of the 1939-40 season, everything was in place with the addition of Dennis Day as the replacement for tenor Kenny Baker. Mary Livingstone came first (as a new character), followed by Don Wilson as a replacement announcer, Phil Harris as a replacement orchestra leader and Eddie Anderson as Rochester.

They were together for a long time (Harris and Day took time off for war duties) but the demise of network radio in the 1950s included the Benny radio show. The growth of television took away listeners from radio’s prime time. That took away advertisers’ money that paid for the shows. Gradually, Benny dismantled his regular cast.

Mary Livingstone stopped appearing live and her lines, unenthusiastically delivered, were edited into the tapes of the show. By the end of the show in 1955, there were episodes where she didn’t appear at all and Veola Vonn was brought in as a female lead. Dennis Day had other projects and he was not appearing every week. And even Bob Crosby had vanished as band leader and his spot was taken by arranger Mahlon Merrick or musicians Charlie Bagby or Sammy Weiss.

Crosby, himself, was a replacement for Harris, who was hired in 1936 when Johnny Green moved to the Packard broadcast. More than Mary, more than Dennis, Harris’ departure was, to me at least, a real blow.

Just as it took some time for the Benny show to develop, it took time for Harris’ character to develop. Originally, he and Benny were antagonists because of Jack’s jealousy over Phil’s popularity with the big female stars of Hollywood (in real life, Harris was married with a son). That resulted in pettiness and yelling, neither of which is very comedic. But the writers came up with some additions that made Harris funny. He became self-confident and self-loving, despite being practically illiterate, with a gang of reprobates as musicians. Audiences ate it up when Harris, ignoring Benny altogether, came on stage and egged on the audience to give him a noisy reception.

The Harris character talked a lot about alcohol, but was never drunk on the air. Talking about it was funny enough. His character became so popular the F.W. Fitch Co. decided to have him replace Cass Daley as the star of The Fitch Bandwagon in the fall of 1946. Joining him was wife Alice Faye and, later, a cast including Elliott Lewis, Walter Tetley and Robert North, as well as two fine child actresses playing his daughters, Jeanine Roose and Anne Whitfield. His show became, like all others, a casualty of the rise of television and left the air on June 18, 1954 (though Harris told his audience that evening they would be back next fall).

Meanwhile, back on the Benny show, something was happening behind the scenes. The Associated Press made the story national on Apr. 1, 1952.

Benny, Harris Reported Near Parting of Ways
HOLLYWOOD, April 1 (AP)—One of radio’s longest and funniest associations—Jack Benny and Phil Harris—may end at the close of this season.
A spokesman for Benny today confirmed a trade report that such a move is under consideration next autumn. The relationship reportedly became strained when Harris refused to make a guest appearance with Benny on the latter’s television show.
Benny chose Bob Crosby instead. Crosby is reported under consideration to replace Harris. But—
“Crosby has not been signed, nor has Harris been dropped,” the spokesman added.
Both Benny and Harris were unreachable.



Harris couldn’t do anything but refuse. He had signed an exclusive television deal with NBC. Benny was on CBS. On April 27, the AP wire quoted Benny as saying Harris was being replaced with Crosby.

The Trenton Sunday Times-Advertiser published this story on May 4, 1952. It is likely a product of the CBS PR department.

Benny Signs New Radio Pact; Bob Crosby Replaces Harris
Jack Benny announced that he will continue on CBS Radio next season at the request of his sponsor. This is the earliest date this decision has been reached in recent years.
"I am very gratified," said Benny, "that my sponsor wanted us to stay on next season. After all, it would have been very difficult to say farewell to an audience that they estimate as 18,575,000 people a week. And I am sure that with Mary, Dennis, Rochester, Don, the Sportsmen Quartet and my regular radio writers with us again, we will broadcast as funny a show as we possibly can for the listeners to this country's 105,000,000 radio sets who tune us in."
The only change in the program will be the substitution of Bob Crosby for Phil Harris. The reason for the switch was because Phil Harris was not available for the Benny television program. Bob Crosby will appear on the Benny television show, as well as the radio program.
"To continue with CBS Radio," Benny went on, "it was necessary to limit my television appearances to a one-every-four-weeks basis. This, I think, is a good balance."
The "Jack Benny Program" is a veritable Sunday evening institution in American radio homes and one of radio's all-time top-rated shows. The comedy series switched to CBS Radio on January 2, 1949. Benny himself made his radio debut in 1932 on CBS' New York radio station, then WABC, and shortly after launched his own program on the network. He has been the recipient of some of the greatest honors in show business, including the coveted Peabody Award.

Harris spent the summer touring and not talking about Benny. Crosby was a little more chatty. Columnist Hal Humphrey reported on June 13:

Bob’s inclined to be somewhat sensitive about the fact that he replaces Phil Harris on the radio show.
“It was just a combination of circumstances,” he explains. “Phil’s own radio show on another network conflicted with Benny’s TV time, making it impossible to use him.

Crosby also wanted the exposure. Humphrey added:

Despite the fact that he’s also set to begin his sixth year on CBS Radio’s “Club 15” series, Bob is hep enough to know that TV is going to make him a bigger name, and that it’s a tough medium for band leaders to crack.

Another factor in the change may have been revealed by Variety, which revealed Benny had “been forced to make salary concessions” and then mentioned the Crosby hiring.

All this took place before the end of the Benny radio show for the season on June 1. One columnist noted there was not so much as a goodbye or thank-you by Jack on Phil’s final broadcast.

There was something else that became a source of discomfort. Hollywood columnist Harrison Carroll wrote on June 12 that Harris’ guitarist and long-time friend Frank Remley would be staying with the Benny show. Remley and Benny had become personal friends and travelling buddies. Benny’s letters to Remley survive and the language wasn’t exactly suitable for a radio broadcast.

Mentions of Remley had been made for years on the Benny show so when Harris got his own show, Elliott Lewis was hired to play him. That changed after the real Remley remained with Jack. When Harris’ show returned to the air on October 5, the Remley character got a name change. In fact, what had been Harris’ band remained with Jack, on radio and television.

Financially, Phil and Alice did well. Toronto Star columnist Gordon Sinclair wrote on June 5 that when the pair’s contract expired, NBC couldn’t sell their show. But they played what Sinclair called “an ‘on-again off-again’ routine” and wound up with more money and a five-year contract.

On the air, Harris was larger than life. Crosby was not. The Spokane Chronicle’s Bob Emahiser interviewed him and reported on June 25 “no attempt would be made to made to imitate Harris and that a new role is being created for him.” Crosby was hamstrung somewhat by being known to audiences through Club 15 and it would have been awkward to deviate from his casual nature. There wasn’t much else to do outside “Bing is my brother” and “I’m not Phil” jokes (some of which were repurposed from earlier shows with Harris). The writers then seized on his mispronunciation of a kosher brand and squeezed what they could out of that. When Club 15 ended, Crosby’s appearances with Benny became fewer and fewer.

As it turned out, Harris (and Faye) had little interest in a television series. He was assigned to NBC’s All-Star Revue at the start of the 1952-53 season and his contract called for eight appearances on the network that year. The contract ran out and he reunited with Benny on the small screen on October 5, 1958. But he preferred to go golfing, fishing and spending time with his family in Rancho Mirage. He and Faye were married for 54 years until his death in 1995.