Oakland Tribune from Oakland, California • Page 60

SCREEN RADIO WEEKLY Sy kernel Robert Jack Benny Sets a New Record with Hii Cross-Country Ribbing Rehearsing Fred Allen 12 RED ALLEN'S "Town Hall Tonight" rehearses in two Peter van Steeden and the musicians go through their' paces in a large udio. Fred and the Mighty Allen art troupe work over their broadcasts in a small NBC studio far from song-pluggers and tourists. On the air Fred heckles his four assistants. Off the air he admires them. It gos both ways.

At rehearsals, Fred injects certain, ex-, temporaneous remarks. They issue from the side1 of his' drooping mouth," sending Jack Smart, tiny Minerva Pious, Eileert Douglas and John Brown into mild cases 61 hysterics. Fred's wife Portland just sits by quietly and chews gum. 'T got this' gum chewing habit from Fred," she explained, "who is either chewing tobacco or gum. I chose the lattfr." rehearsals are private; the only other person in the room is the sound effects who is necessary.

Jack Smart, a former drummer, and now one of radio's best known character actors, has been with Fred for years. Jack can imitate Swedes, Irish cops, East Side toughs, Chinamen, a quintuplet, a whole barnyard and a katydid. Minerva Pious, an ex-stage actress, dubbed "vestpocket Bernhardt" by Allen, has been the air troupe -three years. Her specialties in elude a Mae West drawl, a Jewish dialect, small boy, a debutante, a Russian (Minerva hails from Moscow), a Pole and a Scot. Eileen Douglas writes radio scripts in her spare time, but is best known for AZJ7x: I I til aJfi 11 Jack Benny J' he saw was Jack Benny, wearing ACK BENNY a great big grin.

'Well, weir' said Jack, "if it isn't my old friend Bronsonf On the Telephone in the world's champion long distance practical' joker. His latest victim is Bill ace radio Bill decided to surprise Jack re- Martha Mears French Marie de Ville, who is on her radio character studies of gang- up as an nut; singer, c.r ,4 That's-Gold Does Not Glitter nis trip. m9nil tk. Mndr board operators." Fred will never But BilTneglected to let his wife Rights Division at station WTAM for8et th night Eileen's predeces- takes him to Central Park every "OLDEN-HAIRED -day. -She boasts that she has even.

in on the gag. She wired Jack," hf Previously she had "'nted at a Aress rehearsal, and tellinz him that Bill was arriving with Guy Lombardo's band "ho happened to be the and had been "National Air Race studio, volunteered to pinch-hit. and on what plane. She asked him Girl." But these jobs and honors Last 18 John Brown. He English Martha Mears refuses to glitter, made him like cod liver oil.

Glamour to her is just a word Martha's husband is Sidney which press agents use too much. Brokaw, violinist with Ozzie She has just celebrated the end son's band. of her second year a very event- Martha still looks like a co-ed to have Bill get in touch with her. but does hillbillies, pompous bank. didn't seem to lead anywhere (ex- ers, Yiddish lawyers and New York cops.

ful year for her as one of NBC's five feet two, golden-haired, usu- Fred writes the scripts he is one top blues singers. Speaking of it, ally in sports of the few radio buffoons who do. she said: Tin a wife and mother sufts and sweaters, brie made the first, you singer next." curtains in the Brokaw apartment, When Martha Mears went, to hemmed and -m6nogramrned the New York ih December of 1933, towels and She is not she wasn't looking for a singing interested in glamour. Miss Atwell Directs career, tjhe had just graduated from University "of Missouri and she was looking for a teaching Martha Atwell is one of the few women directors in radio and one of the busiest. Among her CBS shows are "Just Plain Bill," "Mrs.

On to Hollywood You have to be good to get on the CBS Radio Theater, directed job. There was also a matter of Wiggs," "Five Star Jones" and dramatic ffmbition did not Broadway Varieties. But the teaching job Young, blue-eyed, brisk Martha -materialize and the legitimate bV the. little than waves a year, it has drafted the cream of California believes in "letting well enough tneater snowed little--interest in She got a job with Gus Ed- alone. 1 1 A -J Marie de Ville Immediately "Jack went into action at the telegraph office.

When the plane landed at Chicago, an old vaudeville crony of Jack, with a fake detective badge under his lapel, solenfhly nabbed Stuhler as he stepped down for a cup of coffee. Fellow passengers looked on curiously. "Just got word to hold you, Bronson, pending further information." Bill got excited, explained his name was not Bronson he could prove it by his driving The detective apologized profusely. Aloft bound for Cheyenne, Bill found his fellow looking at him suspiciously. At Cheyenne another pal of Jack, tricked out in a Western sheriff's outfit, nabbed Bill.

Bill began to grow apopletic. Again be proved his identity. By the time the plane settled down at Salt Lake City, Bill was' beginnirg to feeel like a criminal. He decided to forego food. He would rather be hungry but safe.

But this time they came into the cabin. Jack's Salt Lake City friend brought along a real policeman. Perspiring, Stuhler followed the pair into the waiting room. The passengers whispered among them, selves. "Listen Bronson," the policeman Edcjie Robinson, Clark Gable, Jimmy Cagney, Joan Crawford, Joan Bennett.

It has never groomed an unknown that is, except Lillian Emerson. Lillian appeared with Clark Modestly, she says "65 per cent Tomorrow revue, of the credit for a good radio show Then the show closed and left her should go to the script writer, the New York. She needed rest to. the actors. A director has farue back, M'ssouWr solved the toughest problems by was herreaL-beglnning casting the show right the first A-t-A Gable in "Misleading -Lady." Now place.

I spend a lot of time cast niArH rtr as 4Uif nU Unn aunt Waam word comes that she has just been ing a show, and then, outside of offering a few suggestions, I don't do much. I check the show from listener's viewpoint, keep my ears open for insincere performances, and that's about all." She tliinks radio is splendid at NHL. bhe had earned and learned a lot over St. Louis stations in undergraduate days, so she knew what she was about. She intended getting two or three spot engagements and then going home.

Instead she got a contract it was more than a year before she bought signed to a Hollywood Lillian never starved in a garret, or walked forlornly on Broadway. She comes from one of New York's first families, and unlike other stage-struck girls, sat' down front to see her favorites, and not in the peanut gallery. Fred Waring and his Pennsyl-, vanians can now be heard over training the most famous a ticket for Missouri, and that was TT-11 .1.. stars, out Daa training for a rounj trjp cept that a lot of pilots never forgot her; she still gets "fan mail from them). iur tnose.

wno wisn. to go irom As for the events of the past radio tntoj the tKeater. year last summer Martha disao- began, with tears in his eyes You an't learn bow to express peared from- the' air, quietly and both NBC and CBS. His weekly But in her positioYi as music nuyr nas oeen spilt, witn a nail aiuniLf p.uuutea ni? waiiei, leuers, rights manager, she got a telephone emotions by gesture and -panto- without explanation. When 'she briet and driving permit and all from Radjo city concerning mime in radio.

But for one who" returned in October, she was the proved tor the last time that he the 0f aparticular song, has learned stage technique, radio mother of Robert Allen Brokaw, was not BfOnson, but a sad, weary SKe couldn't remember the title of is a marvelous builder-tipper for now five months old and husky as radio director 1 hey let him go. the song but she did remember the very reason that you can't de- an average year-old child. There wasn't much rest, left for the tune. She sang jt c-ver -the pend on. gesture and pantomime.

A Martha is a scientific mother poor Bill. He sat uncomfortable telephone. multitude of sins in jfcting can.be reads baby books and her nd sell conscious until the plane An NBC. official listened to her covered by visible personality, but son up accordingly. She super- hour over Columbia Tuesday evenings and a half hour over NBC Friday evenings.

Both broadcasts start at 9:30 p. rri, (EST). Amos 'n' Andy finally married off Ruby, after all these years. After that we can expect almost swooped down to l.os Angeles. As long distance vocalizing.

She was trie microphone conveys nothing vises the preparation ot every but the voice to he stepp-J down, the first person -invited to come to New York. mouthful of food he eats. She anything in radio..