Having listened to all of the extant episodes of high-quality radio Westerns (Gunsmoke, Have Gun Will Travel, Frontier Gentleman, The Six Shooter, and a few others) and detective/crime programs (Dragnet, Richard Diamond, Yours Truly, Johnny Dollars, Box 13, Philip Marlowe, Broadway Is My Beat, Let George Do It, Pat Novak…For Hire, Candy Matson) and a few that were less than high-quality, e.g. Murder Is My Hobby, I’ve now turned to radio comedy. I’ve been listening to Burns & Allen for a few months. I began with the earliest extant episodes (from 1934) and at this point I’m listening to the episodes from 1946.
I find Burns & Allen extremely funny but I honestly can’t tell whether today’s ears would find it offensive. Although Gracie is portrayed as a Dumb Dora, George is the butt of every joke while between the two of them Gracie is obviously the talent. I don’t know that anybody ever had better comedic timing than Gracie Allen. Occasionally going head to head with the grand master of comedic timing, Jack Benny, she gives Jack a run for his money.
There are many running gags. George’s singing. Gracie’s “Beverly Hills Uplift Society”. George’s age and Gracie’s youth—an inside joke since in 1946 George was 50 while Gracie was 51.
Their orchestras provide an interesting window into the development of music through the period. In 1938 through about 1941 Artie Shaw’s orchestra provided the music for Burns & Allen. The Shaw organization was simply brilliant. I don’t think there’s any other word for it. After Shaw Paul Whiteman took over. Then the lesser-known Felix Mills. Then Meredith Willson’s (he later composed The Music Man) Chiffon Music, sometimes with the Les Paul Trio, some of the earliest electric guitar on radio.
I only have another 50-60 Burns & Allen programs left which should take me into 1948, just about the end of the radio series. I’ll probably turn to the Benny program then.
Speaking of Jack Benny, I’ve watched every extant episode available from his long-running television series. The only ones available are ones that belonged to his family or ones that fell into the public domain. CBS apparently owns all the rest, and absolutely refuses to release them on DVD or for streaming. There’s a story there, and I burn to know all the details. I’d buy the entire series the day it became available. Benny was a genius. Many of the episodes were dreck of the highest order, but there are some where I had to stop the DVD, as I was laughing so hard; an episode where he goes to visit Mr and Mrs Ronald Colman comes to mind, as well as his visit to the Beverly Hills Police Department. Please, CBS.
My memory of their TV show is that Gracie always got the winning zinger in at the end, upending the dumb Dora gag.
Say good night, Gracie.
Good night, wherever you are, Mrs. Calabash.
Re Jack Benny (very funny), the problem is Rochester, Jack’s black valet and chauffeur. Although Rochester is in no way obsequious, certainly no Step-n-Fetchit, modern sensibilities on race are so hypersensitive and irrational that it is impossible to show a black servant anymore. Even an intelligent, mocking and somewhat subversive one.
“The Song of the South,” which aired several times during my youth, is permanently embargoed by Disney. It is set on a Reconstruction plantation that still employs freed slaves. The main character, the black Uncle Remus, is an attractive, intelligent story teller, who tells the young white boy visiting his aunt, the plantation owner, fables involving animals. In no way, can this be construed as a racist slur on blacks. Yet it is banned.
The trend towards absurdity, idiocracy and violent dictatorship continues. Tucker Carlson and his family just suffered through a modern kristallnacht pogrom.