Fibber Mcgee And Molly

Fibber McGee and Molly was one of broadcasting's greatest triumphs, reaching its height during the 1940s when millions of Americans tuned in Tuesday evenings to hear radio's royal couple welcome the Old Timer, Gildersleeve, Mrs. Uppington, Mayor LaTrivia, Doctor Gamble, and other visitors who came calling at the most famous address in Comedyland, 79 Wistful Vista. A listening favorite in many homes from the Depression right into the space age, Fibber McGee and Molly was unique in that it aired in three different formats: thirty-minute productions, fifteen-minute episodes, and vignettes heard on NBC Monitor. This guide to over 1200 episodes covers all three formats of the series with entries listing date of broadcast, title, cast, summary, musical numbers, running gags, and comments designed to enhance the enjoyment of listeners and readers. This revised and greatly-expanded edition contains 300 additional entries (including 20 for which no transcription exists), more appendices (one tabulating all openings of that famous hall closet), and a new selection of photographs to complement the text.

Looks at the history of radio broadcasting as an aspect of American culture, and discusses social tensions, radio formats, and the roles of African Americans and women

On the Ides of March, our hero, Raleigh Whittier Hayes (forgetful husband, baffled father, prosperous insurance agent, and leading citizen of Thermopylae, North Carolina), learns that his father has discharged himself from the hospital, taken all his money out of the bank and, with a young black female mental patient, vanished in a yellow Cadillac convertible. Left behind is a mysterious list of seven outrageous tasks that Raleigh must perform in order to rescue his father and his inheritance. And so Raleigh and fat Mingo Sheffield (his irrepressibly loyal friend) set off on an uproarious contemporary treasure hunt through a landscape of unforgettable characters, falling into adventures worthy of Tom Jones and Huck Finn. A moving parable of human love and redemption, Handling Sin is Michael Malone's comic masterpiece.

When Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve bade farewell to Fibber McGee and Molly and left Wistful Vista on a train in 1941, no one could have predicted that he would be riding the airwaves with his own new show until 1957. But when one listens to episodes of radio's first spinoff, it becomes clear the The Great Gildersleeve succeeded because its likable and amusing characters were appealingly fallible, much like the folks each of us knew in our hometowns. This book is a guide to more than 500 episodes of The Great Gildersleeve that are in circulation and also to the scripts of 46 episodes for which no recordings exist. Background on the development of the program is included, and the appendices include a list of episodes as well as information about cast members, notable occurrences on the program, ratings, and the films and TV series.

The king of radio comedy from the Great Depression through the early 1950s, Jack Benny was one of the most influential entertainers in twentieth-century America. A master of comic timing and an innovative producer, Benny, with his radio writers, developed a weekly situation comedy to meet radio’s endless need for new material, at the same time integrating advertising into the show’s humor. Through the character of the vain, cheap everyman, Benny created a fall guy, whose frustrated struggles with his employees addressed midcentury America’s concerns with race, gender, commercialism, and sexual identity. Kathryn H. Fuller-Seeley contextualizes her analysis of Jack Benny and his entourage with thoughtful insight into the intersections of competing entertainment industries and provides plenty of evidence that transmedia stardom, branded entertainment, and virality are not new phenomena but current iterations of key aspects in American commercial cultural history.

In 1939, when Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve first came to the attention of radio audiences, he was but a neighbor and one of the frequent visitors to the folks at 79 Wistful Vista on the popular Fibber McGee and Molly program. His verbal sparring with Fibber came to be a much anticipated and enjoyed segment of the program. Then in 1941, Gildersleeve moved to the town of Summerfield to take on a more serious role as the guardian of his orphaned niece and nephew. His bumbling efforts, his penchant for wooing various ladies, and his interactions with pals in the Jolly Boys club, made The Great Gildersleeve one of radio's most listened-to weekly programs. Harold Peary brought "Gildy" to life on the McGee program and filled the role until mid-1950. Willard Waterman then took over, with a voice so similar to Peary's that few listeners noticed the change. The two stars, supported by a talented team of writers and a cast of seasoned radio performers, kept listeners tuned in for 16 years. Old-time radio enthusiast Dan McGuire recalls the careers of Harold Peary, Willard Waterman, and the featured players who made The Great Gildersleeve a listeners' favorite and one of radio's most long-running programs.