<DIRECTOR HOMER FICKET (SEATED
UNDER FLAG) GIVES THE ENTIRE CAST A QUICK RUN THROUGH THE SCRIPTS BEFORE AIR
TIME.>
<Sound effects are an integral
part of the show, requiring the most experienced men.>
CAVALCADE OF AMERICA
TUNE IN WEDS. 8 P.M. E.W.T. (NBC)
When the Cavalcade series was
first presented eight years ago, few people in radio thought it would succeed. Likely
to be tagged as “long-haired” and an “educational program” those in the know
felt that a show devoted to historical drama would find a very small listening
audience. But Cavalcade has proved that Americans are interested in their
country and its great names. The producers of the show were far-sighted enough
to see that if the program was to have any real value, it must not be a dry,
dusty, rehash of what teachers taught in the grade schools.
It is interesting to note that an
early Cavalcade story on George Washington was unique in that it ignored the
Revolutionary War, and outlined the hero’s remarkably prophetic experiments in
agriculture. And when Edison was ethered there wasn’t a whisper about his
famous light bulb.
The program was designed to
re-awaken in the public mind a consciousness of those ideals and inheritance
that are most basically American. With this objective, the show was submitted
to an air audience as an informative and exciting type of entertainment, and
while the objective was not obvious, it served its purpose. The stories are
conceived by authors from historical records, and selected by a Planning Board
that works in close harmony with the sponsor. After the story has been okayed
by the Planning Board it is scheduled for broadcast some six or eight weeks
ahead. Then the research department gets busy digging out all the facts
concerning the person and his period. The material must be authenticated by
sponsor, Planning Board, and Research Department before final acceptance. Dr.
Frank Monaghan, of Yale University, is maintained as Historical Consultant to
see that the scripts are absolutely without bias. John Anderson, drama critic
of the New York Journal-American serves as critic. Homer Fickett is director.
Briefly, Cavalcade tells the
history of America through the lives of the country’s greatest men and women,
with all the dramatic vividness of which radio is capable. Responsibility for
such full-blown pictures lies at the pen points of a galaxy of writers such as
Robert Sherwood, Norman Corwin, Maxwell Anderson, William Saroyan and Carl Sandberg,
and a dozen others equally prominent.
The actors and actresses who
insure that the Cavalcade episodes are presented at their dramatic best are
Paul Muni, Helen Hayes, Raymond Massey, Burgess Meredith, Lynn Fontanne, EthelBarrymore, Alfred Lunt, and many others. The show is so constructed that the
burden of characterization falls almost entirely upon one person.
Sound effects for Cavalcade are a
story all their own. Present day mechanics in that field can master almost any
sound of a current nature they have to cope with, but when it comes to
reproducing an 1885 grindston, or a Dutch bowling match on the New Amsterdam
Green, then research of a very exacting and accurate nature is required for
this is a show in which radio paints its setting with sound—it has to be good.
At first, Cavalcade used a regular
stock of actors and went purely historical. Recently, however, the public has
been too occupied with rushing current events to give must though to things of
the past, so the show has a modern theme—war, heroism, and problems of the home
front. It is still biographical, but the characters presented are modern heroes
and heroines, and the show has a direct bearing on the present conflict.
Teachers, ministers, mothers and
public officials have sanctioned the program, as have all leading radio
editors. In 1937 it was designated “The Radio show most acceptable and
worthwhile for the general family.”
Regular members of the acting
company, such as Karl Swenson, John McIntire, Arlene Francis, and Ed Jerome
have been with the show for many years. Harking back to the technique used in
the old stock company days, Ed Jerome will star as Abe Lincoln one week, and
the next performance turn up as the butler with a one-line exit. Don Voorhees,
director of the dramatized musical background, is a Cavalcade fixture, the only
absolutely permanent one in the show. Cavalcade is today’s history. What passes
through air-ethered show weekly may be immortal tomorrow.
CONTINUED ON NEXT PAGE
<THE SUPPORTING CAST GATHERS
AROUND ONE MICROPHONE.>
<MEN BEHIND THE CAST HOLD
WEEKLY CONFERENCES ON CAVALCADE SHOW>
Comments
Post a Comment