Golden Age of Radio

Marie Wilson is heard on CBS , Mondays at 10:00 P.M. EST, and My Friend Irma , the kindest, sweetest, dumbest blonde ever to wander across the airwaves. Marie left Anaheim, Calif., for Hollywood when she was fifteen, to become a dramatic actress. Fate handed her a comedy part in “Miss Pacific Fleet” and she has played sad-eyed lovable nitwit ever since on the screen, and now on the air.

HOLLYWOOD. GARRY MOORE is a calm, pleasant, normal acting young man who does the weirdest things. He plays golf in his bare feet because “it’s more comfortable that way.” He has surrounded himself with several hundred dollars’ worth of tropical fish because they’re “fascinating, dreamlike, and soothing.” He also owns two parakeets and two lovebirds which he can’t bear to cage and which are liable to make dive bombing attacks on visitors from the curtain rod. Garry also earns a handsome living—more than $100,000 a year—by working just an hour and a half once a week, on Sunday evening. He’s the new emcee of the quiz show “Take It or Leave It.” Garry confesses, “I feel a little guilty, having such an easy life, and may take on a daily show too.” He’s known as “The Haircut” because he wears his unruly dark thatch in a brushlike stubble—it’s either that or plaster it down with goo. I found Garry in the green walled study of his Brentwood home, where he lives with his wife a

Say Hello To- ANN THOMAS—a sweet-faced young miss of 23 who is radio’s expert in tough-gal roles. You hear her tonight as the thick-witted maid, Lily, in Meet Mr. Meek over CBS —and other days when you tune in a particularly tough feminine voice, the chances are that’s Ann too. She’s a veteran of same 35 productions on Broadway , and long since lost count of all her microphone characterizations. Her big-guest thrill recently came when Minerva Pious, Fred Allen ’s dependable comedy actress, had to go to Hollywood for two weeks and Ann was chosen to handle her roles on the Allen program. She’s blonde, New York born, and single.

ON THE AIR TODAY: ZaSu Pitts , playing the role of Aunt Mamie in the CBS serial, Big Sister , at 11:30 A.M., E.S.T. (rebroadcast at 11:00 A.M., Pacific Time), sponsored by Rinso. That wistful little lady in Columbia’s Studio Four, eyeing the microphone so distrustfully, is ZaSu Pitts, who Eric Von Stroheim always insisted was the finest dramatic actress in America. She has been in the movies since 1917, and never has appeared on the screen, even in a small role, without bringing a delighted murmur from audiences. She is utterly without temperament or stuffiness, and has a heart as big as Radio City. She hasn’t given up movie work for radio , by any means. But she isn’t under contract to any one studio in Hollywood , and when the opportunity came along to spend a few months in New York and act in Big Sister it sort of appealed to her, she says. Asked if she has any movie plans for the future, ZaSu doesn’t commit herself. “I’m hoping,” she says. “I’ve been hoping for twent

MORE THAN A CROONER SINATRA USES WORDS AS WELL AS MUSIC IN TOLERANCE BATTLE THERE are people who think FrankSinatra should climb down off his soapbox and stick to swooning the bobbysoxers. Intolerance, they will inform you, is a hot potato which has no business being kicked around as a publicity stunt by a radio crooner. But let all such skeptics be advised the Frankie Boy’s pitch for racial and religious understanding is the furthest thing from a publicity promotion. In fact, any good press agent would have counseled Frank that he’s putting his career in jeopardy to mention tolerance either pro or con. But Frank isn’t particularly concerned over the threat to his Hooper rating or box office appeal as a result of his campaign against discrimination. He plans to go right on beating the drums for tolerance and if his career crashes as a result, well, let it crash. The public got its first inkling that Frankie Boy’s emotions ran deeper than casting a romantic spe

The Milwaukee Journal – Jan 28, 1945 Unveiling  DUFFY’S TAVERN “ DUFFY’S TAVERN , where the elite meet to eat, Archie the manager speaking . . .” That’s Ed Gardner, Archie himself, who has got himself and his tavern into the movies after winning nation-wide laughter as a radio comedian (7:30 p. m. Fridays, WTMJ) Gardner is a former WPA worker who mangled English so intelligently that the radio industry figured he really was worth $5,000 a week. Hollywood raised the ante so the tavern, with its characters and free lunch, is now before the cameras at Paramount. Everybody from the radio show is there except Duffy himself, the disembodied voice who calls Archie on the phone. And it includes Clifton Finnegan, the well known moron; Eddie, the waiter, and the enchanting Miss Duffy herself. To give the hangout a little style, Paramount has chipped in with Bing Crosby and the four Crosby kids, Dorothy Lamour , Veronica Lake, Eddie Bracken , Victor Moore, Barry Sul

Fitch Drops ‘ Rogue ’; Harris-Faye Seg To Fill Daley Spot HOLLYWOOD , July 27, -- Fitch Company this week revealed intentions to drop Rogue’s Gallery , mystery seg, at end of current summer fill-in on NBC . Hair tonic company is giving Dick Powell stanza the go-by to concentrate on new Phil Harris-Alice Faye show which takes over the former Cass Daley regular slot. Harris-Faye show is to be given top-drawer promotion and dough. Rogue , which s witches to NBC from a permanent MBS-Sponsored slot, meanwhile is being peddled by MCA with Texaco and other sponsors interested.

The Milwaukee Journal – Aug 3, 1941 “You’re hard man, McGee!” That line made famous the character of Gildersleeve , Fibber McGee ’s “little chum” next door, and now has given Gildersleeve ’s creator, Harold Peary (above), his own show on NBC, opening Aug. 24 McGee’s ‘Little Chum’ Leaves Wistful Vista THROCKMORTON P. GILDERsleeve, Fibber McGee and Molly ’s chum, who is known as Harold Peary to his intimates will be starred on his own program. “ The Great Gildersleeve ,” beginning Sunday, Aug 31, over NBC. In making this move, Perry, creator at the Gildersleeve character on the “ Fibber McGee and Molly ” show, will devote full time to his own program Gildersleeve will be replaced on the McGee’s program by Gale Gordon . It is believed that his marks the first time a character conceived on a radio program has been transplanted as the star of his own show. The tremendous fan following built up by the character of Gildersleeve is responsible for this new program.

Monday Night COMES TO LIFE Fibber McGee takes a simple shortcut to change his Monday broadcasting period to 9 o’clock Eastern, 8 o’clock Central Standard Time, NBC . Thus, listeners get a more convenient hour, and he gets what he usually gets—the works. “I’ll tell you a show everybody’s listening to in Hollywood—it’s Fibber McGee and Molly .” Reporters caught this from Jack Benny , star of NBC ’s Sunday night Jell-O program, the other day in Chicago enroute from Hollywood to New York. One hundred weeks ago, sponsored by Johnson’s Wax, this new radio comedy team came strolling down the airlanes. Amazingly soon they became required hearing to millions of Monday night radio listeners. Without benefit of intensive Hollywood fanfare or Broadway ballyhoo, Fibber McGee and Molly have become firmly—and fondly—intrenched in America’s receptive heart. “We’ll have to tell you later” . . . this gay gaballero is, by his own admission, pretty hot stuff with smart quips and witty