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The Old-Time Radio Digest!
Volume 2013 : Issue 24
A Part of the [removed]!
[removed]
ISSN: 1533-9289
Today's Topics:
Re:Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto [removed] [ Brent Pellegrini <brentpl@rocketmai ]
Naming names on Jack Benny Show [ jack and cathy french <otrpiano@ver ]
re: Jack Benny minutiae [ Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed]; ]
Re: Jack Benny intro [ "danhughes@[removed]" <danhughes@jun ]
Jack Benny minutia [ "Don A. Holshuh" <marathondon@[removed] ]
Re: Jack Benny minutiae [ Alan/Linda Bell <alanlinda43@yahoo. ]
Jack Benny [ A Joseph Ross <joe@[removed] ]
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Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:54:12 -0500
From: Brent Pellegrini <brentpl@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Re:Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto [removed]
X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: from multipart/alternative
X-Converted-To-Plain-Text: Alternative section used was text/plain
Van Cliburn died so I listened to Tchaikovsky piano concerto [removed] That is
what he played in 1958 when he "Jesse Owensed" the Russians at their own game.
The begininng sounded like a radio show theme I've heard in the past. First
Nighter? Lux? Can anyone refresh my memory?
*** This message was altered by the server, and may not appear ***
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Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:54:49 -0500
From: jack and cathy french <otrpiano@[removed];
To: OTRBB <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Naming names on Jack Benny Show
A Digester, who declined to sign his posting, is wondering why every cast
member is introduced by their name on the show, except Eddie Anderson, who is
called by his character, "Rochester."
That's pretty obvious, since everyone was called by their character name on
the show; [removed] Jack Benny played "Jack Benny." If Don Wilson had been
reciting real names instead of character names, he would have said, "Benjamin
Kubelsky, Sadye Marks, Owen Patrick McNulty, Edmund Lincoln Anderson, Jr.,
[removed]" But of course, everyone in the cast were merely introduced by their
character [removed](which usually was their professional name also.)
Jack French
Editor: RADIO RECALL
<[removed]>
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Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:55:59 -0500
From: Kermyt Anderson <kermyta@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: re: Jack Benny minutiae
radioaz@[removed] queried the listing of actors in the credits of the Jack
Benny show, noting that
Everybody gets listed by their
name except Eddie Anderson, he gets billed by the name of his character.
Actually they are all listed by their character names. However, most of them
used their character names when away from the mic (and camera) as well. Thus,
Benjamin Kubelsky played a character named Jack Benny, a character whose name
he used offstage as well. Ditto for Sadie Marks (Mary Livingstone) and Owen
Patrick Eugene McNulty (Dennis Day). Only Phil Harris and Don Wilson kept
their birth names when they went into show business. Eddie Anderson didn't go
by Rochester Van Jones in his private or non-Benny professional life, and he
is billed by his real name when he did movie and TV credits (often as Eddie
"Rochester" Anderson, I suppose because people didn't know who Eddie Anderson
was -- the same way Howard Duff was originally billed in films as "Howard
Duff Radio's Sam Spade"). But to my knowledge he never used Rochester van
Jones out in the real world.
There's an episode -- can't remember which one -- in which Mary flubs and
refers to Rochester by the actor's real name. And Jack corrects saying
something like "Mary, when you meet him in the street he's Mr. Anderson, but
on this show he's Rochester van Jones."
Cheers,
Kermyt
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Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:56:25 -0500
From: "danhughes@[removed]" <danhughes@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Re: Jack Benny intro
radioaz asks:
Don Wilson always introduced the cast by saying "starring Jack Benny, with
Mary Livingstone, Dennis Day, Rochester, Phil Harris and me, Don WIlson."
Everybody gets listed by their name except Eddie Anderson, he gets billed by
the name of his character. Anyone know why that was done?
Sure. He was giving ALL the character names! Rochester was the only one who
didn't use his real name as his character name.
---Dan
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Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:58:03 -0500
From: "Don A. Holshuh" <marathondon@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Jack Benny minutia
Hello,
Regarding the recent posting about the introduction of characters at
the beginning of the Jack Benny show. Each participant was indeed
introduced using their real name (of course, Mary Livingstone, famous
for her faux pas utterance of "Chiss sweeze", was actually Jack Benny's
wife,whose real name was Sadie Marks). Although it is pure conjecture
on my part, I believe that Eddie Anderson was introduced only as his
character, Rochester, in the same way that Sadie Marks was introduced
as Mary Livingstone. I know that I listened to a great many Jack Benny
programs before I realized that Mary Livingstone was indeed his wife. I
suspect that very few people knew that Rochester's real name was Eddie
Anderson. I recently read Joan Benny's (their adopted daughter)
semi-autobiographical book "Sunday Night at Seven-The Jack Benny
Story" in which she stated that it was not uncommon for people to ask
her about their butler, Rochester. She also mentioned that she was
often questioned about the "heavily guarded safe" in the basement. She
was surprised that so many people thought that what was portrayed on
the program was actually a representation of Jack Benny's home.
Don A. Holshuh
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Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2013 16:58:45 -0500
From: Alan/Linda Bell <alanlinda43@[removed];
To: Old Time Radio <[removed]@[removed];
Subject: Re: Jack Benny minutiae
Everybody gets listed by their
name except Eddie Anderson, he gets billed by the name of
his character. Anyone know why that was done?
Actually, that's not quite true. Mary Livingston is also the name of her
character. The only difference is that at some point, the former Sadie (Sadye
... or however she spelled it) Marx had her named legally changed to her
character's name. So the woman and the African-American are the only people
in the cast not using their own names. Hmmm.
Sadie/Mary had started earlier, playing some sort of swooning fan of Jack's
on an early version of the show. The character's name was Mary Livingstone.
And of course, Eddie Anderson was not given a name at all in his first
appearance, portraying a train porter who never heard of Albuquerque. It was
supposed to be a one-off but he was so funny that they decided to bring him
back, at first as other nameless characters, then finally as Jack's
butler/valet/whatever.
In fact, to be really picky, both Jack and Dennis Day are using stage names
that they eventually changed legally. As most of us know, Jack was Benjamin
Kubelsky and Dennis was Owen Patrick McNulty. So I guess you could say that
only Phil Harris and Don Wilson are actually using their own names. (Though I
just learned from Wiki-"I know everything"-pedia that Harris' first name was
Wonga! Wonga???)
AB
_________________
Alan/Linda Bell
Santa Rosa, CA
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Date: Fri, 1 Mar 2013 10:25:41 -0500
From: A Joseph Ross <joe@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject: Jack Benny
Date: Wed, 27 Feb 2013 13:20:11 -0500
From: <radioaz@[removed];
First, the theme strikes me as the comingling of two songs. The first few
bars sound like they come from George M. Cohan's "I'm a Yankee Doodle
Dandy." Then it segues smoothly into "Love in Bloom." Is that what it
actually was, or is there some other explanation for they way it sounds?
That's what it was. I believe that opening theme, which returns at the
end to "Yankee Doodle Dandy," was used starting with Lucky Strike's
sponsorship in the late 1940s. The closing theme was "Hooray For
Hollywood."
Second, at the beginning of the show ... Everybody gets listed by their
name except Eddie Anderson, he gets billed by the name of his character.
Anyone know why that was done?
The name Mary Livingstone (originally without the final e) started as
the name of a character, a fan from Plainfield, [removed], who appeared on
the show to read a poem. The character was played by Jack's wife, Sadie
Marks. The character's name took over and became her name, as the name
Rochester took over at least to the extent that he tended to be called
that off-stage. At least Eddie Anderson still was known by his original
name some of the time. Sadie Marks's name completely disappeared.
--
A. Joseph Ross, [removed]| 92 State Street| Suite 700| Boston, MA 02109-2004
[removed]|[removed]| [removed]
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End of [removed] Digest V2013 Issue #24
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