Mon Oct 03, 2016 7:04 pm
I'm a little late getting on this train, but characteristically have a couple thoughts to shout from the caboose.
I think there were many times when actors -- and scripts -- weren't there when ON THE AIR light went on. 40-some years ago, Tom Snyder had a terrific "Tomorrow" show with all guests from the golden age of radio -- Jim Backus, Mel Blanc, William Conrad and three or four others. The bulk of their reminiscing was about those times, and the steps they took to get through the next 15 minutes. When it was a missing player, they'd pull someone off the next show, someone trying to do two voices, etc. The bigger problem would be when the scripts ran out of pages with ten minutes still to go -- a clerical error! -- and they had to improvise as well as act. Did anyone else see this show (it was 1975, I think)? I'd love to get my fuzzy-headed recollections filled in!
It always seemed to me that although Rochester was in a subordinate position to Benny, it was he who really ran things, Benny thought he was the boss, but Rochester steered the best course. I'm not sure here, but wouldn't racial stereotyping serve to heighten the comedy? (Not that I'm advocating or excusing it.)
Also, during the height of their faux-feud, Fred Allen zinged Benny and Benny retorted: "You wouldn't have said that if my writers were here!"
Most of all, though, I always consider Benny to be the absolute trunk of the 20th Century comedy tree. So many comedians learned their comic timing from him -- silence, in every other sphere of radio and television, is poison -- and none bigger than Johnny Carson, who acknowledged flat-out that everything he knew he got from Benny. I'm sure there're some you can't trace back, but not many.
Thanks for letting this newbie pontificate all over the place!
--Harry