Golden Radio Days...

That was our first panel: Bob Loudon, who had started with CBS in 1946, playing a hodge-podge of various clips of shows and songs on cassette tape. :) Strangely enough he started with a Christmas eve wish from Glenn Miller... and then played Jack Benny (when he meets Mary Livingstone... never heard that one before and it was a hoot! ...(to impress her) "When you're with me, money doesn't mean a thing! ...Hey Mister! Here's your penny change.") There was a clip with very corny jokes from Inner Sanctum Mysteries, a fistfight from Gunsmoke, Frank Sinatra singing "Pistol Packin' Momma" on a hit parade special, and a series of bloopers (although childish, they do mention our favorite city: an announcer asks a contestant where she works: "I work at the Pittsburgh Natural Gas Company; over 90% of the people in Pittsburgh have gas.") And to finish it off he played a sketch between Bing and Bob: Beethoven writing a swinging symphony gets a visit from Mozart and they both talk in very faky German accents.

Next, and as a special treat, Leonard Smith (Stretch Snodgrass) in his first appearance at any convention and Gloria McMillan (Harriet Conklin), one of the Enthusiast's regulars, were interviewed together about how they started and what they've done and what it was like working on Our Miss Brooks. They both started very young (Gloria at 6 - from Portland, OR! - and Leonard - from Chicago - at 4 yrs old) singing for various productions before their families moved them to LA. They both thought the world of Eve Arden, describing her as "a great lady" and "generous and kind" without a second's thought. Harriet... I mean Gloria... said she was her mentor and a very close friend, advising her about which boys she should date and just taking care of her in general. Gloria also said that her favorite memories of Eve were not from Miss Brooks... but from later on, after she had started her family. Eve invited (more like insisted) that Gloria join her in Seattle to perform dinner theater together. She said it was the time of her life. Leonard recalled his fondest memories as the cast getting together to play charades, and how it struck him what great actors they were. He also mentioned that Gale Gordon was so good at projection that John Barrymore called him better than anyone on Broadway... and that during rehearsals he would make the walls shake with a resounding (and familiar) "MISS BROOKS!!!!" lol! Gloria said she has absolutely no regrets about her career. She currently teaches acting and dancing to children with her husband in California and envies herself at the fun she has. :) Leonard joined the Air Force during the Korean War, envisioning flying on aircraft, but ending up emptying bed pans at a hospital. :( After his enlistment he became a sportscaster for many years and then got an advanced degree from a religious university and (ironically, from Stretch's standpoint) became an English teacher for over twenty years. It was a wonderful, interesting interview, and was very close to being the highlight of the day!

Then interspersed with lunch were three radio plays (gosh, this has been a fun day!). Like last year, they had a segment of the "I Remember Mama" series with "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn"... where Rosemary Rice reprised her role as "Katrin" in an 1947 episode where she falls in love. Very sweet, but so many sad things happen, that it's, you know... sad. Then there was "The Twilight Zone" in an episode where a Librarian named Romney Wordsworth is deemed obsolete by an oppressive, Big Brother-type government that thought Hitler was a pansy. It was very heavy-handed about truth, democracy, how everyone faces death and the existence of God. Gracious! And this was entertainment! :) And then a much lighter show, a 1948 episode of "The Aldrich Family" where the boys find themselves engaged to girls in town and how they try to escape. I loved the Jello song that the entire cast sang! So funny!

Next we got to meet Norman Corwin himself! At 100 years old this year, I couldn't believe that he was up for talking to a crowd like us! And not only up to it was he, but he complimented us to no end, saying this was the best group of radio enthusiasts he knows of. He also shared with us what a friend told him what living in Seattle was like: "It's like being married to a beautiful woman; except she's sick ten months of the year. But she's very beautiful all twelve." LOL! He was very distressed at the state of radio right now, and the state of the world in general, but he had so many things to talk of. He started out as a newspaper man in the 1930's and he said radio sort of chose him. It was the way to go. And then he got into what he is famous for... the rousing and influential programs he wrote for National Public Radio.

Directly after this, we were given a fabulous performance of "Untitled", written by Corwin in 1944, following the story of a PFC Henry Peters who was killed at 26 yrs old. It had interviews with people who knew him along with a narrator who ended up being Henry in the end, saying that it was hard to leave a mother at the window and a girl in tears at the railroad, but that if freedom really was preserved, then it was worth it. My eyes were not completely dry at the end.

There was another interview with a sportscaster after this, but I was so worn out, and up and excited for so long that I blinked out a little as I sat listening. And then there was a dinner break. Getting out of the building for an hour was a good thing! And the booth at Panera Bread was so comfortable!

Upon returning at 7 pm, there was the "Screen Guild Theater" with Jack Benny and Joan Crawford (Chuck McCann and Gloria McMillan). I loved Jack's line to Joan: "Fan?! I'm practically a windmill!" Chuck was a close friend of the late Eddie Carroll, and dedicated the performance to him. He did a magnificent job at sounding like Jack too. Judy Garland also appeared (Kate McKnight, who did a darned good job of singing like Judy) and sang the song I saw her sing on the "That's Entertainment" with Emma! The "You Made Me Love You" song about "Mr. Gable". :)

The premiere event today was the recreation of Our Miss Brooks. Everyone was a little tired and put out at the schedule being so out of wack (and late), but they did alright. It was very different though; the fact that Eve Arden wasn't there had a big impact. She can make almost anything sound funny because she's Eve Arden. Her stand-in was no Eve Arden, but seeing and hearing Gloria and Leonard in their original roles was well worth it.

They did the episode I listened to last summer in San Diego, the one where Walter and Stretch fight over Harriet. Somehow the ending got messed up though because it wasn't funny. I'll have to go back and listen to it... Oh! and the lady who played Connie's housekeeper, Mrs. Davis, she was PERFECT! :)

By this time it was much later than when they wanted to end, but they did the episode of "Six Shooter" with Jimmy Stewart anyway. Jimmy was played by Jack Benny, if that makes any sense. :) I was very impressed with Mr. McCann's vocal abilities! It was like having my hero before me! :) And as an added bonus for those few of us who stayed for this final performance, they started in the middle of a Fibber McGee & Molly episode, as if we had tuned in half-way through! And as a running joke during Six Shooter, the sound effects team only had 3 half-coconut shells with which to create a posse! When proving everyone else wrong, Jimmy said, "That's the most unhappiest posse I've ever seen riding two horses."

What a day!
Jp