JACK BENNY'S NIGHT OF TERROR BE SURE TO BUY RADIO GUIDE THIS WEEK AEA87BDC RADI<4?~ DOUBLES YOUR RADIO ENJOYMENT 731 PLYMOUTH CO UR T, CHI C AGO, ILl. So Wise, So Stupid I omitting the conventional CllS and NBC tags which formerly dotted One of the more glaring con­ our program pages. Full of edi­ tradictions in this complex system torial rectitude, we felt certain our of American broadcasting which streamline make-up was much gives to us so much and asks from easier to follow. us so little is the very wise man­ We were wrong. You have told ner in which it covers some broad­ us so in no uncertain tenns. That cast events and the very stupid noise you just heard was tae way in which it covers others. sound of us pulling our neck back The very wise way was demon· in (our ears in, too), and our face strated on Monday, September 12, is still red. So we are going back when Hitler spoke at the conclud­ to the old type of listing for all ing session of the Nazi Party Con­ but some of our more specialized gress in Germany. Here was a city editions. For the help your speech which might shake civili­ letters gave us, we give sincere zation itself. All of us wanled to thanks. Your sign-posts will be listen, but few of us understood back just as soon as our type-set­ German. The National Broadcast­ ting department can shoulder the ing Company solved our needs task of resetting the 50,000 lines admirably by putting the Fuehrer's involved. speech on the air, and by fading in an interpreter who gave us the Kate Smith's Story gist of those dynamite-packed Beginners in broadcasting will words. be happy to learn that Kate Smith Few men in the world can whip is about to give them some good crowds to a frenzy by the mere use of their voices. Of these few, advice. She has put the story of ber career and her climb to star· Hitler is the greatest. Uslening to him, we heard his mounting anger, dom into a book. It will be on sale we felt his vehemence and his October 12, and is to be called vitality. and at the same time we "Living In a Great Big Way." We can remember Kate Smith's compreher.ded something of what thing more than the ear tumult of the big games at our finger-tips. first public appearance on the New he said, thanks to the NBC inter­ three different announcers cover· We are completely capable of preter. It is easier, now, to under· ing the same plunge through doing our own selecting. York stage when, as the fat-girl stand how he has persuaded and lackle. comic in a Broadway musical comedy, she pranced up to the cajoled and scared a nation into We want no eastern "expert" More Sign-Posts footlights and did an amazing tap following him. telling us what game we should Several weeks ago we stuck dance. Though she sang, it was On the other hand, broadcasting hear or which will be the "big" out our neck. It was that day we her heavyweight stepping which moves now into its football season. battle of the week. We want all wrote brashly of our reasons for Once more the listener is threat· charmed the audience. Not long ened with the identical stupidity after that. heart-broken and un­ that has marred his pleasure in the happy because of the unfriendli­ past. Once more stations and net­ CONTENTS ness of other members of the cast. works are planning schedules she sought Ted Collins, then man­ which will find all manner of Haunted High Jinks 1 The Rad 10 Tattler '3 ager of a recording company. and senseless duplication confounding The Living Witness 2 The M arch of Music '4 asked him if he thought she would Highlights of This Week 4 A Strip Becomes a Script 16 Saturday afternoon audiences. ever amount to anything. Playbill: "Girl Alone" 6 Listening to Learn 18 Our position is simply this: If "If you will do what I say for Summer's Swan-Sol1g 8 Mr. Fairfax Knows All 20 the next two years and not argue one network carries a major foot­ Airialto Lowdown 9 On Short Waves 22 or ask questions why," Collins ball game, another network should Is There Too Much Swing? 10 Crossword Puzzle 23 told her, ''I'll make you the big­ not duplicate that service. We are Hollywood Showdown 11 This Week's Programs 24-40 aware of the prestige that is al­ A Bomb for Adelina Patti 12 Records of the Week 41 gest star in radio." leged to accrue to the network "You're the boss," she said. broadcasting the "big" game every M. l. ANNEN BERG, Publisher That was the beginning of one of Saturday, but in this country, so CURTIS MITCHELL. Editor the most successful partnerships in full of powerful colleges and their broadcasting, one which has made Vol. 7, No. 50 October I, 1938 teams, there are a half-dozen "big" each of them independently 1t'l'I" (;'11 Tu \1.11 /I IlplN I' '.1'.1 lIiftrof'l. \'"Iuw" \11', !)" \\. II games a week. lJ,t.I", I. l\l.i~. I'"tll t .....kh' In It.."al \" . Irl<" ,JI PI., in ",lh 1,ltItt. llllt,~ 111h wealthy, one which has never ~:.t .. r....la. N 1lJ,1'11~ n II~' ,t 11,.. 1' I .,:1'lrt'. I hi... n, 11111"',1. ~plllu." tl, 11I:t. I "I "al'f'tt I'~!l. ,\"t I.-I ltv 1'., I "nl'" Ikl••rlm,·n1. Il1h"". I."",',. .. _',t 1'1.... ", Itrr "",. been bound by anything more Certainly networks know there tt".l 1\1':'" lor it. al I· I, . \11 rl.hl t~ ....".1 \rUllI,Ih.,.... I' .. I<I"nt; 1..-<lTJ:. 011' ... J I.MI- .ral " ...n ..r; f 11111_ \lit ll. \"1 ... 1'...ld"'''I: ~:,l '1.1 Iln'llall. \1"",......, In .ltdlpi 1II.n" I,.,. are audiences for these other ma­ hnohl br eft'O'",p,"I..t1I" lI111p.-ol. lI·ad,) ce.1 .., I,~ .. flit trlu", Tl'1l ....nl t.... n"l'~ III h.- 1',,11 .. substantial than a handshake and ~I"" ~"".....h,t1,,,, tal lu 'he 1 ~ •• I I r II'" ",..nl,1 ,r II,.. P,tll \"..... I<'a" 1'. t,d jor clashes, yet how often do they tnlnn ol'J.....,U. Jt ,,·u. Jl All. ,,10 il,ti r.'. hi r".I.. ,..,.,II.t. l~ 1/0 complete trust in each other. '~.Illl; ' .... Y".'. '''.'11. 1t,lIllt I I' f" ,.1 "".....' o.dPr. lIJ-1 , l' "",,,. IN , wodI t1 ....Q ,,, "'... think of service before prestige? ,{ It"'JU (;, W" (lIlT flI"J H'Il1.t ub 'Uoe,' rl k. Kate's own story should be ex­ As football fans we want some- citing and inspiring reading. For one night, Jack Benny will Cecil B. DeMille (above) will forget his forthcoming Jell-O direct some new twists in an show to star on DeMille version old favorite. "Seven Keys to of "Seven Keys." Jack and Mrs. Baldpate," when Lux Radio The· (above) will play Benny, Mr•. ater presents the show over CBS The time: Monday night. September 26 a.re you getting on with the story?" The place: Lux Radio Theater Magee: "How am I getting on? Great The drama: "Seven Keys to Baldpate" heavens, man, to what sort of a place And- -the cast! What a cast! did you send me? Nothing but crooks, murderers, ghosts, pistol-shots, police­ ACK BENNY will take the role of men, and dead people walking about that many-voiced tragedian, that the halls. Hundreds of thousands o( Jgreatest liVing interpreter of the dollars, and keys and keys and keys! classics-Jack Benny! You win-I lose. Twenty-four hours! Mary Livingstone, that modern-day Why, I couldn't write a book in twenty­ Duse. that second Sarah Bernhardt. will four years in a place like this! My play-Mary Livingstone! God, what a night this has been'" And Cecil B. DeMille, giant of the cinema, producer, director and author, BUT all in vain. For comes now the de- impresario-in-ehief of the Lux Radio laughed. until they cried watching it­ locked front door of Baldpate and come nouement. The miscellaneous mao Theater. will undertake to create for even as they sat on the edges of their stamping in, shaking the snow from rauders who've driven Magee into the the radio audience the difficult char­ seats wondering what in the world their clothes and swinging their arms purple-fringed dithers aren't real at all, acter of-Cecil B. DeMille! could happen next. to get a measure of warmth back into it seems-they're only stage actors, a It all sounds a little bit wacky. and Basis of the fantastic "Baldpate" plot their blood. There is a girl newspaper whole company of them, brought from no wonder. "Seven Keys to Baldpate," -it has nothing to do with men who've reporter. a confessed. woman black· New York by Bentley just as a joke! a standard classic in every theatrical lost their hair, incidentally-is a wager, mailer, a notoriously dishonest politi­ Nor is that all. The audience is still company's repertory since the Septem­ a bet between a writer, one Billy cian, a hermit. the president of a rail· staggering under the impact of that ber night in 1913 when the curtain Magee, and the owner of a summer road-in all, there are six of them, each revelation when the curtain falls on went up on it for the first time, has resort, one Bentley.