Potrzebie
Saturday, March 20, 2010
  Mickey at the microphone

In 1938, Walt Disney had his own NBC musical variety radio series, The Mickey Mouse Theater of the Air. Sponsored by Pepsodent with a weekly budget of $10,000 to $12,000, it was broadcast from the Disney Little Theater on the RKO lot, airing on Sunday afternoons from January 2 to May 21, 1938. Disney was both the host and the voice of Mickey Mouse, along with Donald Duck (Clarence Nash), Goofy (Stuart Buchanan), Clarabelle Cow (Florence Gill) and Minnie Mouse (Thelma Boardman). Scripted by comedy writer Bill Demling and radio actor Eddie Holden, the series also featured Old King Cole (Billy Bletcher), Clara Cluck (Florence Gill) and other Disney characters. Others heard on the series were Mel Blanc and Walter Tetley (later famed as nephew Leroy on The Great Gildersleeve and grocery boy Julius on The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show).

The opening theme was "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?", and the Felix Mills Orchestra (with 33 musicians) supplied the music. Also heard was Donald Duck's Swing Band and Donald Duck's Webfoot Sextet (with cowbells, bottles, a car horn and a meat grinder creating Spike Jones-like effects), plus a 12-voice female choir (with four members who supplied the whistling for Minnie Mouse's Woodland Bird Choir) and an eight-voice male choir. John Hiestan was the announcer. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs opened February 4, 1938, and this radio series was created to promote the film. So after the debut "Robin Hood" episode, "Snow White Day" was heard January 9. The 20 episodes included "Ancient China," "Sleeping Beauty," "Who Killed Cock Robin?" and "William Tell".

Click below to hear seven episodes, beginning with ''Snow White", followed by "Mother Goose Land," "Cinderella," "King Neptune" (with Bea Benaderet as Miriam the Mermaid), "The Pied Piper" (with Hans Conried), "The Old Woman in the Shoe" and "Old MacDonald" (with Cliff Arquette in the title role and Mel Blanc as the hiccuping farmer's daughter). From the fourth episode on, the voice of Mickey was not Disney but was supplied by comedian Joe Twerp. And when Walt was too busy to host, he was impersonated by announcer Hiestan!
http://archive.org/details/MickeyMouseTheateroftheAir

When I was a child, I regularly bought three magazines, Dell's 1000 Jokes (edited by Bill Yates), Radio Mirror (which later became Radio and Television Mirror and then TV Radio Mirror) and Radio Best (in a large bedsheet size, as I recall). In the 1920s, MacFadden published Radio Stories. During the 1930s, listeners could choose between Radioland, Radio Mirror, Radio Guide and Radio Stars.  The Radio Mirror at top is the April 1938 issue. The Radio Best here is dated April 1948.

The monthly radio magazines made it possible to see what the radio performers looked like. But their program listings were frustrating because the magazines went to the printer so far in advance, they could not list specific episodes. General listings in magazines just could not compare with the daily newspaper radio listings, and some newspapers ran entire pages about radio with photos, columns, features and extensive listings.

Because Walter Annenberg published newspapers, he was aware that daily radio logs brought many readers, so in the early 1940s he did publish a weekly, Movie-Radio Guide, with a 21-page program guide (just titles, but it did give playlists on some classical music programs). It even included a short wave page with "War News in English" (times and stations in Mexico City, Berlin and many other cities) and "Programs for Our Troops Overseas". ("Clip out this column and send it to a soldier friend abroad.") By early 1943, he gave it up and went to a monthly schedule, but a decade later, this weekly magazine became the forerunner of TV Guide, which Annenberg started in 1953.

Labels: , , , ,

 
Comments: Post a Comment



<< Home
Masquerade of the albino axolotls

My Photo
Name:

is the editor of Against the Grain: Mad Artist Wallace Wood (2003), reviewed by Paul Gravett.

ARCHIVES
October 2005 / November 2005 / December 2005 / January 2006 / February 2006 / March 2006 / April 2006 / May 2006 / June 2006 / July 2006 / August 2006 / September 2006 / October 2006 / November 2006 / December 2006 / January 2007 / February 2007 / March 2007 / April 2007 / May 2007 / June 2007 / July 2007 / August 2007 / September 2007 / October 2007 / November 2007 / December 2007 / January 2008 / February 2008 / March 2008 / April 2008 / May 2008 / June 2008 / July 2008 / August 2008 / September 2008 / October 2008 / November 2008 / December 2008 / January 2009 / February 2009 / March 2009 / April 2009 / May 2009 / June 2009 / July 2009 / August 2009 / September 2009 / October 2009 / November 2009 / December 2009 / January 2010 / February 2010 / March 2010 / April 2010 / May 2010 / June 2010 / July 2010 / August 2010 / September 2010 / October 2010 / November 2010 / December 2010 / January 2011 / February 2011 / March 2011 / April 2011 / May 2011 / June 2011 / July 2011 / August 2011 / September 2011 / October 2011 / November 2011 / December 2011 / January 2012 / February 2012 / March 2012 / April 2012 / May 2012 / June 2012 / July 2012 / September 2012 / October 2012 / November 2012 / December 2012 / January 2013 / February 2013 / March 2013 / April 2013 / May 2013 / June 2013 / July 2013 / August 2013 / September 2013 / October 2013 / December 2013 /


Powered by Blogger