Summary: clickhere Visit the Radio America Store web site.Buy your 50 mp3 for &5.00 Fred Allen hated television. Allen was a radio comedian for nearly two decades who, as early as 1936, had a weekly radio audience of about 20 million. When he visited The Jack Benny Show to continue their long running comedy feud, they had the largest audience in the history of radio, only to be later outdone by President Franklin Roosevelt during a Fireside Chat. The writer Herman Wouk said that Allen was the best comic writer in radio. His humor was literate, urbane, intelligent, and contemporary. Allen came to radio from vaudeville where he performed as a juggler. He was primarily self-educated and was extraordinarily well read. Allen's world of radio was highly competitive and commercial, just as TV would be many years later. He wrote most of the material for his weekly shows himself, usually working 12 hour days, 6 days a week. Most comedians, like Bob Hope, had an office filled with writers, but Allen used only a few assistants in writing his comedy. And some of these assistants went on to have successful careers in literature and comedy, such as Herman Wouk author of The Caine Mutiny and The Winds of War, and Nat Hiken who created Phil Silver's The Phil Silvers Show for TV. Allen's program was imbued with literate, verbal slapstick. He had ethnic comedy routines in Allen's Alley, appearances by celebrities such as Alfred Hitchcock, musical numbers with talent from the likes of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein, and social commentaries on every conceivable subject, especially criticisms of the advertising and radio industry.
