Radio mirror (Nov 1936-Apr 1937)

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Check Shade of unecK snaae oi i-i pip-h r-i Rarhel n "eni Powder Desired U *lesn U "acnei U Rachei AddressCity Idol of the Roaring Forties (Continued from page 19) as much for the profession as any group of people. "More than most," said Tommy Hyde when we talked to him. Hyde is an old timer, and one of the greatest dance instructors in America at the present time. He appeared on Fred's program, not because he wanted a chance in radio, but because Fred once did something vaudeville will never forget. Hyde is a rather small, dapper man in his middle fifties now — and making more money than you can shake a stick at as dance instructor for Ned Wayburn. Twenty years ago when Fred Allen first broke into vaudeville, he was making scads of money as one of the foremost minstrel men, and was teaching George White to dance. "Fred was a smart young man," he says, "Audacious. Afraid of nothing. When he decided to get himself a job, he realized that a well-known name would be an asset — and blandly took that of Freddy James, a great star, when he applied for a job on the Australia circuit. Why, it would be like taking W. C. Fields' name now to play Timbuctoo. THE thing he did down on the Australia ■ circuit is what attracted the attention of the whole entertainment world to him. Made him sort of a hero, right at the start. To understand it, you've got to have the background. "In those days, the Australians had a great little gag they pulled on American performers who came down on a three month contract. If they didn't like the Americans, they couldn't get rid of them, but they had a little trick that did the job. "We called their trick the Ozone Circuit, and there was no one who had ever beaten it. If an act was not an immediate hit it was booked for a week on one side of Australia, then a week in New Zealand, then a week on the other side of Australia. You'd get paid for your three weeks' work, but not for the six weeks of sailing between ports. On the Ozone Circuit, it would take a year to earn three-months' salary. "No matter how patient they were, Americans always quit when they saw it coming. Asked for their week's pay and their return tickets and sailed home. "But not Fred Allen! His first week was bad and he knew it. At the conclusion of his last performance, he went to the booking office and got what he expected — notice that his next theater would be in New Zealand, a mere matter of two weeks' sailing. Fred grunted. After looking at the agent a minute, he said, 'I'll be back,' and strode out. The booking agent apparently thought that this one was going to give up more easily than the rest, because he proceeded to get Fred's contract and return ticket out. However, when Fred returned a few minutes later, he didn't have his baggage with him. He was wearing a sailor's uniform and he said to the astounded agent. 'Might as well give me the rest o' my sailing orders now, matey.' "The agent gave up and booked Fred for three months solid, to get rid of him. It was a great victory for the Americans." Tommy Hyde chuckles when he tells that story. Just as all of vaudeville does. For Fred Allen, you see, is one of those rare mortals who is funniest when he is mad. When the average mortal can only sputter in impotent _ rage or unleash a right hook to the chin, Fred is, by some magic, always able to deliver a sarcastic wisecrack that makes his victim first squirm, then laugh in spite of himself, and finally do what Fred wants him to do. If Hamlet had been Fred Allen, he wouldn't have wasted a lot of time fretting over the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune." He'd have worked himself up into such a temper that "Hamlet" would have become the funniest comedy ever written, instead of the greatest tragedy. Jim Kelso, who has appeared on Town Hall Tonight, and whose sneezing act you may remember from 'way back, is another of those who reveres Fred for his acid method of setting things right. Kelso is a little more than forty years old, straight, blond, English in appearance. "We who have been around," he says, "think of Fred as the greatest man vaudeville ever turned out. We remember things like the time he showed up a tap dancer who used to get applause by making an American flag burst into all its glory at the end of his act. It was wartime, and of course people would applaud the flag, even if they hadn't liked the dancer's act. It made all the other actors sore to see this guy getting applause by a trick, but Fred was the only one who did anything about it. First he bet the dancer that he could get more and longer applause than the dancer could. We all hoped he'd win, but we didn't really think he could. "Fred did his usual act, but right at the end he unfurled first a picture of Abraham Lincoln, then a picture of George Washington, then one of Woodrow Wilson, who was president at the time — and finally, a bigger flag than the dancer's. The audience started clapping for Lincoln and kept clapping louder and louder with each new picture. Fred won the bet, of course, and a thousand entertainers got a laugh. "Once Fred pulled into a little Ohio town that had two theaters. One of them showed big stars, the other one little stars. Fred, of course, wanted to book himself into the big theater, but its manager had never heard of him, didn't know whether he was good or not, and didn't want to take a chance on engaging him. THAT didn't bother Fred. He went over to the small theater and got himself a job there, on the understanding that if he wasn't a success on his first performance he wouldn't give a second. "Fred was doing his ventriloquist act at that time. It included a dummy that had a tendency to fall apart every time it was supposed to say something. The whole act was crazy comedy — completely nutty, without any sense to it at all. "The audience in the small theater didn't understand that kind of comedy. They just sat and watched, and they didn't laugh and they didn't applaud — except for one man down in the front row who was practically rolling in the aisle, he was laughing so hard. "As Fred came off the stage the manager met him in the wings, shaking his head sadly. 'Sorry, Allen,' he said. 'You aren't going over here. My audience doesn't like you.' '"Oh, that's all right,' drawled Fred. 'I was just breaking my act in for the manager of the other theater. That was him doing all the laughing.' " Jim Kelso first met Fred Allen when they were both playing the Keith Circuit in the middle west. Fred was already famous then, among the members of his profession, and that was fifteen years ago. 84