Radio stars (Oct 1938)

RADIO STARS THE TEN MOST UNUSUAL PEOPLE IN RADIO (Continued from page 21) to vivid colors . . . and perhaps scarlet is just the high note your wardrobe needs ... or green ... or dashing blue. Rit offers you dozens of sparkling, flattering shades that are fun to wear, never look "dyed". Rit's amazing new formula (latest patent 1936) contains "neomerpin" that gives you fast colors without boiling! So much easier — YOU'LL 'DYE' LAUGHING. BLONDES! Keep Hair Golden With New Shampoo! Bring out the full, radiant loveliness of blonde hair with NEW BLONDEX, the Shampoo and Special Golden Rinse that keens it lighter, lovelier, that gives it the lu-trou,, golden sheen— the alluring highhght, that can make Monde hair so attractive. Try BLO.N DKX today. Costs but a few cents to use and is absolutely safe. New combination package — shampoo with separate rinse — sold at \11 stores. 52 That Toscanini takes his radio appearances seriously, that his interest in bringing his music to the airwaves is tremendous, is demonstrated by the great anticipation he showed while his first concert was almost a year off. After agreeing to broadcast, Toscanini lay awake for hours that night, unable to sleep. Finally he awoke his wife, and said : "Carla . . . what shall I play on my first program?" THE KIDOODLERS: It may seem to be going somewhat from the sublime to the ridiculous, but we give you, next, The Kidoodlers, unusual among radio personalities. The Kidoodlers, of course, are four young men, not one, but their aggregate instrumentation is well over a hundred ; several more than Signor Toscanini's orchestra. And the total cost is $97.21 ! Certainly unusual among singing foursomes, the Kidoodlers perform entirely upon toy instruments, with the exception of Bill Remington's guitar. The tiny fiddle Paul Cordner plays cost $5.00; redheaded Bill Kearns' toy marimba was $10.00 and his set of toy bells was $6.20. Eddie Lewis' toy xylophone was $6.00 and their "Trombonoodle" cost $2.57 to build from copper tubing and a trombone mute. It gives a "wah-wah" sound when sung into. These are the most costly of the Kidoodlers' instruments. The rest came from dime stores, toy shops and rummage sales. They pay fifty cents for their pianos ! And from this conglomeration of rattles, whistles, ocarinas and toy fifes, combined with their voices and clever arrangements, the Kidoodlers produce music that delights grownups as well as children. They have achieved the near-impossible in presenting not only something distinctly different but at the same time highly entertaining. Their weird instrumentation came about when the four, all previously members of more orthodox singing groups, began singing together in a hotel room, for fun, to Remington's guitar. The others, to keep busy, began beating out rhythms on table tops, crockery and drinking glasses. The next session the boys showed up with a kazoo and a megaphone ; then a toy fiddle and a dime horn were added. It sounded pretty good to them — and from that grew the present setup of toy instruments that clutters three three-tiered stands. Many of their instruments they've made themselves, like the "Trombonoodle". There's the "Kadoofus", which is a saxophone reed stuck in the end of a doll bedpost and sounds like a cross between a kazoo and a bagpipe, and a rhythm instrument called the "Cocanoodle" which is four hollow coconut shells mounted on a sounding board. They had to hollow out fifteen nuts to find four in pitch. There would have been five, but someone ate the "C" Cocanoodle. With most quartets singing either like the Rhythm Boys' scat rhythms, or imitating the Mills Brothers' effects, the Kidoodlers rate high for bringing a different musical group to the air. And radio listeners, as well as fans of the animated movie cartoons for which they have helped produce sound effects, seem to agree that they are unusual. FRED ALLEN: One of radio's leading comedians, Fred Allen's claim to fame rests on more than the fact that he has consistently stayed among the top-notchers in both salary and popularity. Last January — on New Year's Eve — Allen was in a train speeding across the Kansas plains, returning East from Hollywood where he had been making a movie. Portland Hoffa, Mrs. Allen in private life, was playing Bridge in a compartment with some friends. And while most of the world was making whoopee to celebrate the arrival of the New Year, as Times Square in New York filled with a milling crowd of people and drinking and gaiety ran riot, Fred Allen was in his compartment writing script for his radio show. "He came in once," Portland says, "while we were playing, about ten minutes to twelve, yelled 'Hooray' a couple of times and, twelve seconds after midnight, he was back at work on his script." The fact that Allen is the only big-time comedian to prepare all his own material is unusual enough in itself. He's tried working with gagmen and comedy writers but has always wound up doing the script himself, and doing it with a thoroughness and painstaking care that is probably a large part of the secret of his consistently amusing broadcasts. That, too, is probably why the Allen type of humor is distinctly his own, running less to the straight "gag" comedy, which might be handled by any good comedian, and more to the sly, homely snappers that have become identified with Town Hall Tonight. Everything about Fred Allen, however, is unusual and belies the highly paid entertainer. For one who has been a star on the air longer than most, and who was a big name in the theatre before that, Fred Allen suggests nothing of Broadway. Nothing in his dress, looks or life suggests the Broadway atmosphere, the wise-cracker or the big shot. Fred looks more like a small-town businessman, his drawl suggests the group around the cracker barrel, and his social life makes a small-town spinster seem like a butterfly. In the space of one year, Fred and Portland stepped out socially, by actual count, twice ! On both occasions it was to visit Arthur Mason, an old friend, and there they sat around talking until early morning. Once Allen went out to a fight. Yet he's probably one of the best-liked personalities of stage and radio. A great deal of that might be traced to the fact that swank or affectation is totally absent from the Allen makeup. While