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EVUI
• JIMMY DURANTE SHOW • ED WYNN SHOW
Each of the Four Star Revue shows is differently designed, but it's doubtful that anyone really designs a Durante show, not even the Schnoz himself. His are a case of spontaneous combustion. The fellow who tears up the piano and throws his hat all over the set has the cameramen on the run, and it generally takes all five cameras to follow him around. Eddie Jackson, old-time buddy from the vaudeville days of Clayton, Jackson and Durante, teams with Jimmy for nostalgic bits, and as many as sixty performers have appeared on one Durante show. Like the other three comedians, Jimmy starts worrying about his next program the minute he walks off the current one. His problem is getting songs. Schnoz's verdict on TV: "Dat box? It's moider on my mater'al!"
The Wynn humor is built on "sight" gags, bizarre inventions, and intimate delivery that lets the audience in on the jokes, plus Ed's own contagious chuckle after he tells one. Even for first rehearsals he gets into the mood by wearing one of his fantastic hats, an outlandish coat, and a pair of ancient blue pants. Wynn keeps five writers busy, one or two more than the others use, but he's always the sixth. A minimum of three cameras cover all these Wednesday programs, with sometimes a fourth in the balcony and a fifth nosing through backstage. There are usually six dancers and four showgirls, but each comedian's show has its own group of girls and special choreography. Dancers rehearse forty hours. General rehearsals run about two weeks before telecast time.
• DANNY THOMAS SHOW • JACK CARSON SHOW
Your quartet of Wednesday night jesters includes a sadeyed Syrian who took the name Danny Thomas from the first names of two of his eight brothers. Danny mingles story telling, comedy sketches and musical numbers with sentimentalizing and philosophizing, in a way that sets him apart from the other three highly individual comics in this mid-week NBC-TV lineup. Like the other programs, however, Danny's has the help of some 400 workers, counting the scenic and costume designers, truckers, engineers, stage crew, props, make-up and wardrobe, musicians, cameramen, writers, script girl, directors, producers and performers. Pete Barnum, supervisor of production, sums up his job this way: "Where could you find four guys more wonderful to work with?"
It's natural for a Hollywood actor to think in terms of screen treatment, so that's what Jack Carson uses on his show. There are no curtains that part and close. The cameras cut from one scene to the next, just as it's done in the movies. This is situation comedy, with a complete new story every time, the same characters running through all. Jack, as the central character, is the big, wellmeaning guy who gets into as much trouble as if he went out looking for it. Regular cast includes March and Sweeney, Betty Kean, the Honey Brothers and Jack Norton. Technical problems are different from Hollywood's, such as lighting, which is more intense and less contrasting. Jack finds the lingo much alike, except that the movies' mike boom is a boom mike in TV!
The Four Star Revue is televised Wed., 8 P.M. EST, NBC-TV. Sponsored by Motorola, Norge and Pet Milk.
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