Radio-TV mirror (July-Dec 1954)

won first prize — a cup which he sold for a quarter. His career had begun. Berle never forgot about the muff. He said, "You know how, in vaudeville, everyone wanted to play the Palace? I'd been there as a child, but that didn't count. Once, when we were having real tough going, I promised Mother, 'The first time I play the Palace, I'll make up for that muff. I'll buy you a mink coat.' " It happened, finally, in 1930. "The day I opened, I drew an advance of five hundred dollars to make the down payment and bought her that mink coat before the first show. Oh, it wasn't much of a mink. Cost me twenty-two hundred dollars, I believe. But it marked the turning point. From 1932 on, I was able to keep Mother in luxury." He gazed at the portrait fondly. "Mother loved furs, so I got all of them for her. Mink, ermine, Persian lamb. She had coats, scarves, stoles. That was the least I could do, to make up for the days when only her nerve kept us going. . . ." Milton Berle, the great story teller, was deep into a topic which delighted him, and to his telling he gave all the fervor of an on-camera performance. The recollections which ensued marked both highlights and crises in his life and in that of the remarkable Sarah Berlinger, the woman who became known as Sandra Berle. "She had to work as well as take care of the house and all us kids," he said. "My father was ill. Mother became a department store detective. I doubt if she ever made over seventy-five cents an hour and sometimes our whole dinner would consist of a nickel's worth of rice." The job had hazards. "When she caught a shoplifter, she not only had to haul him up to the office to get a confession, she also had to go search his living quarters to find other loot he might have stashed away. It wasn't ever easy and sometimes it was dangerous, for she would go alone into criminals' hangouts and dives." Her third job was getting Milton his start in show business. "She'd take me around to the booking agents," he said. "If I got an engagement, she was there with me, coaching, encouraging, leading the applause. Or, she'd take me clear over to Jersey to the film studios. You know I played the kid in 'The Perils of Pauline.' " Their poverty brought tough battles. "I remember the day they came for the piano. We couldn't pay the two dollars and a half a week. My mother told the man, 'The children need the piano to learn their music. If you take it, you'll have to take me, too.' Then she climbed on top of it and wouldn't budge. They didn't take the piano." Vaudeville bookings out-of-town demanded sacrifices. Said Milton, "One of my first big engagements was in Philadelphia. My partner, Elizabeth Kennedy, and I were in E. W. Wolfe's kiddie acts. We stayed in a ratty rooming house around the corner from the theater. My mother went out and bought two oranges, two slices of bread, two eggs and a can of Sterno to cook them. The food was for Elizabeth and me. She said she wasn't hungry." Shortly, they were touring the country. Sometimes the bookings were good, sometimes they were bad, but both Sandra and Milton Berle were learning every facet of show business. It was knowledge both were to use later to make his show the nation's first big television hit. Only once did he ever see his mother's iron nerve break. "It was 1921, and we were making the long jump from Cincinnati to Memphis. . The incredible thing happened. Mother, the v store detective, wise to the ways of grifters, had her own pocket picked. Someone slashed her purse and stole both money and train tickets. She had us all on the train — my sister, Elizabeth Kennedy, and 82 me — when she discovered it. She was frantic for fear we'd be put off and stranded in some small town. She started to sob. "Then I'll never forget. A stranger — he turned out to be Mr. Henry Halle, a member of the Cleveland department-store family — came over to ask what was the matter. He told Mother not to worry. He advanced money to pay our fares and, when we arrived in Memphis, he called the Chiska Hotel to arrange for our rooms. He even invited us out to his estate, Oak Hall. We've remained friends ever since." Throughout the long climb upward, from dismal little theaters to Milton's ranking spot as "Mr. Television," Sandra Berle remained her son's confidante, critic and one-woman claque. Milton quotes a familiar show business saying: "Managers insisted that Mother, out in the audience didn't laugh louder than anyone else when I told a joke, she just laughed longer." Significantly, in that afternoon of affectionate recollection, he did not quote its counterpart — that Sandra Berle was the only one who has ever seen Milton cry, and that she saw it happen more frequently than one would imagine. For the top, as well as the bottom, has held turbulence and travail for him. Even at the pinnacle of success, his personal life was not happy. Twice he was married to and divorced from Joyce Mathews. At their final parting, Miss Mathews retained custody of Vicki, but Milton was granted unlimited visiting privileges. Today, they are on amicable terms. Only once, and then only obliquely, did he refer to the distressing period when they separated. "Times when I got myself into some real jam, Mother would talk things out with me, not on a parental basis, but in a man-to-man sort of way. There never was anything I couldn't tell her." Sandra Berle's professional advice also was dependable. Said Milton, "Mother knew when the time came that we should have changed the show. I'd taken my original television format directly from vaudeville, but even in vaudeville I used to revise my act completely, every two months. "Mother favored making a change during the 1950 season when we were right at the top. She recognized that the shock treatment I used no longer was effective. The surprise was gone. Besides that, television audiences were also changing. To say that the average viewer had the mind of an eleven-year-old was totally wrong. Rather, it's the four-year-old today who has the mind an eleven-year-old once had. People are wiser, sharper, than they have ever been before. "Mother realized that. She also recognized the challenge of a change. And she:knew its dangers." What happened when the old format was retained became television's first major upset. The Berle rating December TV RADIO MIRROR At your newsstand NOVEMBER 9 Get your copy early Cast your ballot for your favorite RADIO and TV STARS of 1 954 dropped from number one to a bad twentieth. Milton met that crisis by bringing in the brilliant Goodman Ace to captain a team of excellent writers, and together they developed the "story-line" format. But, while this was going on, it became the habit with critics to take pot shots at Berle. Again, his mother's loyalty was important. Milton said, "She knew it hurt when the very ones who had complained about my former way of piling gag on gag panned the new show by saying the old Berle had been funnier. She took the sting out of it by reminding me that, through our tours, we knew about the world beyond Broadway and that those viewers were the people who counted. She made me see that, if you worry about what the boys say in Lindy's, you're cooked. "Mother knew we'd get back to the top again. Ruth knew it, too." He shrugged as though to toss the weight of those days off his shoulders. In a happier vein, he continued, "Mother loved Ruth. And I think I fell in love the moment I met her." It was October 7, 1951, that lovely, darkhaired, serene Ruth Cosgrove came into Milton's life. She had seen one of his rehearsals and had been appalled at his driving pace. She met him later at a party and was charmed by his pleasant manner. The legend has it that Milton, the funny man, was so taken with her that he had no quick quips. He is supposed to have said only, "How do you do?" and "May I take you to dinner?" Milton himself neither confirms nor denies the story, but explains, "I'm never 'on,' to use the show business term, when I'm at a party. Then I'm a guest, not an entertainer." Ruth and Milton went together for more than two years, marrying on December 9, 1953. During this long courtship, their intentions became a favorite topic for speculation by the boys along Broadway. With a grin, Milton recalled, "Sure I know that at Lindy's they were laying eight to five against our marriage, but you know the way those guys are — anything for a bet." More seriously, he explains, "But Ruth and I never had any doubts about what we intended to do. Right after I met her, I wrote a song titled, 'If I Knew You Were There,' and that about said it. For us, the only problem was when. We wanted to plan so that we'd have some time together without all the demands of the show. Time that belonged to us." Such time was not easily attained. So many things demanded his attention. So many people had claims on his interest. Wisely, Ruth found the patience to let his work come first. Milton confides, "I can tell you now that we had set an earlier date. In March, 1953, we decided we would be married as soon as the show went off the air for the summer." Fate intervened. "Mother chipped the bone in her ankle. We knew she'd never be happy going to our wedding reception in a wheel chair. She'd want to dance around, be the life of the party, and that's what we wanted, too." Postponing the wedding until Mrs. Berle recovered put them right into the start of a new season. Again they had to scheme for a break. Milton said, "I had three weeks' vacation at Christmas time. We set the date right after the last show. That let us go to Florida for our honeymoon." He paused reflectively. "You know, it's remarkable that at my age I should finally find a girl like Ruth. A girl who understands me and who understands this business. She knows that when I've finished a show I can't just go home and go to bed. I'm tense and it takes time to unwind." He also recognized that such "unwind