Radio varieties (Sept 1940-June 1941)

Cantor Looks at Radio "We need laughter as much as we need music, education and the news of the day/' says Cantor. "It is the oxygen tank to keep Americans alive today." VOUR INTERVIEW with Eddie Canter is set for the lunch hour. You are admitted to hi^ suite on the top floor of a midtown Manhattan hotel and directed to his bedroom. A faint, linimenty, locker room aroma catches up with you on the occasion of his decade in radio. Cantor extricates a tanned arm from the white sheet that envelopes him and motions you to a seat, just as his muscled masseur punches out a staccato run on the keyboard of his spine. Eddie Cantor caught in tlie act of "raiding the ice box" claims his steady diet of milk gives him most of his energy and is the beneficial all around drink in his house. as you enter and find your host stretched on a table taking his rub-down. You have come to get a story Page 10 "This is how I get my exercise, "Eddie tells you dolefully. "Between rehearsals and broadcasts and benefit shows you can never find time for the real thing." To start things off, you remind your host that in October, 1931, he began his radio career with the National Broadcasting Company when it occupied only a few floors of broadcasting space at 71 1 Fifth Avenue. Now that he is beginning his tenth year with NBC with his "Time to Smile" program, how does radio look in retrospect, especially in regard to comedy programs? Before the masseur can lay hands on another vertebra Cantor replies: "There have been changes. They were slow in coming, but the changes have been for the better. The quality of radio comedy is at a higher level now than at any period in radio's history. Puns, jokes and wheezes have passed out of the picture. In their place we have situations involving real people. We are making actors living persons instead of machines that spout jokes. Radio comedy is building characters, not caricatures, and ycu can give Jack Benny the credit for showing the way. He gave us real characters that every listener can recognize." The blond muscle man, with hands half closed, half slaps and half punches the comedian's well developed torso. Eddie's voice is about as steady as Jack Benny's in his old Maxwell, but there is no interruption in his train of thought. Resting his chin on his arm, useful as a shock absorber, he goes on! "Another change for the batter is the faster tempo of radio comedy. We're doing in a half hour now what seme programs used to do in an hour. We were the first, I believe, to set the style in this respect. We cut away nonessentials like extravagant introductions and buildups, which were auite the rage a few years ago. Listen, this will slay you. Do you know how we introduced Deanna Durbin for the first time? Don't faint. All we said was, 'Here's a 13-year-old girl with a very lovely voice.' The famous pop-eyes popped. He pondered this. In retrospect this seemed an incredulous in RADIO VARIETIES JANUARY