I was reading the thread on The Three Stooges and The Marx Brothers, and I got to wondering- radio was the major medium during the Stooges heyday. Did they ever try to do any work on radio? It’s not as ridiculous as it sounds. The Marx Brothers (Chico and Groucho) did Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel, and Harpo even made a guest appearance on Burns and Allen. Laurel and Hardy even did a little radio. The Stooges did enough verbal material in their act that it could have worked. The cartoony sound effects would even have allowed some of their slapstick to work. I have not run across anything before, but that doesn’t mean anything, really.
Yes, but only as guests, not a regular show.
I had never even ran across any guest appearances, and I have read a decent amount of stuff about old time radio.
My reference source is Moe Howard & The Three Stooges by Moe Howard.
Certainly.
Oh, a wise guy, eh?
The one that amazes me is that Edgar Bergen had a popular radio show.
Ventriloquism seems like the worst act for radio up to Howard Stern’s idea of having women strip on the radio.
wel;l, he was reportedly not really a great ventriloquist (you could see his lips move). It’s really a matter of voice and personalities.
He also did records, like this one:
http://bizarrerecords.com/wordpress/2010/edgar-bergen-with-charlie-mccarthy/
In fact, I learned ventriloquism from a Jimmy Nelson Danny O’Day record like that:
Heck, Jeff Dinham’s done radio/albums:
Edgar Bergen’s strength was not that he could speak without moving his lips (he was awful at that, in fact Charlie made fun of him for it), but his ability to switch back and forth between himself and his character, and have it seem like it really was two people talking to each other. Heck, I’ve listened to Bergen and McCarthy and thought, “Edgar Bergen isn’t very good…Charlie needs a funnier partner!” before realizing how stupid that was. He was an immensely talented voice actor. Jeff Dunham (whatever you think of his material) is very good at the same thing- he can have a conversation between himself and two different characters, in any combination he wants.
One advantage of radio for Bergen was that he could “leave the room” and have Charlie say things that Bergen wasn’t supposed to hear. You could even have Charlie and Mortimer discussing Bergen as though he wasn’t in the room.
Primarily, though, Bergen was funny. His technical ability didn’t matter since he made you laugh.