So You Want to Be on the Radio

What passed for humor in the '40s is quite different than today's silliness and nowhere is this more evident than in some of these Joe McDoake comedy shorts that people thought were so hilariously funny in the '40s.

This one attempts to spoof a couple who are crazy about radio quiz shows and get called frequently to participate in them. McDoake (GEORGE O'HANLON) makes a fool of himself over and over again, failing even to answer simple questions like "Who wrote 'The Last of the Mohicans' by James Fenimore Cooper?", and fluffing the answer while his exasperated wife can't believe how dumb he is. Very funny, sure.

O'Hanlon is reasonably okay as a comedian but the script is so foolish, it's sometimes painful to watch. These sort of comedy shorts drew chuckles in the '40s as fillers between double features, but everything about the radio era is so dated today that it all seems even worse than it is. Can't give this a good recommendation, even to nostalgia buffs.

..............BUT THEN AGAIN, none are examples of that virtue. But we must consider both the genre, the sub-genre and the purpose for which the comedies were intended. We also should factor in the general successes of episodes, the longevity of the series and the recognition attributed to its star by the movie going audience.

WE MUST NEVER make any "Apples to Oranges" comparisons, lest we prejudice the chance of any objectivity.

IN ACTUALITY, ONE of these JOE Mc DOAKES comedies is a one reel, short cut to laughs; designed to be easily added to any theatre's programming. Having just half of the running time of the usual comedy short, this flexibility of schedule manipulation renders it both an advantageous addition and yet heavy on the comic material in regards to the laughs per minute of film footage ratio. That's a criteria term that we just coined. (That means 'made up', Schultz!)

AS IS THE usual case, this short takes a close look at certain universally recognized human foibles. In this particular it is a tendency for us to substitute certain truly unimportant or artificial cultural phenomena in our way of life for that which is truly important and uncontrollable.

GOOD EXAMPLES OF these surrogate activities are professional sports, the daily newspapers' gossip columns and popular broadcast programming; be it on Radio or Television. Any psychologist, even among those ranked as being "amateurs", will agree that these areas of endeavor provide us with harmless substitution for that which is truly serious.

AS AN EXAMPLE please allow us to offer the following. If my Baseball Team (in this case being the Chicago White Sox) does not win the Pennant and has an otherwise horrendous season, life will still go on.

SO AS WE join Joe & Alice Mc Doakes (George Hanlon and Phyllis Coates), we find that they are ardent fans of radio quiz shows. Like so many of us, they seek diversion from the daily rat race by way of entering program related contests by submitting their telephone number in show related call in contests. As would be the case for anyone, they listen faithfully; both hoping and praying for successful fulfillment.

THIS IS WHERE the typical humor of Writer/Director Richard Bare and (uncredited)Writer & Star George O'Hanlon vigorously kick into high gear. Their wildly exaggerated lampoon of such popular game show and audience participation types as PEOPLE ARE FUNNY, DOUBLE OR NOTHING and TRUTH OR CONSEQUENES are presented in rapid succession. All are easily recognizable and quite enjoyable and (in spite of some others' opinions) very funny.

WHEN WE CONSIDER the evaluation and in the reviewing of this or any other subject, we must consider the particular film's classification. Ergo, both GONE WITH THE WIND and the 3 Stooges' PUNCH DRUNKS may receive high marks; but that's because they're not in competition with each other.

THEN AGAIN, ON a truly serious and sobering note, it is the likes of these simple. little and non-pretentious snippets of film that are most revealing in human frailties; such as greed, selfishness and lack of charity toward others, or neighbors in the Fellowship of Man.

ALTHOUGH WE DID enjoy this installment, it was definitely not one of the best in the series. Gee, this means that the production team was only human! (Is this allowed in Hollywood, good buddy Schultz?)

In this installment of the Joe McDoakes series (starring George O'Hanlon), Joe and his wife (Phyllis Coates) are amazingly lucky. During the short course of the film, they appear on three separate radio quiz shows! I could say more about what happens next, but I don't want to spoil the fun by telling you if they won or not or what they won--just watch it and see.

As the short played on Turner Classic Movies, my wife commented about how silly the film was--and I would agree. It was ridiculous--but also quite funny in a brainless, madcap way. My only negative comment is that in one portion, Joe is being tormented to the delight of the audience at the radio show. BUT, as they never describe what's happening, the people listening to the show at how would have no idea whatsoever what's occurring. This, oddly, is a relatively common cliché in movies involving radio--and is seen in other films such as "The Great American Broadcast".

Having previously seen So You Want to Be a Detective on YouTube and thinking it was only slightly funny, I found this other Joe McDoakes comedy short in the Related Videos section and found this one a little better. In this one, McDoakes (George O'Hanlon) and his wife (Phyllis Coates) are called to a radio quiz show in which Joe gets splashed with water or hit with pie on face every time his wife answers question wrong. (and how can she get any right when one of them asks to name all first 32 U.S. presidents!) They do get some consolation prizes among which is some tickets for another quiz show in which the host is so obvious about some clues, McDoakes seems a sure winner except...oh, watch the short. I think I liked this one better because there was more consistency in plot and characterization during the proceedings. And the way things twist at the turn of a dime was also very amusing. So on that note, I recommend So You Want to Be on the Radio.

Long before television and its plethora of game and quiz shows, radio had such shows. This 1948 short by Warner Brothers is a very good and funny spoof of the quiz and game shows that aired over radio before TV squeezed them out. Made in the series of Joe McDoakes, "So you want to," or "Behind the 8-ball" format, it stars George O'Hanlon in one of his many short comic roles. Phyllis Coates plays his wife, Alice; Fred Kelsey plays Senator Backtrack, and Jack Perrin plays the radio official.

One of the shows Joe tries to get on is called, "Aren't People Ridiculous." Joe says to Alice, "We can be as ridiculous as anyone else. Maybe even more so." The last show they get on is called "Double Up or Drop Dead."

What a great parody - years before some popular TV shows that would last for decades. And what laughs this provided. Here are the subjects from the blackboard on Double Up or Drop Dead. 1 - Mid Victorian Literature; 2 - Abyssinian Statesmen; 3 - Nuclear Fission; 4 - Einstein's Relativity; 5 - Social Habits of the Aborigines; 6 - Dynamic Tension; 7 - Girls; 8 - Protracted Physics.

This is a nice 10-minute short for some good laughs.