Jack Benny, 1894-1974: He Won Hearts Mostly by Making Fun of Himself

Source: http://www.manythings.org/voa/people

I'm Sarah Long. And I'm Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program PEOPLE IN AMERICA.

Today, we tell the story of Jack Benny. He was one of America's best-loved funnymen during the twentieth century.

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Jack Benny was one of the most famous names in show business for more than fifty years. He started as a serious musician, before he discovered he could make people laugh.

Jack Benny became famous nationwide in the nineteen thirties as a result of his weekly radio program. His programs were among the most popular on American radio, and later on television.

Jack Benny won the hearts of Americans by making fun of himself. He was known not as someone who said funny things, but as someone who said things in a funny way.

Jack Benny was born in Chicago, Illinois, on February fourteenth, eighteen ninety-four. His parents, Meyer and Emma Kubelsky, were religious Jews. They had moved to the United States from eastern Europe. They named their first child Benjamin.

Benjamin Kubelsky and his family lived in Waukeegan , Illinois. Benjamin was a quiet boy. For much of the time, his parents were busy working in his father's store. As a child, Benjamin, or Benny as his friends called him, learned to play the violin. Benny was such a good violin player that, for a time, he wanted to become a musician.

While in school, Benny got a job as a violin player with the Barrison Theater, the local vaudeville house. Vaudeville was the most popular form of show business in the United States in the early nineteen hundreds. Vaudeville shows presented short plays, singers, comedians who made people laugh and other acts.

Benny worked at the Barrison Theater -- sometimes during school hours. He left high school before completing his studies. The piano player for the theater was a former vaudeville performer named Cora Salisbury. For a short time, she and Benny formed their own performing act. Later, he and another piano player had their own act.

At first, Benny changed his name to Ben K. Benny. However, that name was similar to another actor who played a violin. So, he chose the name Jack Benny.

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The United States entered World War One in nineteen seventeen. Benny joined the Navy and reported to the Great Lakes Naval Station. He continued using his violin to perform for sailors at the naval station. In one show, he was chosen more for his funny jokes than for his skill with the violin. That experience made him believe that his future job was as a comedian, not in music.

After leaving the Navy, Benny returned to vaudeville. His performances won him considerable popularity during the nineteen twenties. He traveled across the country with other well-known performers, including the Marx Brothers.

In Nineteen Twenty-Seven, Benny married Sadie Marks, a sales girl from the May Company store in Los Angeles. Mrs. Benny soon became part of the traveling show. She used the name Mary Livingstone.

Jack Benny appeared in a few Hollywood films, but then left California and moved to New York. He had a leading part in the Broadway show, "Vanities."

Benny made his first appearance on radio in Nineteen Thirty-Two. He was invited to appear on a radio show presented by newspaper reporter Ed Sullivan. Benny opened with this announcement:

"Ladies and gentlemen, this is Jack Benny talking. There will be a short break while you say, who cares?"

However, many listeners did care. Within a short period, Benny had his own radio show. It continued for twenty-three years.

ANNOUNCER: "The Jack Benny Program, starring Jack Benny, with Mary Livingstone, Phil Harris, Rochester, Dennis Day, and yours truly, Don Wilson ... "

(MUSIC)

Jack Benny developed a show business personality that had all the qualities people dislike. He was known for being so stingy he refused to spend any of his money, unless forced to do so. He always was concerned about money. For example, he would put on a jeweler's glass to examine the diamond on a wealthy woman he had just met.

In another example, a robber points a gun at Benny.

(JACK BENNY PROGRAM)

ROBBER: "This is a stick-up."

BENNY: "Mr. , put down that gun."

ROBBER: "Shut up. I said this is a stick-up. Now, come on. Your money or your life."

(LAUGHTER)

ROBBER: "Look, bud. I said, your money or your life!"

BENNY: "I'm thinking it over."

(LAUGHTER / MUSIC)

On his shows, Jack Benny often spoke of his appearance, especially his baby blue eyes. As he grew older, he always claimed to be thirty-nine years old.

Benny was known as a comedian with great timing. He seemed to know the perfect time to tell a joke and when to remain silent. The way he looked at other actors and his use of body movements were world famous. He also was skilled at using his violin to make people laugh.

Jack Benny was one of the first comedians who was willing to let other people share some of the laughs. He rarely made jokes that hurt other people. Instead, he would let the other actors on the show tell jokes about him.

Many of the actors in Benny's show became almost as famous as he was. They would criticize Benny's refusal to replace his ancient automobile. They made fun of the pay telephone that he added to his house.

This is a telephone discussion between Benny and his trusted employee, Rochester.

BENNY: "Hello …"

ROCHESTER: "Hello, Mr. Benny. This is Rochester …"

(APPLAUSE)

BENNY: "Rochester, I'm in the middle of the program."

ROCHESTER: "I know, boss, but this is very important. The man from the life insurance company was here about that policy you're taking out and he asked me a lot of questions."

BENNY: "Well, I hope you answered them right."

ROCHESTER: "Oh, I did. When he asked me your height, I said five-foot-ten."

BENNY: "Uh, huh."

ROCHESTER: "Your weight, one-hundred-sixty-four."

BENNY: "Uh, huh."

ROCHESTER: "Your age, thirty-nine."

BENNY: "Uh, huh."

ROCHESTER: "We had quite a roundtable discussion on that one."

(LAUGHTER)

BENNY: "Wait a minute, Rochester. Why should there be any question about my age?"

ROCHESTER: "Oh, it wasn't a question. It was the answer we had trouble with."

(LAUGHTER)

Jack Benny said: "The show itself is the important thing. As long as people think the show is funny, it does not matter who tells the jokes." He also made fun of the paid announcements broadcast during his radio show that were designed to sell products. They often provided some of the funniest moments in the show.

Most performers never would make fun of the businesses that helped pay for the show.

Over the years, Jack Benny did well financially. In nineteen forty-eight, he moved his show from the National Broadcasting Company to the Columbia Broadcasting System. As part of the agreement, CBS paid more than two million dollars to a company in which Benny had a controlling interest.

Much later, the Music Corporation of America bought Benny's production company. Benny received almost three million dollars in MCA stock shares.

In real life, he was the opposite of the person he played in his show. He was known to be very giving and someone people liked having as their employer. He also could play the violin very well.

Jack Benny entered the new medium of television in nineteen fifty. Five years later, he dropped his radio program to spend more time developing his television show. At first, his appearances on television were rare. By nineteen sixty, the Benny show was a weekly television program. It continued until nineteen sixty-five.

Benny appeared in about twenty films during his life. A few became popular. But most were not. In nineteen sixty-three, Benny returned to Broadway for the first time since nineteen thirty-one. He performed to large crowds.

Jack Benny received many awards during his lifetime. The publication "Motion Picture Daily" voted him the country's best radio comedian four times. In nineteen fifty-seven, he won a special award from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for the best continuing performance. He also won the Academy's television award for the best comedy series in nineteen fifty-nine.

Perhaps the one honor that pleased him most was that his hometown of Waukeegan named a school for him. This was a special honor for a man who had never finished high school.

Jack Benny continued to perform and to do a few television specials after his weekly series ended. He died of cancer on December twenty-sixth, nineteen seventy-four. His friend, comedian Bob Hope, spoke at the funeral about the loss felt by Benny's friends and fans. He said: "Jack Benny was stingy to the end. He gave us only eighty years."

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This Special English program was written by and produced by George Grow. I'm Sarah Long. And I'm Steve Ember. Join us again next week for another PEOPLE IN AMERICA program on the Voice of America.

RADIO DAYS

Source: http://kieranhanrahanbanjo.com/

Source: Speak Up

Language level: Advanced

Standard Justin Ratcliffe British accent

RADIO DAYS

Kieran Hanrahan is a musician who won the All-Ireland Banjo Championship at the age of 18. Since then he has also becomes a radio presenter and his show, Céilli House, is broadcast every week on the national network, RTE Radio 1. The programme concentrates on traditional Irish music and, for this reason, we asked him about the state of traditional music in Ireland today.

Kieran Hanrahan

(Irish accent):

Yeah, it is great, I mean, I travel the country, and what really I find sweet sometimes is that you might get three generations of one family playing together, you know, you get a…a grandfather, a father and a daughter and a son, those combinations. I always find that they’re very special moments when we come across that, and you do come across them in certain parts of the country and it’s just lovely to see the handing down of the tradition. I suppose one great example of that is Chris Droney, a famous Clare concertina player. There’s a recording in the archives in RTE, of Chris and his father, from 1956, two concertina layers. Now, Chris’ father was 70 at the time, so he would have been born in 1886, and he learned the music from his own father, so you’re heading back sort of towards famine times. But, 40 years after that recording was made in ’56, I recorded Chris and his son. And last year, on the music competition on TV here. Chris’ grandson was playing in it. So there’s all these kind of generations, going almost back to the Famine, from today’s generation, playing traditional music, so it’s just lovely to unearth that solid tradition you know. 

Radio Pioneers Pulled Words, Music and World Events Out of Thin Air

Source: Voice of America Special English

www.manythings.org/voa/people 

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I'm Barbara Klein. And I'm Steve Ember with PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.  Today, we will tell about several men who influenced the development of radio.

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Some people say radio was invented by Guglielmo [gu-lee-YER-mo) Marconi of Italy.  Marconi sent the first radio communication signals through the air in eighteen ninety-five. In fact, no one person can be called the inventor of radio.  Many people, including several Americans, helped to develop radio. You may not know their names. However, their work affected many people. 

 

Over the years, radio has become one of the most important forms of communication.  It can be used for two-way communication, such as between a ship and land.  Scientists even use radio to communicate into space.  And radio broadcasts let people send words, music and information to any part of the world. 

 

 

The first experimental radio broadcasts in the United States were made in the early nineteen hundreds.  One of the first broadcasts came from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City in nineteen ten.  It included music by the great singer Enrico Caruso. An American inventor, Lee De Forest, produced that broadcast.  

 

Only a few people could hear the broadcast.  Some were people in the New York area who had built radio receivers.  Some ships at sea and military radio stations received the broadcast.  Many newspapers of the day reported on the event.  The name of Lee De Forest became part of broadcasting history.

 

De Forest developed some of the technology used in early radio. During his lifetime, he invented hundreds of devices that were used in telephones, shortwave radio broadcasts, and similar technology.

His most famous invention was the vacuum tube, or electron tube. In nineteen-oh-six, the electron tube was considered the single most important development in electronics.  The device made it possible to strengthen radio signals and to send them over long distances.  It was a major reason for the fast growth of the electronics and communications industries in the early part of the twentieth century. 

 

Edwin Armstrong was another American inventor who was important in the development of electronics and radio communication. Armstrong developed technology that helped to improve radio reception.  He discovered ways to limit unwanted radio signals.

Edwin Armstrong also was a leader in using radio to reproduce 

sounds clearly.  This process became known as frequency modulation, or FM radio.  FM radio provided better sound reproduction and less noise or interference than traditional AM radio.  Armstrong also developed radio receivers that became widely used.

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Many experts say station KDKA in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania was 

the first American radio station.  It broadcast results of the 

American presidential election in November, nineteen twenty. 

That is generally considered the start of professional radio 

broadcasting in the United States.

Soon, radio stations began to appear in other areas.  In nineteen twenty-two, two stations in New York State joined together to broadcast the championship game of American baseball.  The stations were connected by telephone lines.  This permitted them to share the same program.  It was one of the first examples of a radio network.

By the middle of the nineteen-twenties, there were two main radio networks in the United States.  The National Broadcasting Corporation, NBC, was formed by the Radio Corporation of America. NBC became the first permanent national network.

The other network was the Columbia Broadcasting System, called CBS.  The networks provided programs to radio stations across the country. Local stations created very few programs.  What listeners heard in New York was often heard in Los Angeles, California and other cities. 

 

David Sarnoff was the man responsible for NBC. As a young man, Sarnoff had taught himself Morse code.  He got a job with the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company where he worked as a telegraph operator.  He was on duty when the passenger ship Titanic sank in the Atlantic Ocean in nineteen twelve.  Sarnoff helped the rescue effort by informing other ships about the accident.  He understood that someone using radio could affect many lives.

By nineteen twenty-one, Sarnoff was an official of the Radio Corporation of America.  He pushed RCA to enter broadcasting. The company soon earned huge profits.  Five years later, David Sarnoff helped create NBC. David Sarnoff developed the theory of broadcasting.

This was very different from the communication between two people speaking to each other on a telephone.  Radio meant that someone could speak to millions of people.

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William S. Paley developed another radio network.  In nineteen twenty-eight, Paley left his family's business. He spent several hundred thousand dollars on several radio stations.  These stations became known as the Columbia Broadcasting System. Paley's friends and advisers told him that he had made a huge mistake.  They said his dream of building a large and important radio network would never come true.

Paley did not listen to them.  Instead, he went to see the heads of some of the largest American companies to get their financial support for his network.

Then, Paley searched for the best people he could find to produce the radio shows and news programming he wanted.  He paid them well.  William Paley was always looking for people with special skills.

One night, he attended a show by the popular Tommy Dorsey Band.  A young man with the group sang during the performance. His name was Frank Sinatra.  Sinatra soon had his own program with CBS, Paley's radio network.

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Radio was extremely popular in the United States between the late 

nineteen twenties and the early nineteen fifties.  This period is 

known as the Golden Age of Broadcasting.

During this period, families gathered in their living rooms every night to listen to radio shows.  Children hurried from school to hear shows created for them.  In the daytime, millions of women listened to radio plays called soap operas.  They were called soap operas because companies that make soap paid for the shows.

Radio influenced the way many people felt about their community and the world.  It permitted them to sit at home and hear what was happening in other areas. During World War Two, people could hear the voices of world leaders, such as American President Franklin Roosevelt. 

 

(SOUND)

 

Listeners also could hear the voices of reporters covering World War Two.  Edward R. Murrow became famous for reporting about the war.  People sometimes could hear guns and bombs exploding during his report. 

 

(SOUND)

In nineteen thirty-seven, Edward R. Murrow was the only representative of CBS in Europe.  Murrow built a team of news reporters whose names would become well known to listeners.

Murrow and reporter William Shirer made broadcasting history in nineteen thirty-eight.  They organized a special broadcast with European reaction to the seizure of Austria by Nazi Germany.  The show had reports from London, Berlin, Paris and Rome.  It was a huge success. 

 

In the United States, the rise of television in the nineteen fifties ended the Golden Age of Radio Broadcasting. More and more people started to watch television.  Most of the popular shows disappeared from radio.

Many people believed television would cause radio broadcasting to become unimportant.  However, the number of radio listeners continues to grow.  Most experts say radio will continue to be important during this century. 

 

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This program was written by George Grow. It was produced by Caty Weaver.  I'm  Steve Ember. 

 

 

And I'm Barbara Klein.  Join us again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

The Radio Centenary

Source: www.speakup.com.br

Language level: Pre-intermediate 

Standard: American accent

The Radio Centenary

On January 13th 1910 the De Forest Radio Laboratory transmitted the first public radio broadcast of a live performance from New York’s Metropolitan Opera House. Enrico Caruso and Ricardo Martin performed arias from Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci. On the 100^th anniversary of this event, radio stations around the world continue to broadcast to millions of listeners. Experts predict the death of radio again and again; but radio not, only survives today, it prospers!

THE GREAT SURVIVOR

How has radio survived the introduction of television, then cable and satellite services, and, more recently, mp3 players, the Internet and Podcasts? US radio station owner Steve Keeney explains: “Radio re-invents itself. Today radio is more local and targets its audiences. For example, talk radio stations are also very popular because they let listeners express their views.”

THE PIRATE STATIONS

In the 1960s radio had an important role in the birth of pop culture. Teenagers around the world listened to the latest pop music on transistor radios, which they hid under their pillows from disapproving parents. This was the age of pirate radio and rebellion against laws that regulated transmissions. Today radio transmitters are so small that pirate FM stations broadcast illegally all over the world. London has over 20 illegal stations, including Shine 87.9 and Genesis.

LOCAL

Public radio stations NPR and the BBC, in the US and UK have also evolved: for example, the BBC has local stations in every region and city in Britain. The BBC remains very successful, with over 30 million people listening to its seven national stations every week. Tradition and innovation are very important at the BBC: while Radio 4’ The Archers in the world’s longest-running soap opera, it has over a million listeners each week using the BBC’s internet-based iPlayer. Listener Wendy Lee from Devon suggests: “Radio survives because it’s free. You simply turn it on and listen.”

Marconi and the Birth of Radio (no audio)

Guglielmo Marconi was fascinated by the work of German physicist Heinrich Hertz on electromagnetic waves. During a summer holliday in the mountains near Biella, Italy in 1894, he had the inspired the idea of suing Hertzian waves to communicate in the following months, he worked radio set. The first version transmitted a weak signal form the window of his laboratory to the end of the garden. His first real victory came beyond a hill at the bottom of his garden. The Italian government didn’t recognize the importance of Marconi’s invention, so he went to England to the Wireless Telegraph Trading Signal Company and introduced wireless telegraphy to the world. 


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