'Take a Giant Step': A Romance in Radio

By Richard Seff

RICHARD SEFF remembers the excitement of his early days in the radio industry, when 85 million radios were blaring away in American homes, while a mere 1.3 million TV sets were moving in. Everyone in the nation turned those AM dials seeking financial advice, weather reports, news of the world, news of the city, mood music, heavy and light drama; they could even have the comic strips read to them by the Mayor of New York. Many actors did their best acting only from the neck up, and some became well paid stars, who never needed to sign an autograph because no one had a clue what they looked like!

Richard Seff was there, he was one of them, as Bruce Bigby, a young millionaire on the daytime serial "The Brighter Day" in which his nine month marriage to Althea Dennis ended abruptly when a slight cough developed into an unnamed terminal disease. All this and more is told in a comical voice that pokes fun at the absurdities and the power plays. Though everything in the book could have happened, a clerk in a hardware store may in fact have been an office boy in an under garment showroom, a pretentious understudy may actually have been a woman who had changed her family name to one of her own creation, a raffle ticket may have won its winner a toaster instead of a kayak. Come join Alice and Harold in the Wonderland of Radio.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: May 23, 2013
• ISBN: 9781481740593

Richard Seff

RICHARD SEFF has spent his entire working life in show business as actor, playwright, librettist, agent, investor, memoirist and now novelist. He joined Actor's Equity in 1946 and his last engagement onstage was in 2008. He took a 22 year leave of absence from the stage after a long run on Broadway in the prize winning "Darkness At Noon." During those 22 years he represented artists in the musical theatre, including Chita Rivera, Robert Goulet, Julie Andrews, Ron Field, Linda Lavin, John Kander and Fred Ebb. At the height of his agency career, he left that field to return to the stage. In the decades since, he has appeared in some 25 plays, for one of which ("Angels Fall") he won the Carbonell Award in 1982 for Best Supporting Actor in a play. He's been in 7 feature films and over 50 television series, soap operas, TV films and mini-series. He is the author of "Paris Is Out!" a comedy which brightened Broadway in 1970 for 104 performances. The musical "Shine!" for which he wrote the book, was a triple prize winner in the 2010 NYMF Festival of New Musicals, and has been published by Samuel French and recorded by Original Cast Records. His memoir, "Supporting Player," published in 2004 is still selling as a vivid visit to the Golden Age of Broadway. But in the beginning, in the halcyon days of 1949, he was sustained by the then-flourishing field of radio, so come join him as he conjures up Alice and Harold, a young couple, newly arrived in the Big Apple with high hopes, as they discover each other, and together enter the revolving doors of the mighty United Radio Society (URSo) in search of fulfillment and an honest dollar. Whether or not you recall the pull of those voices emanating from Philcos across the land, you'll have a wild ride, for distance has lent enchantment to this very Disneyish dinosaur called Radio.

Book preview

‘TAKE A GIANT STEP’

A Romance in Radio

By:

RICHARD SEFF

Illustrated by:

MARK DEAN

US%26UKLogoB%26Wnew.ai

AuthorHouse™ LLC

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

© 2013 by Richard Seff. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 07/05/2013

ISBN: 978-1-4817-4058-6 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4817-3629-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4817-4059-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2013906719

All images in the book are copyrighted works of Mark Dean.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

THE WARM UP

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

AFTER THE BROADCAST

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

In Loving Memory of

DOLORES SUTTON

who knew Alice and Harold well

THE WARM UP

Who said lovers in real life don’t ever meet cute? The movies had it happen all the time, and the movies of 1949 always told things the way we wanted them to be. Why not? In this tale, Alice Cromwell and Harold Moore met that way. It was raining in New York that afternoon, that soft gentle late spring rain that cooled the early heat of approaching summer. They lived only a block or two from each other on New York’s Upper West Side, but it’s not likely they would have known that had it not been for the rain and the pull of the Tip Toe Inn on 86th Street and Broadway, into the warmth of which they both drifted to get out of the wet. The Inn was a favorite West Side eatery, which featured a delicatessen display case inside the entrance, just behind the cashier whose job it was to push the buttons on her machine so the bell would ring and the merry clink of coins could be heard by all. No credit cards yet; not in 1949. They were years away. No, it was strictly cash at this large neighborhood restaurant which managed to make its customers feel warm and cozy and just a little elegant at the same time. Round leatherette booths beckoned just beyond the entrance rotunda, but Alice and Harold had never used them. Reasonable as prices were at the Inn, they were beyond the reach of these two youngsters, newly arrived in Gotham, seeking a toe hold as they joined thousands like them from all over the world seeking the same thing. No restaurant banquettes for them, it was strictly casseroles at home, Horn and Hardart for dinner on special occasions, and Woolworth’s soda fountain for lunch. This did not depress them; they were thrilled to have a roof over their heads just to be allowed to have a bite of the big apple, after twenty years of small town meat and potatoes.

Harold hung his hat in a small one-bedroom rent controlled apartment on West 87th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue. It was three flights up, but he had no problem with climbing the stairs three and four times a day. Alice was living in a three bedroom, two bath apartment on West End Avenue just around Harold’s corner, with two roommates, each of whom had one of the large bedrooms. Alice was billeted in the maid’s room, just off the kitchen., but she had the second bathroom all to herself, and though the tub had cracks in its porcelain, a chain flushed the toilet and the mirror over the yellowing sink had a crack that made her look Picassoesque, it was her own little corner in her own little room that still had her beaming and content after 2 1/2 months.

She’d never have found her new home without her Dad, back in Goleta, California, where he managed a lemon ranch. Goleta was known as America’s lemon capitol, so his job made him a prominent citizen. He had spared her a fate she felt was worse than death—she’d been offered a job as secretary to his best friend. The man was in boilers, his company manufactured and sold them, and he’d assured Alice that she wouldn’t be typing his letters long. He was certain she’d have a big future in boilers, and that scared her so much that her Dad came forth with this plan to pay her rent for one year in New York provided she took the room in his second cousin’s apartment, for cousin was looking for the $30 monthly rent that would lessen the burden of the $110 plus utilities that she and her room mate shared. For the rest, Alice was on her own, but she wasn’t at all concerned. She’d squirreled away almost $1,000 over the years from her small allowance, from birthday gifts, from her high school and college graduation gifts. She’d never lived away from home, a nice little house on Bay Laurel Lane, walking distance from her elementary and high schools in Goleta, and by the time she got to college, she was able to drive herself in her $400 used Ford stick shift to the University of California-Santa Barbara, and still live with Mom and Dad at home. By the time she was fifteen, she knew she’d be an actress. Playing Emily in high school in Our Town had started her thinking about that. Later, in college, the joys of tackling Alexandra in The Little Foxes and Raina in Bernard Shaw’s Arms and the Man convinced her that she had to find out more about acting as a way of making a living, of making a life. Monroe Rosenblatt in the Santa Barbara News-Press had written: Her Raina glowed. She reigned over the entire evening. This gal is going places! She was going to New York and Dad, hoping she’d get it all out of her system in a year, gave her just enough support to make it all happen.

Harold on the other hand, grew up in Guilford, Connecticut, only two hours from New York. There was no train station in Guilford until much later, but service to nearby New Haven was frequent enough, so Harold got to go to New York on special occasions, and on one of them his Aunt Regina took him to see a Broadway comedy called What A Life! when he was 12 and slam! bam! he knew he’d found a vocation. Out the window went all thoughts of becoming a soldier of fortune or an international banker (he’d identified closely with Cary Grant in Gunga Din and George Arliss in The House of Rothschild.) No, once he discovered there could be live actors on a stage, that would be it. He didn’t identify with actors in movies any longer; they weren’t real to him. No, it would have to be on the stage that he made his mark or, and this seemed a sensible way to start, on radio.

Radio for the Moore family was THE entertainment medium. Nightly they would gather in the living room to listen to Edward G. Robinson and Claire Trevor as Steve Wilson and Lorelei Kilbourn on Big Town, to J. Anthony Smythe as Father on One Man’s Family, to Orson Welles now and then on the Mercury Theatre Hour. There was always something. Dad enjoyed Raymond Gram Swing for commentary on the news, Mom was wild for Cecil B. DeMille and a feast of stars on Lux Radio Theatre, they all enjoyed Jack Benny and Fred Allen and their roster of supporting players, one of which Harold thought he would like to be one day. He’d rush home from grade school at lunch time to listen to The O’Neills with Marie, the lady from Barbados who lived with the Moores to help tidy up the house, to look after Harold at lunch and after school until the family was gathered for dinner. Big sister Carol was four years older and needed no further looking after, so Harold and Marie shared the O’Neill’s ups and downs on N.B.C. over peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and Campbell’s tomato soup.

The stage was out there somewhere in his mind’s eye, but he was panting to have a crack at the airwaves, so when Carol married and moved with her husband from their one bedroom apartment in New York to live in Old Greenwich, Connecticut he had their lease turned over to him when it expired, informing the landlord he was his sister’s blood relative and had the right. Apartments were plentiful in 1949 and the man in charge of rentals decided in his favor, mostly because Harold would not require a paint job.

Harold thrived on the city itself. Some do, some don’t. But his years in a Columbia dorm had taught him that he loved the city’s energy, that he wanted to stay and absorb it for himself. So it was that on a rainy Tuesday, only weeks after he’d moved into his first apartment, he found himself ordering a coffee and danish at the Tip Toe Inn at the same moment that Alice Cromwell was doing the very same thing. Of course he had to comment on that.

Do you come here often? he asked her, for openers.

Not often, she replied. Mostly when I’m wet, she added as she offered coins to the cashier.

The deli section had some small tables, but there was only one unoccupied.

Well, I’m certainly wet, so would you mind if we shared the table?

No, I don’t mind. She could clearly hear her Dad’s voice. Never have coffee with a stranger! You’re in New York. That is not Goleta. Always remember that! But she tuned out.

That was how it started. They spent over an hour slowly savoring each other and their coffees and cheese danishes, and by that time it had stopped raining and they both remembered they had a thousand things to do before calling it a day. When Harold learned she lived a block away from his own apartment, he asked for a proper date for the next evening. It just seemed inevitable; they both felt it. They were meant to meet, and they met. Now all they had to do was carve out a life in this new town, to fling themselves into the flow, to find out if they had the stuff, or as would happen to some, discover the competition was too keen, the odds were too stacked against them. On this rainy Tuesday none of that even entered their minds; the bond was formed, the attraction was clear, excitement was in the air, doubled now that it could be shared with someone who actually liked cheese danishes. A week later, head shots in order, shoes nicely shined, resumés printed and at the ready, they set out to make their first move.

RSBookOpeningSceneCover1.JPG

Alice and Harold paused for a moment and stared up at the skyscraper in front of them.

TAKE

ONE

GIANT

STEP

34066.jpg

1

Alice and Harold paused for a moment, and gazed up at the skyscraper in front of them. Then they pushed their way through the revolving doors of the United Radio Society.

Remember, think like a professional, Harold whispered.

Yes, Alice answered. She tried, but she couldn’t. Not for a minute.

The Information Girl looked up after she had finished a line in her anthology of Three Plays By Eugene O’Neill.

May I help you? she asked.

Thank you, yes. Harold answered, professionally. Casting Department, please.

Information looked the pair up and down, suspiciously.

Do you want to audition? she asked.

Bingo! That’s what we’d like to do, Harold answered.

Second floor. Room 207. Information went back to The Hairy Ape.

Harold pulled Alice away.

Now remember, they need us, he said. Without actors there wouldn’t be any Industry. We’re not asking for any favors.

Maybe they can do without us a little longer, said Alice. They’ve managed till now.

Never mind that. Let’s go upstairs and get it over with.

They turned around.

Harold, look!, Alice cried.

In the middle of the corridor, there was a large sign. Please Show Your Pass Before Entering Elevator.

We don’t have a pass. Alice was ready to go home.

Look at all the other people going in. They’re not showing any pass.

Maybe they work here. Maybe they’re pro— Harold gave her a look.

Maybe the guard knows them.

He can only throw us out. Come on, we’ll try it.

Where are your passes? said the guard as they whizzed past him.

Alice emitted a ladylike burp.

Don’t have them with us this morning, Officer, Harold said. Just an oversight.

We can go home and get them and come back later, Harold. We’re holding everyone up. Alice left the elevator, and tripped on the door. Harold followed her.

Why did you do that?, he demanded. He would have let us go up.

I can’t go through with it, she said. I don’t like my audition material anyway. Why don’t we work on it some more, and then come back. When we’re really prepared.

You said that yesterday. We’re as ready now as we’ll ever be. There must be some way to get up to Room 207.

I could get a job as a secretary, Alice said.

What are all those people doing over there? Harold asked. They look like they’re waiting for the elevator. Maybe he just wanted us to wait in line.

Around the corner there were a hundred people roped in against the wall. Harold spotted a Page and asked him who they were."

That’s the Armstrong Theatre audience, said the Page. It’s on the air in half an hour. If you’ve got your tickets, you’d better get on line. Alice was thinking how nice it would be to be a secretary with an elevator pass, when she found herself along with the crowd tied up against the wall.

What are we doing here? she asked, as she pulled at the rope on her stomach. We don’t want to hear Armstrong Theatre. But no matter because we DON’T HAVE TICKETS!

They won’t look at the tickets until we get to the studio, Harold whispered. We can duck out before then.

The line began to move.

Here we go. Keep your face away from the Starter. He might remember us.

Yes he will. We’re Bonnie and Clyde on a bad day. She felt less professional by the minute.

Half the battle is believing. Start believing. Harold answered.

The elevator was so crowded Alice had the feeling she was standing on someone. A small boy was under her legs, squatting on his haunches. His hand was stretched out into the people, evidently hanging onto someone. Alice hoped it was someone he knew.

They passed right by the second floor. The little boy moaned, Mommy, I have to go potty. Now! Everyone moved slightly away from him, including whoever he was attached to. The elevator was an express and didn’t stop until the eighth floor. There the doors slid open and the little boy was whisked away as Harold grabbed Alice’s wrist and ran for the first door that didn’t have a number on it. This was a bad choice because, after wading through a large lounge, it turned out to be the Men’s Room, and there was a small commotion when Alice showed up. But before any big fuss could be made, they fled, ran down the hall and disappeared behind a big red door marked Exit.

I don’t like how things have been going, Harold said simply. Alice nodded. We’ve made a few mistakes, Harold went on, but nobody of any importance has seen us yet, so all we have to do is find Room 207. Forget about the last few minutes, and let’s start thinking like professionals.

RSBookElevatorScene2.JPG

The little boy moaned, Mommy, I have to go potty. Now!

So they ran down six flights of stairs. There they stopped another Page for directions.

I beg your pardon, said Harold.

The Page put down his copy of My Sister Eileen.

Yes?

Do you know where Room 207 is?

"You’re