Alternate Names for the Skits

[Greg]

Hi all. I'm listening to a run of shows from 19370-1938, a time when the gang was doing a lot of skits based on then-current movies and stage shows. When Jack is introducing the skit, he often introduces an alternate title as well, such as "tonight's play is entitled Murder In the Library, or Book Marks the Spot".

I know of Dr. Strangelove: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, from the 1970s, but what is the origin of this alternate title gag? The fact that he uses an alternate title must be a riff on something famous from the time.

Thanks,
Greg

[kbbl]

Much, much, later Police Squat (Leslie Nielson) used to to this in their six episodes, so there must be some reference to that style.

[Gerry O.]

They used alternate titles in "Rocky and Bullwinkle" cartoons too....particularly at the end of each cliffhanger episode when announcer William Conrad would excitedly tell the viewers not to miss "our next exciting episode...." and then he would give the two titles (at least one of which was a funny play on words).

[Maxwell]

Real alternate titles (as opposed to gags) probably go back to dime novels in the 19th century (think of Frank Meriwell books for example). I'm sure the gag titles followed soon after that.

[shimp scrampi]

Much, much, later Police Squat (Leslie Nielson) used to to this in their six episodes, so there must be some reference to that style.

The funny thing about POLICE SQUAD is tha the narrator announced something entirely different: "Tonight's episode 'Revenge and Remorse!" while the on-screen title read "A Guilty Alibi"

Max is right, that dates back to at least the 17th century where it was commonplace to have books be titled "The Thing: Or, A Treatise concerning the acquisition and disposal of certain rare and refined objects located upon a beach whose auditory properties are sometimes concealed by a repeated handclap or foot-stomp, such as is found in the raucous bars and pool-halls of Doo-Wah-Ditty...." you get the point!

[scottp]

I remember them doing that with skits on the Red Skelton Show in the late 60s. In fact, one of them got half-stuck in my mind... that is, half of one of them got stuck... "Clem Brings Home the Bacon, or: ???" and that was all I could remember.
I can only hope all the Skelton scripts go into a searchable archive someday.

Books compiled from Robert Benchley's short newspaper and magazine pieces included "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea, or: David Copperfield" but my favorite title was "My Ten Years in a Quandary, and How They Grew."

[Brad from Georgia]

My latest novel (albeit published under a pseudonym) is Wicked Will: Or, Murder in Stratford.