This intrigues me....

[Maxwell]

I was just checking out Chuck Schaden's "Nostalgia Digest" web site, and saw this: http://www.nostalgiadigest.com/When%20Radio%20Was.htm.

I can't wait to find out what it might be.

[Maxwell]

I found out what the event is today, and I've already ordered tickets. Eddie Carroll is coming to Chicago! It's in honor of Chuck Schaden's (you guessed it) 39th year in broadcasting.

Chicago area members (or those who would like to visit the beautiful North Side in May) can check out the information at http://www.nostalgiadigest.com/When%20Radio%20Was.htm.

[Maxwell]

This is as good a place to follow up as any, I guess. We saw Eddie Carroll today in "Laughter in Bloom." It's the first time I've seen him, and I have to say, the show lives up to everything that has been said about it here. Eddie Carroll is as close to being Jack Benny for two hours or so as anyone could possibly be. We had a great time.

Eddie Carroll was brought to Chicago by longtime OTR host Chuck Schaden on the occasion of the 39th anniversary of his "Those Were the Days Radio Show." What better way to celebrate your 39th anniversary on the air but with a show honoring the man who is "39 Forever." Oddly enough, Schaden's anniversary show was yesterday, the 77th anniversary of Jack's first show.

Sadly, Chuck Schaden is retiring after his June 30 show, but we were introduced to his replacement, Steve Darnall who four years ago took over publication of Schaden's "Nostalgia Digest" Magazine. The only thing that kept the day from being perfect was that we didn't win the framed issue of the "Saturday Evening Post" with a portrait of Jack by Norman Rockwell that was given away.

At any rate, if you have a chance to see Eddie Carroll as Jack, do so. It's a great show.

[thinkingitover]

I must respond to this. I also attended the much-anticipated Chuck Schaden anniversary celebration and the "Laughter in Bloom" show put on by Eddie Carroll. In the first few minutes of the program, there were at least three [b]off-color jokes[/b]. This was very off-putting to my husband and I. He said if there was one more joke like that, he was leaving. There was, and he did. I was relieved I did not bring my mother or any children to this show.

Yeah, he looked like Benny, he talked like Benny, his gestures were like Benny; but it angered me to have the precious Jack Benny legacy sullied with unnecessary attempted humor about sexual performance and other innuendos regarding genitals. Further, the "safer" jokes were not very funny at all. I guess when one can't make it on clever writing (like the real Benny did) one has to stoop to the ever-so-popular blue material of today.

How sad for us and for Jack Benny...and for Chuck Schaden. I don't understand his reasoning for putting this show on...at least without drawing the line beforehand. For Schaden's wonderful reputation for family entertainment for 39 years to be ended with this unfortunate, sobering show was quite a disappointment. We love Jack Benny, and this makes us very sad. Why the Benny family approves of this is also a mystery.

It is true that nothing is sacred anymore. Very, very sad.

[Mister Kitzel]

When I saw Laughter In Bloom I was surprised by what I perceived as "Las Vegas jokes" just like you, but those jokes may very well have been told by Jack to an adult audience in Las Vegas. They are out of character with the image we have of Jack Benny as the man who was a star of radio and television at a time when the broadcast decency standards were very high. Eddie Carroll would not be including those jokes if there were not a precedent for them in Jack's life.

[thinkingitover]

Then Schaden should have put a disclaimer about it in his promotions.

[thinkingitover]

And, oh, yes, let us perpetuate the filth, after all. "May have" is also not very conclusive.

[shimp scrampi]

I haven't yet seen Eddie's show, but I'm familiar with the content you mention since it has been discussed here and in chats before. Really, Jack himself told these jokes, not just in Vegas, but also on the Dick Cavett show on regular old daytime TV back in the early '70s. You can even see the clips on youtube, if you're referring to the gag about Jack's mohel being an Indian and things like that. I'd say they are exceedingly mild.

You've a perfect right to be disenchanted or offended, but I'd suggest you are setting the bar awfully high to suggest it is "filth" or requires some kind of a disclaimer for most audiences in 2009.

[thinkingitover]

Yes, I do set the bar high. And I thought Schaden would, also. I didn't like being surprised by the show's content. I guess I am not "most audiences" and would not have attended if I had even just a hint of what to expect. I have better things to do.

[shimp scrampi]

Well, setting the bar higher than Jack Benny himself is a tough standard to expect of either Eddie Carroll or Chuck Schaden. Again, it's your call as to what you find enjoyable or appropriate. However, it's inaccurate to suggest Jack's memory is being tarnished by material he himself used.

Here's a clip of Jack using some of the gags in question on the Dick Cavett show in 1973, so he clearly considered it appropriate, (if maybe edgy for Jack Benny) for a general broadcast television audience 36 years ago. Your mileage may vary, but I'd say, Redd Foxx it ain't!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBVV6D

I'm sorry you weren't able to enjoy the show, because I know Eddie is a huge favorite and friend to many here. I'm looking forward to seeing the show and judging for myself. Hopefully you'll stick around here and contribute to the many positive and fun discussions we have of Jack and gang, so welcome!

[shimp scrampi]

Ooops, sorry, copy-paste error. Here's the correct URL for the Cavett clip.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBVV6D-iiPQ

[Maxwell]

Eddie Carroll didn't use those particular jokes in the show, but the were in a similar vein. I didn't see any kids in the audience. In fact my son and his fiancee were about the youngest people I saw, and they're both twenty-nine. Most of the audience appeared to be older than I am, and I recently thirty-nine for the twenty-first time.

I'd say the humor (about four jokes) was a little bluer than you'd expect of Jack, but it was certainly not much different than the way I've seen Jack's Las Vegas material described.

I was more concerned with a few erroneous factual details than I was about the off-color jokes, but that's just me.

[thinkingitover]

Thanks for the kind welcome. I really do appreciate that.

I admit my views on what constitutes entertainment can be considered mouldy by today's standards. But for this I do not apologize. I cannot insist others hold the bar as high as I do. But I don't like to be drawn into an event that offends me without some warning. Chuck could have called it "The Real Jack Benny" or "The Las Vegas Jack Benny" or something similar to give a bit of a forewarning. Chuck interviewed Carroll on his radio show in preview of the performance and nothing was hinted at that this would be a Vegas style show. Even today's TV shows offer "this show may be objectionable to certain audiences." It was tacky. I'd like my $25 x 2 back. I could buy a lot of Jack Benny radio programs with $50.

I've listened to Chuck Schaden since I was in high school (I graduated in 1970) and never dreamed he would sponsor anything that would be questionable because I never heard him do anything objectionable in all this time. I am obviously no expert on Jack Benny and connect his style with his sparkling clean radio and television show.

I also took the train trip to Waukegan with Chuck Schaden and fellow Benny fans a long time back (30 years?) with Frank Nelson. And I took my mother! There was not one slight iota of blue material that whole day. It was wonderful, and we talked about it for years afterwards.

So I guess my main reason for posting my objections here was to somehow let fellow Benny fans know what's what with the Eddie Carroll show. If that's the real Jack Benny, so be it. I would rather remember him as I grew up with him.

[Maxwell]

Shimp,

Probably the "worst" of the jokes, at least the one I remember, involved Mary, breast augmentation using an exercise suggested by George Burns, and a guy who also received certain advice from Burns involving squats. I'd say that's about as bad as it got.

Certainly not clean, but the rhyme in the punchline involving the squats was left unsaid, so it could have been a lot worse.

It's all in one's taste in humor. I thought the show was very good. OUr son probably didn't like it as much as I did. My wife and our son's fiancee both enjoyed it. However, I can see where someone else, expecting the type of humor Jack did on radio and TV might be put off.

I'd like to welcome thinkingitover. We're all Benny fans here, and probably every one of us became a fan via his radio or TV shows. Jack and Bill Cosby are my two favorite comedians (in that order), and interestingly enough, Cosby is also noted for not working "blue." I'm not really that much into off-color material either. I just didn't think what I heard Sunday was all that bad. I've heard a lot worse.

[thinkingitover]

Maxwell, thanks very much for the friendly welcome.

You forgot the joke about something involving putting saltpeter into cement so that it never "hardened." I won't explain further. Not funny to me. What does that have to do with Jack Benny? I think there were a few more off-color jokes than you remember. But you are right, I guess things could always have been much worse. More jokes about his toupee would have been much better and more relevant. I wonder what Sadye would have thought?