What happens
Fred Allen hosts a comedy broadcast that mixes spoofs and sketches. Portland Hoffa and Kenny Delmar appear with him, along with Minerva Pious as Mrs. Nussbaum. A running gag has the listeners sending letters that mock Jack Benny in a contest. A sketch follows a woman who wants advice on women in the post-war business world. Later, a Shakespearean actor named Marie Evans quarrels over a torn pair of trousers and a ticket refund, and a satirical advertising scene parodies Hamlet as a radio soap serial. This 1946 broadcast aired on CBS and NBC.
A radio comedy studio in New York, with sketches set in a theater, an advertising office and a small-town radio serial.
Characters: Fred Allen, Portland Hoffa, Kenny Delmar, Minerva Pious, Titus Moody, Senator Claghorn, Mrs. Nussbaum, Marie Evans
Listen for: The sketch in which Marie Evans quarrels over a refund, and the advertising office scene where Shakespeare pitches Hamlet as a radio serial.
Written from the episode itself; it never gives away the ending. Every recording is remastered for the stream: cleaned of rumble, hiss and mains hum (and the old TV whine where we found it), then levelled in two passes to steady broadcast loudness, so one show is never quieter than the next.