What happens
Fred Allen and Portland Hoffa stroll down Main Street on a Sunday evening, chatting with a series of colorful passersby about the news of the day. They discuss radio's supposed decline in the face of television, falling prices, and a Russian washing machine. Along the way they meet a senator, a woman whose husband runs a fur business, and a dapper man in a wedding outfit. Later, Fred visits a rehearsal hall where Bert Lahr hopes to get into television, and the two men plan a variety show with acts such as singing rats and a talking dog. The 1949 Fred Allen radio broadcast on CBS and NBC is a comedy sketch program with Fred Allen, Portland Hoffa, Kenny Delmar and Minerva Pious among its lead actors.
Main Street on a Sunday night, a drugstore, a rehearsal hall, and a television studio in New York
Characters: Fred Allen, Portland Hoffa, Kenny Delmar, Bert Lahr, Senator, Mrs. Nussbaum, Ajax, Adjutiv Adams
Listen for: The street interviews with odd characters, Fred and Portland's banter about radio and television, and Bert Lahr's plans for an all-star television revue
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.