What happens
Fred Allen hosts his variety program, joined by regulars Harry Von Zell, Portland Hoffa and Peter Van Steeden's orchestra, and the show is shaped as a broadcast of comic sketches, musical numbers and sponsor-style interludes. Allen and his cast joke about how listeners can never make money from a radio show, then present a mock newsreel of minor earthquake reports from New England and New York, with colorful local interviews. Singer Ray Murray performs a song, and the program turns to a segment called Mr. and Mrs. Average Man's Roundtable, where studio guests discuss whether Thanksgiving should be moved a week earlier. Billy Rose is introduced as guest, and his career is reviewed in an interview with Allen.
A New York radio studio during a 1939 broadcast of The Fred Allen Show, with the New York World's Fair as a recurring topic.
Characters: Fred Allen, Harry Von Zell, Portland Hoffa, Peter Van Steeden, Billy Rose, Arthur Hershkowitz, Nora Amaluth, Edward Parks
Listen for: Allen's running banter with Harry Von Zell and Portland Hoffa, the mock earthquake newsreel interviews, and the Thanksgiving roundtable discussion with studio guests.
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.