Jury Duty: The Phil Harris (February 20, 1949)

The Phil Harris, old-time radio on Stupid Potato

“Jury Duty” is an episode of The Phil Harris, the old-time radio show, first broadcast February 20, 1949. Listen free on Stupid Potato: no sign-up, no app.

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What happens

Phil Harris receives a notice to appear for jury duty and tries every excuse he can think of to avoid it. Alice Faye and the children react to his schemes, and his friend Frankie Remley, out of work and in need of a place to stay, moves into the Harris home. Phil's efforts to dodge the summons lead him and Frankie into an argument over whether a person can suffocate in a wall bed. The Phil Harris show aired on NBC on February 20, 1949, with Phil Harris and Alice Faye starring alongside Elliott Lewis and Gale Gordon.

The Harris home, and later City Hall

Characters: Phil Harris, Alice Faye, Frankie Remley, Julius, Willie, Curly

Listen for: Phil's increasingly absurd excuses to avoid jury duty, and the wall bed experiment

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.