Newsletter April 2025

Hello everyone!  Here’s the Hollywood 360 newsletter, April 2025 / Vol. 48.  As someone on our mailing list, you’ll receive the most current newsletter via email on the first day of every month.  If you don’t receive it by the end of the first day of the month, check your spam folder as they often end up there.  If it is not in your regular email box or in your spam folder, contact me at carlpamari@gmail.com and I’ll forward you a copy.  The monthly Hollywood 360 newsletter contains articles from my team and the full month’s detailed schedule of classic radio shows that will air on Hollywood 360.  The week of April 29th, we’ll broadcasting an episode of The Aldrich Family starring Norman Tokar (pictured here).  Other great radio shows scheduled for April include: Gunsmoke, Rogue’s Gallery, The Adv. of Maisie, The Shadow, The Jack Benny Program, The Great Gildersleeve, Our Miss Brooks, Suspense and The Roy Rogers Show.  We’ll also have five Easter shows the week of April 19th so don’t miss it.  Happy Easter everyone and thank you for helping to keep these amazing radio programs flourishing! Stay safe.  Blessings, Carl Amari

THE ALDRICH FAMILY 

by Carl Amari and Martin Grams

The Aldrich Family was the perennial of situation comedies, focusing on the comedic exploits of a modern-day teenager who faced enormous challenges in the modern age. Youngsters were quick to associate with Henry Aldrich’s antics, a teenager in high school who could not stay out of silly trouble. The success of the program stemmed from its frequent glimpse into the curious facets of adolescent nature – the sort that tapped the nostalgic tear ducts as well as the funny bone.  Perhaps that was why teenagers of the times made up the largest demographic of faithful listeners. And as a result, the program lasted 12 years on the radio, plus additional years on television.

Henry Aldrich was the brainchild of Clifford Goldsmith, who penned the stage play, What A Life, in 1937. Henry’s exchange of barbs were featured as 10-minute insertions on both the Rudy Vallee radio program in 1937, and as a weekly feature on the Kate Smith program throughout 1938. By 1939 the general impression among ad agencies was that the same dramatic idea could be expanded into a half-hour comedy series. The result was The Aldrich Family, which served as a summer replacement for The Jack Benny Program. Modeled after MGMs popular Andy Hardy movies, father Sam Aldrich, an attorney by profession, was the patriarch to whom family members could turn to for advice. But most of the radio adventures centered on Henry Aldrich’s zany experiences.

Cast changes over the years included three mothers, seven sisters and three fathers. Ezra Stone was the first and last Henry Aldrich, considered the best among the youthful souls because of his trademark and obedient response, “Coming, mother!” When Uncle Sam called on Stone during the war, three boys substituted: Norman Tokar (pictured here), Raymond Ives and Dickie Jones. Tokar came the closest to Goldsmith’s approval. Within two years The Aldrich Family reached the top ten with a Crossley rating of 33.4 percent of the listening audience, rivaling such radio comedians as Bob Hope and Jack Benny.

Paramount Pictures, hoping to cash in on the MGM Andy Hardy series, produced a series of 11 Henry Aldrich motion-pictures. The first two starred Jackie Cooper with the remaining 9 starring Jimmy Lydon.  A TV series lasted 4 seasons and a series of comic books soon followed, published by Dell Comics. As with the radio formula, those incarnations also concentrated on Henry Aldrich and his penchant for getting into trouble.

Through hindsight, no better compliment is bestowed on the program than to observe a number of well-meaning teenager comedies that were inspired by The Aldrich Family program: Archie Andrews, A Date with Judy, Meet Corliss Archer and That Brewster Boy were just a few. Radio critics in the trade columns were often comparing these programs to Aldrich, substantiating the best of them provided lasting memories.

SUPER EXCITING NEWS FROM CARL AMARI:

I licensed all 41 complete radio series produced by Frederic W. Ziv, the most prolific radio syndicator in history.  All 10,000+ radio episodes have been preserved on Mr. Ziv’s personal 16 inch master transcription discs.  So far, I’ve launched three different Kickstarter campaigns to raise the funds necessary to professionally transfer these 16 inch discs so that the complete series for each can be enjoyed for generations to come in brilliant sound quality!

If you have pledged to help save these important radio series, thank you!  If not, feel free to learn about these three radio series and their campaigns by clicking the links below.  All three of these Kickstarter campaigns were successful and are now closed.  If you missed out on obtaining these complete radio series, call me to order them on audio CDs or via digital download links.  FYI: The cost is slightly higher than the Kickstarter pricing.  To order, call 1-815-900-7535.