|
|
Article: THE MAKING OF A FUNNY MAN FRED ALLEN FOUND HUMOR IN UNLIKELY PLACES: THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY, A PIANO COMPANY, AND THE AWFUL AMATEUR NIGHTS OF SMALL-TIME VAUDEVILLE
- Article from:
- The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)
- Article date:
- May 28, 1989
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright (null) The Boston Globe. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
|
From Fred Allen: His Life and Wit, by Robert Taylor,
published by Little, Brown and Company. Copyright (c) 1989
by Robert Taylor.
Fred Allen, radio's foremost wit in the 1930s and '40s, wrote his
own performing material. He based his characterizations, however,
on vaudeville types and situations he observed in the small-time
Boston theaters where his career began.
The comedian's national popularity, always formidable, soared
in the immediate postwar period, when he perfected the format of
the routine called "Allen's Alley." On each Fred Allen Show he
started with a topical question, then he and his wife, Portland,
strolled down an alley where four contrasting types ...