On March 29, 1932, Jack Benny appeared on Ed Sullivan's La Geradine program and said "This is Jack Benny talking there will be a slight pause while you say 'Who Cares...'"The Canada Dry Program (NBC -WJZ Studios)
May 5, 1932 to October 10, 1933 - 26 Weeks Airing Monday & Wednesday at 9:30-10PM Eastern.
On March 29, 1932, Jack Benny appeared on Ed Sullivan's La Geradine program and said "This is Jack Benny talking there will be a slight pause while you say 'Who Cares...'"
Douglas Coulter of N.W. Ayer & Son, Inc, the agency representing Canada Dry Ginger Ale, needed a program to replace "With Canada's Mounted" their program featuring stories of the North West Mounted Police heard on WJZ at 10PM that was up against Robert Burns Panatela Program on WABC.
He had liked what he heard and offered Benny the Master Of Ceremonies spot on their new program featuring the music of George Olsen and his wife Ethel Shutta. After a few weeks of writing and rehersal the first show was broadcast May 2nd.
This twenty-six week series would air Mondays and Wednesdays on the NBC BLUE network at 9:30 PM Eastern and would introduce many of the core qualities of what Jack wanted in a program, such as the integrated comedy commercial, the fresh unrehearsed feel and the ability to capitalize on the humor the audience liked.
As a bi-weekly radio program eats up material at a voracious pace, Benny could not write everything himself, so he had hired Harry Conn and Al Boasberg to help him with generating the required material. Both had worked on his vaudeville shows and would define the core of the Jack Benny character that he would forever be identified with.
Conn felt that getting laughs was easier when the whole company was involved, so the comedy routines usually worked in the announcer, band leader and a couple of stooges to bounce lines off.
One of those stooges was Jack's wife, Sadye, who came to the show due to needing someone to fill the bit part of a fan - Mary Livingstone - and became a regular on the program due to popular request by the listening audience when she had not appeared in subsequent shows. Sadye would later legally change her name to that of her character, Mary Livingstone. The other regular stooge was Sam Hearn, a vaudevillian with a dialect character called 'Schlepperman', that would become another member of the Benny family of characters.
As this program was mostly to feature music, the Olsen orchestera's singers: Fran Fray, Bob Borger and Bob Rice would sing the currently popular tunes.
NBC staff announcers Edward Thorgerson and George Hicks would tie in the commercials and give Jack someone else to talk to.
There is only one recording of the NBC run of the Canada Dry show in circulation, and happily that is the premier episode; the others are either lost or in no condition to play due to poor storage conditions prior to their donation to U.C.L.A.
As this was a time before transcription recordings were made for rebroadcast, these early recordings were made for reference either by the advertiser or Jack and so most musical selections were not recorded unless they featured Jack. The scripts for all of these broadcasts are part of the U.C.L.A. collection.
George Olsen would next appear on The Oldsmobile program on NBC starting January 7, 1933.
The Canada Dry Program (CBS)
October 30, 1932 to January 26, 1933 (13 Weeks - Sundays and Thursdays)
After a successful twenty-six week run on NBC, Canada Dry moved their program to CBS for a thirteen week run. Ted Weems and his Orchestra would take over from George Olsen and the show would continue its twice weekly schedule but air Sundays at 9:00 pm and Thursdays at 7:15 pm. Eastern.
The Ted Weems orchestra was playing an engagement in New Orleans, so the first three broadcasts originated there over WGN and the Columbia network. Joining the cast is stooge Sid Silvers and vocalist Andrea Marsh.
One review of the first show:
Jack Benny moved over to Columbia and fell miles behind the pace he was hitting
with George Olsen and Ethel Shutta. maybe he's been infected by the slow motion
of New Orleans. At any rate he was anything but funny as the Jack Benny of the
past and Mary Livingstone (Mrs. Jack Benny) is not Ethel Shutta. Sid Silvers hardly
got started to work as Benny's stooge.
Two recordings of the CBS run of the Canada Dry Program are in circulation:
It is said that Canada Dry did not like Jack making fun of their product so they dropped him as their spokesman, but as Benny had one of the most popular programs on the air, finding continued sponsorship was not difficult. Five weeks later, on March 3, 1933, he is back at NBC this time plugging Chevrolet cars.