One of the greatest ‘vehicle’ for laughter was Groucho Marx and his television show You Bet Your Life. I happened to pick up a DVD with six of his quiz shows. Do you remember that duck which popped down when a contestant said the ‘secret word’? What a hoot it was watching soothing 1960’s black and white entertainment via modern technology. ‘Talking’ about ‘vehicles’, every show on that DVD began with Groucho driving a Desoto, the program’s sponsor. The following is an example of how fast he was with puns. A contestant happened to mention something about a marriage being incompatible. Groucho lit up like one of his smoking cigars when he explained that ‘incompatible’ means (employing more politically correct terminology), one partner lost their income and therefore, the other was no longer “pat-a-ble.”
While we happen to be on the subject of Marx, did you know that that Zeppo Marx introduced Jack Benny to his future wife in Vancouver? True story. In fact, Vancouver City Hall has a plaque dedicated to Sadie Marx who lived at the Ferrera Building still located on East Hastings. Her father was a tailor. Back in the old Orpheum days, Jack Benny (his real name was Benny Kubelsky) was entertaining at The Orpheum as well as the Marx Brothers. Zeppo Marx introduced Sadie to Jack. A few years later they were married. Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone (as she was known on television) were on their way. At the age of eighty, a few months before he passed away, the perpetual ’39 year old’ gave a benefit in Vancouver to help save the Orpheum Theatre on Granville Street.
So much has changed since those years and yet, some expressions remain, even though logically they shouldn’t. For example, a ‘hard drive’ back then might have referred to the difficulties of an old Desoto or Rambler. Today, that expression refers to the computer.
However, listening to an old Harry Belafonte song (did you ever see him perform at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre) back almost in the days of Irwin Hoffman, conductor of the Vancouver Symphony and Arthur Polson, the violinist.
It was a fun piece about ‘scratch, scratch my back’…it really is a fact, the less you itch, the more you scratch. The host was so excited he grabbed a phone in haste, dialed a number and quickly said ‘spray this place’. Now it’s 2014 and I’m always itching to sing this song. Anyway, to make a long story short the expression of dialing a number is still used in commercials even though dial phones are about as common today as pink Studebakers with fins.