I'm noticing a tendency,  when I do a review post,  that often the subject matter reminds me of another show.  I had so much fun doing the write-up of the butler comedy It's Higgins, Sir,  That I decided to share a similarly themed show, the hilarious comedy, The Smiths of Hollywood. 

As the title implies,  the show is set in Hollywood,  and it revolves around the daily life of the Smith family,  with Harry Von Zell as Attorney Bill Smith,  Brenda Marshall as his wife Nancy, and Jan Ford, who plays their precocious daughter, nicknamed "Bumps".   The thrust of the story comes when Mr. Smith's stuffy British uncle Cecil Smythe,  played by the charismatic Arthur Treacher, comes to live with them.  Uncle Cecil is a hilariously stereotypical English snob,  and like Higgins,  the clash of cultures between him and the family provides the comedic spark.  Treacher fans especially will find Cecil's condescending attitude a pleasant change from his other, more personable roles. 

As a side-effect of the show's setting, a number of Hollywood stars appear as themselves, including Ann Sheridan, Marsha Hunt, Lucille Ball, and William Holden.  You can tell that the producers were really trying to sell the show to audiences.  There were twenty-seven episodes in it's run,  and every one of them is thoroughly entertaining. Unlike some shows that are basically cast-supported personality pieces, everyone in this cast holds up very well against Treacher's fireball perfomance.
Arthur Treacher is one of my personal favourite figures on the movie landscape.  He lights up everything he's in, and livens up roles that otherwise would fall completely flat.  He's in some movies I'm very fond of, including the Shirley Temple classics The Little Princess and Heidi, and apropos of my previous It's Higgins, Sir post,  he played the amazing butler Jeeves in Thank You, Jeeves (1936), and Step Lively, Jeeves (1937) opposite David Niven as Bertie Wooster.

Harry Von Zell had a colourful career in the movies,  radio, and on television, with a longtime announcer's spot on The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show.  Brenda Marshall, as well as being a capable and interesting actress, was a very beautiful woman.  She showed up in quite a few movies that I like, including Whispering Smith (1948),  Captains of the Clouds (1942), and best of all,  The Sea Hawk (1940), alongside Errol Flynn.  Jan Ford later became a Howard Hughes protege-lover-et cetera.   Renamed Terry Moore, she would become known to sci fi fans as the female lead in Mighty Joe Young.  She was quite attractive, and in her 50s she even posed for Playboy,  giving a new meaning to her Smiths of Hollywood character's name.

This is a great companion piece to It's Higgins, Sir!, and they go well together as a double feature.  I hope you enjoy the show!

Download The Smiths of Hollywood episode,  "Cecil's Auto Accident"
HERE

The butler,  as a character,  has been popular in fiction for a very long time.  Everyone is familiar with at least one.  If you were around in the 1980's, it would have been the snide Mr. Belvedere (writer Gwen Davenport's creation from the 1947 book Belvedere), or perhaps John Gielgud's fiercely aloof Hobson in the 1981 comedy film,  Arthur.   Earlier on, it might have been the capable Crichton in J.M. Barrie's much-produced 1901 stage play,  "The Admirable Crichton", or the earnestly noble Marmaduke Ruggles in the classic tale Ruggles of Red Gap,  or William Powell's bemused Godfrey in My Man Godfrey (1936),  or,  most likely of all, P.G. Wodehouse's  near-superhuman valet,  the inimitable Jeeves.  

There is another butler that also had a certain small claim to fame;   if one turned on the radio in 1951,  that butler was called Higgins.  Higgins was played by the charming British character actor and comedian Harry Mcnaughton.  Mcnaughton had a career in films spanning from the 1920's to the mid-50's,  and was apparently quite successful on the stage.  His more permanent claim to (relative) fame, though, was the radio game show spoof, "It Pays to Be Ignorant", which ran from 1942 to 1951 on both CBS and NBC.  Immediately after the run of that programme,  he moved over into the role of Higgins.  He was perfect for the part;  he had a crisp received pronunciation accent, a weapon that he used to deliver a never-ending barrage of caustic one-liners to great effect.

The basic premise of It's Higgin's, Sir  was a simple one;  a typical 1950's American family inherits a highly-mannered butler from a distant relative, and hilarity ensues.  It's Mcnaughton that drives the programme with his fantastic comedic timing,  and the rest of the cast does an amazing job in helping him to shine.  It's a truly fantastic listening experience for any OTR comedy fan,  and, I dare say, for fans of 1950's television shows like Father Knows Best.

It's worth mentioning here that there was a television version of the show called Our Man Higgins (1962–1963),  in which Higgins is portrayed by veteran stage and film actor,  Stanley Holloway.  Holloway was in a number of movies that I enjoy, including Ten Little Indians (1965),  The Lavender Hill Mob (in 1951, during Mcnaughton's stretch as Higgins),  My Fair Lady (1964), and The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970).


Download It's Higgins, Sir,  episode #1,  "Higgins Arrives"    HERE

In those early days of radio, well before the profound effects of the civil rights movement, there was an interesting transition point for the media exposure of immigrants and minorities in American culture.  The popular media of the time was peppered with ethnic stereotypes, and some were quite well known, even beloved. Most people, even now,  are familiar with Amos & Andy,  Charlie Chan,  Mr. Moto, and even milder portrayals, such as Luigi Bosco in the well-known series Life With Luigi,  and Mrs. Goldberg in the charming Jewish-oriented soap The Goldbergs.  It was rare to have a non-white-identified person play their own race at that time,  and if so,  they were usually not allowed the full spectrum of human expression.
As much as people may be offended by these things now,  back on the 1930's and 40's these characters were a regular part of the lives of most Americans.  Warner Oland's Charlie Chan was popular,  as well as was Peter Lorre's fantastic Mr. Moto, and along with Boris Karloff's Mr. Wong, they were always the smartest men in the room;  the Caucasian characters (the good guys, anyway) always deferred to their skill.  Of course this wasn't always the case (Amos & Andy is a less flattering example), and in any discussion of the subject the more negative aspects must be fully acknowledged.  That said,  I don't let those very real issues detract from the artistic contributions of the period.  The aforementioned characters have provided some of my fondest watching and listening experiences, whether I'm expected to shun them or not.

Now that the proper caveats have been made, I feel prepared to present the wonderfully amusing but socially eye-burning character Frank Watanabe.  Frank is the valet (he's called a 'houseboy', but his duties are primarily that of a valet) of the well-to-do English fop Archie,  amusingly played by the well-spoken film actor Reginald Sharland.  Watanabe seems to enjoy his employer,  and is always playing the raconteur,  telling jokes and stories that the honourable Archie never seems to understand.  There's a good reason for that.  Frank was played by voice actor Eddie Holden,  and when it came to stereotyped dialect,  he really pulled out all the stops.  The character is supposedly  Japanese,  from Tokyo,  and the dialogue is so convoluted that at times it comes across as a racially intense tongue-twister.  In spite of that,  I find myself enjoying their antics;  it's a sort of inverted Jeeves and Wooster,  yet one isn't quite sure who is the genius and who is the twit.  The comparison goes further in that they're always in some sort of sticky situation,  and Archie always involves Frank in the solution.  They're simple stories, usually only fifteen minutes in length,  and at times verge on being standup routines.  Still,  Holden and Sharland keep the fun going in a light and peppy way,  showing glimpses of the deeper talents hidden behind the shtick.

From a historial point of view,  the timeline of the show's run is telling.  Frank Watanabe and the Honourable Archie ran up until 1939, and then,  mysteriously (or perhaps not so), there was a failed spinoff in 1940, titled merely The Honourable Archie...without his Japanese Houseboy.  One year later,  the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the United States was in a full-on war with Japan.  At that point, the idea of a sympathetic Japanese character on the American airwaves would have been surreal (yep, in spite of the stereotype,  Frank Watanabe was very much so, especially relative to the propaganda that would follow);  even Mr. Moto's film run ended in 1939,  returning a distant twenty-six years later.   In spite of it's eye-burning cultural aspects,  I hope that you'll listen and enjoy the show.  I'm pretty certain you'll have fun...just keep the eye drops handy.

Download the episode "Frank & Archie try to pass a cop in disguise"  HERE