OVER AGAIN"
A Great Radio Pair Look Back Over Their
Career on Their Fourteenth Anniversary
By Amos 'n' Andy
from Movie Radio Guide March 1942
WHEN the nation turned the hands of its timepieces to adjust them to the new war time, we started wondering what we would do if some magic power could enable us to turn back over the years of Amos 'n' Andy's existence. We wondered if, perhaps, we would be guided differently. We talked about what might have been done with the characters Madam Queen, Brother Crawford, The Kingfish, and all the others. Would we have made them mean what they do today? Would we have changed any of the patterns we have followed steadily all these years?
Of course, in the first place we don't want to turn back the clock. Even though we realize there were things we could have improved, we're content to carry on from here. But it's always interesting to go back over the past and perhaps remodel it in imagination. It's interesting to us to do so, because we have so completely and enjoyably lived the lives of Amos 'n' Andy.
There's a lot to look back over--a matter of millions of words of dialog wrung from our experience and form thin air and knocked out on the old typewriter; a matter of a decade and a half of broadcasting five days a week; a matter of a couple of hundred fictitious characters that we have had to make live in our minds and in our voices.
Yes, a lot of water has run under the bridge since we, Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll, sat down at a microphone to become "Amos 'n' Andy" -- March 19, 1928 --after holding forth as "Sam 'n' Henry" for a couple of years. Radio has changed a lot, and the world itself has changed somewhat.
But we're still contented that Amos 'n' Andy are the same old Amos 'n' Andy they've always been.
One of the policies we have followed most steadfastly throughout the years, and one which might, perhaps, be most debatable, is the "no audience" practice. If we were starting all over, would we follow that policy again? We're sure of our answer to that: We would. There are two reasons-- and neither of them is temperamental aloofness. In the first place, we try so intently to put ourselves completely into the many roles we portray that we feel spectators make us fall short in building a perfectly natural atmosphere. In the second place, we have always felt that radio in general and our homey little act in particular is chiefly for the listeners in the home, and us usually more effective with no possible intrusive sounds from an audience. We still have both reasons for carrying on that policy.
And because we believed our skits should be aimed directly at the family sitting in the living-room, including the kids, we've always had for our number-one script rule "Keep it clean." Next to that, these rules: "Keep it plain," Keep it true to character," and of course "Make it funny." We'd have the same rules if we had it all to do over. Naturally, we haven't always been funny to everybody. But we don't think we've fallen short in the first rule-- and we certainly don't think that following this principle has been a mistake. Radio and the world may have undergone some changes--but people and human values haven't.
One thing we've sometimes wavered about is whether we should have more performers in our sketch instead of portraying practically all the characters ourselves. We have had a few voices other than our own in the story. We have considered others. And we still wonder if we would have a bigger cast if we were starting again. It isn't a snap--being so many different people. But we've got a mighty big kick out of it.
Then there's the fact that we've had a n umber of characters, mostly women, who have been talked about plenty on the show but who have never been heard speaking themselves. We might have had Madam Queen and some of the others more vocally active, but listeners seemed to now them and take to them just about as well without hearing them.
There are many other questions that could be argued over. For instance, would we have the same old reliable theme song? Undoubtedly. We still think the "Perfect Song," which was written for "The Birth of a Nation," a perfect song for the theme melody of "Amos 'n' Andy." Would we have Amos get married and be a family man and Andy continue to be a blundering Don Juan? Yes, for that seems to us to be the ideal situation for working in both ludicrous humor and human interest of a little more serious nature. Would we like the same time of day for broadcasting? Yes, again. Most people are at home and most people want to relax and grin a bit at that time of day. We like to help them.
Well, it looks as if there isn't much we'd care to change. That's true. Not because we think our work has been perfect but because we've got such a tremendous kick out of doing it our way. And as long as listeners tune in and smile with us and tell us once in a while they're still with us-- and, of course, buy our sponsor's product! --we should worry about new formulas.
Maybe there would be a few things we'd do differently if we had it to do over again. But for the most part it would be the same "Amos 'n' Andy" that we, Gosden and Correll, have lived with these rapid radio years. "Check and double check."Return to the "Original Amos 'n' Andy Web Page
04/08/2000
