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Fibber McGee and Molly was an outgrowth of an earlier network show called Smackout. In this series, Jim Jordan played a grocer who was "smack out" of everything but tall tales, with his wife Marian as Teeny, the little girl who lived across the road. The tall tales element carried over into FM&M when it was launched on April 16, 1935 on NBC, replacin The earliest shows took a little bit of polishing, but right from the beginning the engine that drove the show was Fibber's penchant for tall tales, although it would be some time before Molly would develop into the soul of understanding well-remembered by classic radio enthusiasts.
Also on the show from the beginning was announcer Harlow Wilcox, into his fifth year in radio by the time Fibber and Molly opened. At first playing character roles in addition to reading the commercials, Wilcox's main role in the show was as himself, showing up to deliver the "integrated commercial" that was worked into the story at the halfway point of the half-hour.
The show itself developed into a sitcom with a dose of vaudeville patter shot through it; the "story" usually took a back seat to exchanges with Wistful Vista's citizens based around a theme (or not), while Fibber was trying to accomplish something, although usually he didn't. Molly's role in all of this was to offer a voice of reason, in an often futile attempt to keep Fibber anchored in reality, but to stand by her man nonetheless.
A classic lineup of characters passed through the door at 79 Wistful Vista: Abigail Uppington (Isabel Randolph), the snooty society matron; Mayor LaTrivia (Gale Gordon), whom Fibber always managed to unravel; and Doc Gamble (Arthur Q. Bryan), the "bone bender". Marian reprised Teeny, her little girl voice from Smackout, to drive Fibber to distraction. Also in this mob were a pack of characters played by Bill Thompson, another cast member from the earliest days: the joke-telling Old Timer ("That's pretty good, Johnny, but that ain't the way I heerd it!"), Nick Depopulous, who ran the Greek restaurant, and Wallace Wimpole, with the Droopy-dog voice (or more correctly, Droopy Dog had a Wallace Wimple voice, usually supplied by Thompson) and the big wife named Sweetie Face. Various other characters drifted in and out of the show over the years, but the basic group was pretty much set by the start of the second World War.
For a few shining years, however, the character that was second only to McGee and Molly in airtime was Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve, as played by Hal Peary. Several episodes were built with the Fibber vs. Gildy angle as its foundation. Another difference between the blusterfests with the other characters and Gildersleeve was the intensity. With Mayor LaTrivia or Doctor Gamble, you knew that it wouldn't go much farther than a few nasty words. On the other hand, Fibber pulled a lot of interesting practical jokes on his "old pal" Gildy, and at least once Gildy was preparing to clean Fibber's clock, although it didn't exactly happen that way. All this came on top of a regular stream of verbal invective, but in spite of all this, Gildersleeve and Fibber were bosom pals. In one of the earliest examples of sitcoms spinning off sitcoms, Hal Peary took the Gildersleeve character to his own show in 1941. Beulah, the McGees' maid for a brief time, also ended up with a successful show of her own.
Just as memorable were the characters that weren't heard, but implied, through conversation (Fibber's pal Fred Nitney, Molly's Uncle Dennis). Most famous of these was Myrt the telephone operator, who Fibber got every time he picked up the phone. The type of wordplay that was used in the Myrt spots was the bread and butter of radio comedy in the 30s and 40s.
And then there was that closet...The legendary hall closet, piled high with a lifetime of mementos, knickknacks, and junk, made its first appearance in 1940. You could hear it all, invariably climaxed by the tinkling of a tiny dinner bell. Once the potent nature of this door was estabished, the writer--since Don Quinn was the sole writer until the mid-40s--would often have Fibber "clean out" the closet just for the variety, and the audience would laugh just as hard at the silence. The "bait and switch" was done with the other running bits...one time, Myrt actually got a number for Fibber! (Sidenote: A brief film clip of the Fibber and Molly soundman "working" the closet, excerpted from a "behind the mike"-style documentary, actually turned up in, of all places, an OTR themed episode of the Muppet Babies cartoon! It's really something to see.)
The sponsorship of Johnson's Wax ended on May 23, 1950. That fall, the show opened for Pet Milk, who stayed on for two years, and then Reynolds Aluminum, who stayed on through the last 30-minute broadcast on June 30, 1953. On October 5, 1953, a 15 minute daily version opened, but it was too late for radio. Fibber and Molly finished as a series of 5 minute segments which peppered NBC's Monitor weekend service in the late '50s.
During the 1959-60 TV season, a Fibber McGee and Molly series was attempted with Bob Sweeny and Cathy Lewis attempting the title roles, and Hal Peary returning to the fold, this time playing Mayor La Trivia. Somehow, it just didn't work, and this new version was laid to rest in January 1960.
Fortunately, thanks in part to Johnson's Wax, who were smart enough to hang on to their broadcast recordings decades after they dropped the show, a large selection of shows from the "classic" years of the show have made it into circulation, both through commercial sources and old-time radio collectors.
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Established October 20, 1996; Last revision: March 16, 2004. Original content copyright 1996-2004 Eric N. Wilson.