''Hollywood Hotel'' is an American radio program that was broadcast in the 1930s. It featured Hollywood stars in dramatized versions of then-current movies and "helped to make Hollywood an origination point for major radio programs."
[Buxton, Frank and Owen, Bill (1972). ''The Big Broadcast: 1920-1950''. The Viking Press. SBN 670-16240-x. P. 113.] Radio historian
John Dunning called the program, sponsored by
Campbell Soup Company
Campbell Soup Company, trade name, doing business as Campbell's, is an American processed food and snack company. The company is most closely associated with its flagship canned soup products; however, through mergers and acquisitions, it has gro ...
, "the most glamorous show of its time."
The program was the inspiration for the 1937
Warner Brothers
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly known as Warner Bros. or abbreviated as WB) is an American Film studio, film and entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios, Burbank, Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, Califo ...
movie of the same title, which featured
Louella Parsons
Louella Parsons (born Louella Rose Oettinger; August 6, 1881 – December 9, 1972) was an American movie columnist and a screenwriter. She was retained by William Randolph Hearst because she had championed Hearst's mistress Marion Davies and su ...
as herself.
The instigator of the program was gossip columnist Louella Parsons, whose column was distributed by the
Hearst Syndicate. Dunning wrote that she "promoted the concept and became the driving force behind the success of ''Hollywood Hotel''."
[Dunning, John. (1976). ''Tune in Yesterday: The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Old-Time Radio, 1925-1976''. Prentice-Hall, Inc. . P.282-283.]
At the time ''Hollywood Hotel'' was launched, Parsons had no peers in Hollywood. In 1937, columnist
Jimmy Fidler
Jimmie Fidler (August 26, 1898 – August 9, 1988) was an American columnist, journalist and radio and television personality. He wrote a Hollywood gossip column and was sometimes billed as Jimmy Fidler.
Born James Marion Fidler in St. Lo ...
wrote, "Louella Parsons has broadened her domination of filmland to include radio, and woe be to those who dare to flout her authority."
''Hollywood Hotels popularity even spread beyond the United States. On January 28, 1938, all stations of the
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation
The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (french: Société Radio-Canada), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a federal Crown corporation that receives funding from the government. ...
began carrying it. It was also broadcast in Australia. A June 11, 1938, ad in a Sydney newspaper said, "In America, 'Hollywood Hotel' entertains millions of listeners, and now, from
2UE, it is winning a big audience who appreciate smart, snappy entertainment. Hear it every Thursday night at 8:15."
Format
Dunning described the hour-long program as being "built around the illusion of a glamorous hotel." Although it was broadcast from a studio, an episode would begin with "a lot of talk and film babble as the stars supposedly made their way in and out of the theater." Next came a musical segment featuring an orchestral number, a solo by a member of the cast and a performance by a guest singer. Then Parsons interviewed a celebrity. A station break ensued, followed by a 20-minute sketch based on a new movie and featuring several of the movie's stars.
[
That abridged version of a movie apparently whetted listeners' appetites for the real thing. One writer reported, "Lolly ]arsons
Arson is the crime of willfully and deliberately setting fire to or charring property. Although the act of arson typically involves buildings, the term can also refer to the intentional burning of other things, such as motor vehicles, water ...
could sometimes double a picture's earnings by admitting it to the program."
In a sense, ''Hollywood Hotel'' may have marked a transition in the relationship between the movie industry and radio. Edward D. Berkowitz wrote that, although the movie industry considered radio a threat in the latter's early years, "In time, however, Hollywood came to accept the permanent presence of radio and to use the new medium to its advantage." He went on to cite the role Parsons' program played:The conceit behind the program was that it was taking place in a glamorous Hollywood hotel -- not a utilitarian radio studio, as it actually was. Stars dropped in for drinks or dinner and caught up with Louella Parsons, who interviewed them on their latest doings. Dick Powell sang a song, replicating the variety format popular on radio, and then the stars re-created scenes from their latest pictures. It was radio in the service of Hollywood in the service of radio, and everyone made out.
Star Power
Much of ''Hollywood Hotels attraction was the caliber of Hollywood stars that appeared on it. In the first five episodes alone, listeners heard Claudette Colbert
Claudette Colbert ( ; born Émilie Claudette Chauchoin; September 13, 1903July 30, 1996) was an American actress. Colbert began her career in Broadway productions during the late 1920s and progressed to films with the advent of talking pictures ...
, Ronald Colman, Loretta Young
Loretta Young (born Gretchen Young; January 6, 1913 – August 12, 2000) was an American actress. Starting as a child, she had a long and varied career in film from 1917 to 1953. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role in the fil ...
, Jean Harlow
Jean Harlow (born Harlean Harlow Carpenter; March 3, 1911 – June 7, 1937) was an American actress. Known for her portrayal of "bad girl" characters, she was the leading sex symbol of the early 1930s and one of the defining figures of the ...
, Dolores del Río, Reginald Owen
John Reginald Owen (5 August 1887 – 5 November 1972) was a British actor. He was known for his many roles in British and American films and television programs.
Career
The son of Joseph and Frances Owen, Reginald Owen studied at Sir Herbert ...
, Victor Jory
Victor Jory (November 23, 1902 – February 12, 1982) was a Canadian-American actor of stage, film, and television. He initially played romantic leads, but later was mostly cast in villainous or sinister roles, such as Oberon in ''A Midsummer N ...
and Gloria Swanson
Gloria May Josephine Swanson (March 27, 1899April 4, 1983) was an American actress and producer. She first achieved fame acting in dozens of silent films in the 1920s and was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Best Actress, most f ...
. A January 23, 1937, article in Motion Picture Daily reported that ''Hollywood Hotel'' had 83 "film guests" from July 1, 1936, to January 1, 1937.
Listeners might have been surprised to learn that those big-name Hollywood stars appeared for free—or, more precisely, that they received one case of the sponsor's soup for their appearances. Such was Parsons' power in Hollywood that, as an article in Life
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for growth, reaction to stimuli, metabolism, energ ...
magazine summarized, she "could -- and did -- bully the biggest stars in the business into appearing without pay on her radio program." Another article in Life in 1965 summarized Parson's broadcasting success after an earlier failure:When she flopped with a local radio program on which she interviewed "guest" stars, she simply essayed a grander scheme; instead of kidnaping screen personalities one by one, she corralled them by whole companies to do synopsized versions of current movies, and in so doing, she hit it rich.
Even Parsons' power, however, had its limits. Movie stars who normally received $1,000 for appearing on a radio program resented receiving only a case of soup. Life magazine reported, "when the Screen Actors' Guild, led by Jimmy Cagney, insisted they be paid with money instead, the sponsor recoiled in horror and the program was speedily abandoned."[
]
Cast
Initially, Parsons was the hostess and star. After the soup-for-performance system was abandoned, the program was brought back in 1938 with William Powell
William Horatio Powell (July 29, 1892 – March 5, 1984) was an American actor. A major star at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he was paired with Myrna Loy in 14 films, including the ''The Thin Man (film), Thin Man'' series based on the Nick and Nora Cha ...
as host and star. Herbert Marshall
Herbert Brough Falcon Marshall (23 May 1890 – 22 January 1966) was an English stage, screen and radio actor who starred in many popular and well-regarded Hollywood films in the 1930s and 1940s. After a successful theatrical career in the Uni ...
filled in for Powell at times.
Other cast members were as follows:
* MC: Dick Powell, Fred MacMurray
Frederick Martin MacMurray (August 30, 1908 – November 5, 1991) was an American actor. He appeared in more than one hundred films and a successful television series, in a career that spanned nearly a half-century. His career as a major film le ...
, Jerry Cooper, Ken Murray and Frank Parker
* Telephone operator (opening each show with "Hello, Hollywood Hotel"): Duane Thompson
Duane Thompson (born Lura Duane Malony; July 28, 1903 – August 15, 1970) was an American film actress during Hollywood's silent film era. When Talkies pushed silent films into the background, she worked in stock theater for a time befo ...
* Vocalists: Rowene (Jane) Williams, Frances Langford
Julia Frances Newbern-Langford (April 4, 1913 – July 11, 2005) was an American singer and actress who was popular during the Golden Age of Radio and made film and television appearances for over two decades.
She was known as the "GI Nighting ...
, Anne Jamison, Lois Ravel, Shirley Ross
Shirley Ross (born Bernice Maude Gaunt, January 7, 1913 – March 9, 1975) was an American actress and singer, notable for her duet with Bob Hope, " Thanks for the Memory" from ''The Big Broadcast of 1938''. She appeared in 25 feature films be ...
, Loretta Lee
* Orchestra leaders: Raymond Paige; Ted Fio Rito
Theodore Salvatore Fiorito (December 20, 1900 – July 22, 1971),DeLong, Thomas A. (1996). ''Radio Stars: An Illustrated Biographical Dictionary of 953 Performers, 1920 through 1960''. McFarland & Company, Inc. . P. 95. known professionally a ...
* Announcer: Ken Niles
Ken Niles (December 9, 1906 – October 31, 1988) was an American radio announcer. Niles was born in Livingston, Montana. He was married to Nadia Niles, and had two children, Kenneth Niles and Denise Niles. His brother, Wendell Niles, was also a ...
[
A contemporary source also lists ]Igor Gorin
Igor Gorin (October 26, 1904 – March 24, 1982) was a Ukrainian Jewish baritone and music teacher. In screen credits, he is sometimes known as Charles Igor Gorin
Early life
Gorin was born Ignatz Greenberg on October 26, 1904, in the small v ...
as a singer on the program.
See also
*''Brownstone Theater
''Brownstone Theater'' is an old-time radio dramatic anthology series in the United States. It was broadcast on the Mutual Broadcasting System February 21, 1945 – September 23, 1945.
Format
''Brownstone Theater'' featured adaptations of stories ...
''
*''Hollywood Star Time (interview program)
''Hollywood Star Time'' was a radio interview program in the United States. It was initially broadcast on 20 Pacific Coast and Rocky Mountain stations beginning February 28, 1944. Later the 15-minute program was carried nationwide on the Blue Net ...
''
*''Lux Radio Theatre
''Lux Radio Theatre'', sometimes spelled ''Lux Radio Theater'', a classic radio anthology series, was broadcast on the NBC Blue Network (1934–35) (owned by the National Broadcasting Company, later predecessor of American Broadcasting Company ...
''
References
External links
{{Portal, Radio
Jerry Haendiges Vintage Radio Logs: "Hollywood Hotel"
1930s American radio programs
American radio dramas
Anthology radio series
CBS Radio programs
1934 radio programme debuts
1938 radio programme endings
Radio programs based on films