The Great Gildersleeve (1941-1957), initially written
by Leonard L. Levinson, was arguably the first spin-off program
in broadcast history. Built around a character who had been a staple
on the classic radio situation comedy Fibber McGee and Molly, The
Great Gildersleeve enjoyed its greatest success in the 1940s. Actor
Harold Peary played the character during its transition from the
parent show into the spin-off and later in a quartet of feature
films released at the height of the show's popularity.
On Fibber McGee and Molly, Peary's Gildersleeve was a pompous windbag
who became a consistent McGee nemesis ("You're a haa-aa-aa-aard
man, McGee!" became a Gildersleeve catch phrase). But he also
became a popular enough windbag that Kraft Foods looking
primarily to promote its Parkay margarine spread sponsored
a new series with Peary's Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve (the character
was given several conflicting first names on Fibber McGee and Molly,
and on one episode of that show revealed his middle name as Philharmonic)
as the central, slightly softened, and slightly befuddled focus
of a lively new family.
Premiering on NBC on August 31, 1941, The Great Gildersleeve moved
the title character from the McGee's Wistful Vista to Summerfield,
where Gildersleeve now oversaw his late sister's estate and took
on the rearing of his orphaned niece and nephew, Marjorie (originally
played by Lurene Tuttle and followed by Louise Erickson and Mary
Lee Robb) and Leroy Forester (Walter Tetley). In a striking forerunner
to such later television hits as Bachelor Father and Family Affair,
both of which are centered on well-to-do uncles taking in their
deceased siblings' children, Gildersleeve was a bachelor raising
two children while, at first, administering a girdle manufacturing
company ("If you want a better corset, of course it's a Gildersleeve")
and then for the bulk of the show's run, serving as Summerfield's
water commissioner, between time with the ladies and nights with
the boys. Indeed, The Great Gildersleeve may have been the first
broadcast show to be centered on a single parent balancing child-rearing,
work, and a social life, done with taste and genuine wit, often
at the expense of Gildersleeve's now slightly understated pomposity.
The key to the show was Peary, one of the most gifted voice actors
of his generation (and several others), whose booming voice and
facility with moans, groans, laughs, shudders, and inflection was
as close to body language and facial suggestion as a voice could
get. Peary was so effective, and Gildersleeve became so familiar
a character, that he was referenced and satirised periodically in
other comedies and in a few cartoons.
This collection of The Great Gildersleeve Greats includes
512 different shows and appearances for a total of 254+ hours of
listening enjoyment.
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