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JACK BENNY PROGRAM, THE - The Life of Jack Benny

Air Date/Released Sunday, November 28, 1954
Station/Studio CBS / J&M Productions
Featuring Joe Besser (Solo)

Jack Benny adapted his long-running 1930s - 1950s radio show to television in 1950, with the characters and characterizations that made his show a Sunday night favorite for decades. As the TV show progressed thru the 1950s, some of the regular cast retired, e.g., Jack's real-life wife Mary 'Livingstone' Benny, and the show focused more on Jack's "on-air variety show" adventures with guest stars. Regardless, Benny's vain and cheap characterization never changed, and radio cast members Mary, Dennis Day, Phil Harris, Bob Crosby, Artie Auerbach, Sheldon Leonard and The Sportsmen Quartet continued to make guest and cameo appearances. Don Wilson, Mel Blanc and Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson were supporting mainstays throughout its run, and Jack's television program remained a quality, comedy classic until it ended in 1965.

Jack plans an autobiographical show for his next broadcast, casting a beautiful model as his first love, and the woman who really was his first love as his Mother. The boy auditioning for Jack 'as a youth' loses the role to his pushy and greedy child agent (Harry Shearer). Joe Besser guest stars as a studio employee, hysterical over Jack's running late.


Live and kinescoped, this episode was remade and filmed several years later, airing on January 1, 1961; Joe Besser did not appear in the 1961 episode. Baseball legend Ted Williams appears in a Lucky Strikes commercial.

Cast: Jack Benny (Himself), Eddie Anderson (Rochester Van Jones), Don Wilson (Himself), Bill Days, Gurney Bell, Robert Garsen, Martin Sperzel (The Sportsmen Quartet), Joe Besser (Joe), Mel Blanc (Herman the Western Union man), Hallene Hill (Mildred Holmquist), Jean Willes (Miss Gordon), Leigh Snowden (Sexy girl), Dick Ryan (Kevin O'Hoolahan), Jimmy Baird (Jimmy), Harry Shearer (Harry Shearer), Andre Baruch (Commercial announcer), Ted Willams (Himself)

Crew: Ralph Levy (Director), Hilliard Marks (Producer), Sam Perrin, George Balzer, Milt Josefsberg, John Tackaberry (Writers), Mahlon Merrick (Musical Conductor)
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