![]() She estimates Benny and his work at what seems to me to be the correct level of cultural importance. Even the chapters on race and gender (which I was dreading) are well-done, combining facts about the Benny show and its reception with relevant social history vignettes. The writing is mature, the sentences are intelligent, and the writer reserves her first person involvement for the final paragraphs of, where it is most welcome. ![]() It manages to straddle the divide between too little and too much information, offering modest interpretation, and mostly letting the reader make his or her own inferences. "Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy" stands alone as a no-nonsense, no nostalgia overview of Jack's radio oeuvre. Those of us who are devoted to the Jack Benny radio programs finally have the book we deserve. Kathryn Fuller-Seeley examines a life and career in entertainment as well as the half-century, cross-media popularity of Benny's particular form of Jewish masculinity."-Eric Smoodin, author of Regarding Frank Capra: Audience, Celebrity, and American Film Studies, 1930-1960 Now we have another perfect pairing, the great Benny with one of our finest cultural historians. "When we think of Jack Benny, his real-life wife Mary Livingstone and his radio valet played by Eddie Anderson also come to mind. ![]() "At last, Jack Benny gets the treatment he deserves! This lively, wonderfully detailed and meticulously researched study of Benny's contributions to twentieth-century arts and culture will delight not only those who remember him but those who have yet to discover this icon of American comedy."-Michele Hilmes, Professor Emerita, University of Wisconsin-Madison Like its subject, Jack Benny and the Golden Age of American Radio Comedy is tone-perfect and a delight to dial in to."-Thomas Doherty, Brandeis University A meticulous researcher, sensitive critic, and unabashed fan, Fuller-Seeley examines the sonic wraparound and cultural reverberations of Benny's comic art and discovers an atmosphere thick with the buzz of ethnic, racial, and gendered static-not to mention some seriously funny gags, wisecracks, voices, and sound effects. "Jack Benny built his career on letting his second bananas cut him down to size, but media scholar Kathryn Fuller-Seeley knows a giant of twentieth-century entertainment when she sees-and hears-one.
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