Chautauqua

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Hazel Dopheide's Journey From Chautauqua to Radio

Hazel Dopheide on the cover of Stand By magazine in 1935 Both the training school and the practical school of experience made Hazel Dopheide the finished actress whom radio listeners know. After graduating from the dramatics department of McKendree College and the School of Speech at Northwestern University, Hazel entered Chautauqua and lyceum work. This was shortly before the rise of radio and Chautauqua was in its heyday. At 18, Dopheide was billed as the youngest dramatic reader of plays on ... (read more)

2024/04/07

Edgar Bergen First Performed with Charlie McCarthy at his High School

Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy on NBC radio I can't remember how old I was when I found out that Charlie McCarthy wasn't a real little boy. I doubt I really believed he wasn't a kid until I saw a photograph of Edgar Bergen with Charlie sitting on his lap in one of those radio-TV magazines. No matter -- Charlie remained as real a person to me as all those other wonderful radio folks I had met in the theater of the imagination during my youth. Charlie McCarthy was, of course, the creation of ... (read more)

2022/11/17