Jeffrey Silver Collection

In several important aspects "Radio Row" in Hollywood was a whole different world than the cut-throat atmosphere you found across town at the motion picture studios, and later just down the block at the big TV network facilities. For the big and small screens, producers were convinced that they needed a certain "type" of talent, and usually, the more beautiful and glamorous you were, the closer you came to filling that type. In theory, there were plenty of "character" parts for girls and boys who had a less than stunning figure or a not quite magazine-cover quality face. In reality, even the plain-faced parts went to the beautiful people, the producers just put less makeup on them.

Obviously, looks were not as important for those working on "Radio Row", consider the many years someone as rotund as Robert Conrad played lean and tall Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke or the fact that "America's Mother of the Air" Ma Perkins was played by Virginia Payne who was only 23 when the show began. The glamor of movie people helped to attract sponsors (which is part of the reason so many of them abandoned radio for Television in the Fifties), but what was most important in the radio studio was a good attitude and a reputation for being "easy to work with". This is why there were relatively few child actors in radio.

Kids are notoriously difficult to work with, and not just because they are younger than everyone else. When kids are a necessary story element in a movie, shooting schedules need to be adapted to their school obligations. Even when the production is family fare, the set where the production takes place is a workplace for grownups, and some of the language and stories told between takes may not be suitable for "younger ears". Since no one saw the actor's face on radio, the character of a youngster can often be played by an adult speaking in a higher register of a young boy might be played by a woman. Babies on the radio were more likely to be a sound effect than an actor!

Sometimes, if a real kid was available, it was easier to work with him. Being in the right place at the right time is a common theme for many radio actors' careers, and child actor Jeffrey Silver was no exception. Born in Brooklyn, New York, 1937, and growing up in Cleveland, Jeff's path to Radio Row began when his mother saw her very bright eight-year-old's report card and could not understand why he got low marks in Citizenship. At a conference with his teacher it came out that Jeffrey loved to "keep the class in stitches." The teacher went so far as to recommend that the youngster be transferred to the Cleveland Playhouse School where he could get such hijinks out of his system. Jeff flourished at the theatrical school and landed lead roles in productions of Tom Sawyer and My Three Sons. His first radio job came when the local NBC affiliate produced "The Ohio Story". In the summer of 1948, the Silver family took an extended vacation to Long Beach, California, to enjoy some sand and surf. Jeff's mother took Grandma to watch a few audience participation programs and was hit by the idea that Jeff should audition for some radio shows.

After making a few phone calls, Jeff had six auditions lined up, and he was hired for all six! Perhaps his biggest radio role was replacing Bobby Ellis as Dagwood Bumstead's boy Alexander on Blondie. The popularity of the comic page's favorite housewife may have been even bigger on the radio than in the funny papers. Jeff remembered of the audition process, "it seemed as if every boy actor in Hollywood was trying out for it. The producers and director kept eliminating each day after script readings. After five days of so I was the last kid standing, so to speak, and was given the part." He joined the cast on their float in the Hollywood Santa Claus Lane Parade, and he recalled Penny Singleton, who played Blondie, was slightly upset thinking the float was just for cast members but Arthur Lake, who played Dagwood, brought his wife and kids on the float. In general, the casts that Jeff got to work with were pretty close.

One of his favorite programs to work on was Mr. President on ABC starring Edward Arnold. The premise of the program was that the company would dramatize an event from the life of someone who had held the office of President of the United States, with Mr. Arnold playing the different Presidents. Jeffrey, who enjoyed studying history, played the President's son and remembered that Arnold was always patient in answering his questions. Arnold also brought the cast and crew coffee and sweet rolls (and a glass of milk for Jeffrey) to rehearsals.

When he began working in radio, Jeff attended the Hollywood Professional School and received good marks. In 1950, he transferred to Luther Burbank, a public middle school on Jeffries Avenue. By this time, Jeff had earned some serious showbiz chops. He played a recurring character on the Jack Benny Program as Butch, the smart aleck member of Jack's troop, the Beverly Hills Beavers. At one point he got to work with three Oscar winners before the microphone, Ray Milland, Dean Jagger, and Mercedes McCambridge, and there was a general feeling that Jeff would have a statuette of his own someday. In the mid-Fifties, he began appearing in a number of TV guest roles and was apparently considered for an important supporting role with James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause (1955, the part went to Sal Mineo). Jeff's last Hollywood role was as McGruder, a Marine on Iwo Jima with Tony Curtis in the Outsider (1961).