Texaco Star Theater was an American comedy-variety show, broadcast on radio from 1938 to 1948 and telecast from 1948 to 1956. It was one of the first successful examples of American television broadcasting, remembered as the show that gave Milton Berle the nickname "Mr. Television".
It originated in the late 1930s with a popular radio comedy series starring Ed Wynn. The classic 1940-44 program, hosted by radio's Fred Allen, was followed by a radi...
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Texaco Star Theater was an American comedy-variety show, broadcast on radio from 1938 to 1948 and telecast from 1948 to 1956. It was one of the first successful examples of American television broadcasting, remembered as the show that gave Milton Berle the nickname "Mr. Television".
It originated in the late 1930s with a popular radio comedy series starring Ed Wynn. The classic 1940-44 program, hosted by radio's Fred Allen, was followed by a radio series on ABC (the former NBC Blue) in the spring of 1948. When Texaco (now Chevron Corporation) first took it to television on NBC on June 8, 1948, the show had a huge cultural impact.
The roots of Texaco Star Theater were in a 1930s radio hit, Ed Wynn, the Fire Chief, featuring the manic "Perfect Fool" in a half hour of vaudevillian routines interspersed with music. When Wynn's ratings began to slide and the comedian lapsed amidst personal and professional crises, Texaco turned up as the new sponsor for Fred Allen in 1940, with the show re...
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