Chester A. Riley: I know what you did! Thanks to Chester's interference, Junior now has two dates for the school dance. Chester A. Riley is back, with long-suffering wife Peg, trouble-prone kids Junior and Babs, moochy pal Gillis, and Digger O'Dell, The Friendly Undertaker, in sixteen hilarious half-hour episodes. But you have to do that first, because people will sense if you're not willing to do that, if you're just sort of going through the motions. Whether a person is consigned to the earth or the fire is, at the end of the day, no difference. [in a flashback sequence, Peg has just given birth to her first child]. I think it's always been the case that funerals in general, and funeral directors in particular, provide an easy target for cartooning, because there is so much about what we do that can be held up for ridicule. The American Meat Institute (194445), Procter & Gamble (Teel dentifrice and Prell shampoo) (194549), and Pabst Blue Ribbon beer (194951) took turns as the radio program's sponsor. Once he had to be pulled from his apartment after the dirt sides turned to mud and caved in after a thunderstorm. Chester A. Riley: Besides that, he's nothing but a lazy loafer. Question #48486. web site copyright 1995-2014 And for those who are unchurched or unfamiliar in any tradition that gives them sort of the framework for this, a funeral home is still a safe place to talk about matters mortuary and matters of mortality. And it was over, oftentimes, the most mundane of circumstances. Digby 'Digger' O'Dell: Why, I was just taking a stroll around the pond. Jim Gillis: She'll be back in a couple or three days. interview with the film's producers|credits|privacy policy|journalistic guidelines We'd just say, "Well, let's not think about that anymore." "Lux Radio Theater" broadcast a 60-minute radio adaptation of the movie on May 8, 1950 with William Bendix, Rosemary DeCamp, Meg Randall . Crowther concluded, "[W]e suppose there are millions who will like this sort of truck. I was thrilled to find IA, where I can find some of those classics. . 2023. So yeah, I do find that people who have dealt with their dying -- whether it was taking them to their chemotherapy or sitting those weeks through hospice care, or checking in those weeks through hospice care, because we can't always be physically present -- those people who were thoroughly engaged with this are thoroughly engaged with the rest of it. Chester A. Riley: Hello, Digger. [after Riley discovers the man he accused of bank robbery is a policeman]. Chester A. Riley: You mean I'm going to live? Vance Lauderdale is the history columnist for Memphis magazine and Inside Memphis Business. Chester A. Riley: Christmas, nothing doing! [1], William Bendix also starred in the 1949 film version of The Life of Riley directed by Irving Brecher. He liked the idea that the culture had sort of organized these wheels, in some way liturgically, in some ways socially. Executives, who immediately began production on a television series, did not share Crowther's opinion, but because Bendix's movie contract barred him from doing television (a not uncommon ban in the early days of the medium when studios wanted to discourage audiences from staying home and watching TV), Jackie Gleason played Riley for one unsuccessful season in 1950. We'd be wise, as a culture, to examine some of these things. Dear j.b.: Well, for starters I can tell you that this interesting fellow (and Im certainly not disputing that) was not a Memphian, and his name wasnt really Digger ODell. So I like the word "funeral" for what we're doing here, because it doesn't require me to feel this way or that. He had a new book out about God not being great. When he heard the sad news about his wife, said a newspaper, Diggers own heart broke like a clod of dirt. I know his nickname was Digger, but thats just mean. An unrelated radio show with the name Life of Riley was a summer replacement show heard on CBS from April 12, 1941, to September 6, 1941. Jim Gillis: Sure! Well, both my parents were buried like Irish Catholics were buried, so there was this sort of tribal and religious language that had been developed over centuries for how we do this. He didnt come close to breaking his record. On any given day, it's up for grabs. John Brown returned as the morbid, counseling undertaker Digby (Digger) O'Dell. We are less grounded than our grandparents were. While readying for Monahan, Riley's daughter Babs, a serious-minded college student, catches the eye of Miss Bogle's handsome young nephew, Jeff Taylor. Chester A. Riley: Their gonna slit my throat from ear to ear and rip out my tonsils, and she says there's nothing to it! [citation needed] Brown's lines as the undertaker were often repetitive, including puns based on his profession; but thanks to Brown's delivery, the audience loved him. He then is embarrassed in front of the Monahans when Junior appears with his full piggy bank, having been unable to open it, and during a struggle with the waiter, the bank falls to the ground and breaks. I see my sons now working through this, and their generation. She has her picture on the front page. Burial was the norm in the Western world probably until the mid-60s. Riley's catch phrase in the series and the film was "what a revolting development this turned out to be." He'll never amount to anything. Whether youre growing hot or sweet varieties, there are some important tips for success. The question is not meant to mock; the question is to say: "What is it you don't want to see? I have often noticed the difference between the first day that a family will spend here and the next day. There's this wonderful essay that was written -- I have it framed in the hallway there; the woman's name, I think, is Sullivan who wrote it. Thomas Lynch reads to camera his essay Tract, in which he broaches the topic of his own funeral. Unreliable advice on how to handle these situations came from Riley's pal Digger O'Dell, the friendly undertaker, who would sneak in a string of dark-humored jokes before he had to be "shoveling off". But cremation has increased since then by about 10 percent in every decade. Peg Riley: No. And yet you write that beautiful essay Tract in your book, The Undertaking, which is in some way a map, is it? Director Irving Brecher Writers Irving Brecher Groucho Marx (story) Stars William Bendix Rosemary DeCamp James Gleason See production, box office & company info Add to Watchlist 10 User reviews Photos 10 Top cast Edit Irving Brecher's onscreen credit reads: "Written and directed by Irving Brecher." Lewis, and I think, how would you get by without it? Bearing witness one way or another, that's a key ingredient. Jim Gillis: Yeah, well, he oughta shampoo more often - with kerosene! Both [are part of] this effort to say something about something unspeakable -- great love, great loss, great hope, great fear, great doubt, the fist we shake in God's face, asking him, "What did you have in mind here?". Who were the other musicians in that performance? The till doesn't ring as precisely, and what works and where the values are require more discernment. It's something handled by "them" offsite, elsewhere, and I think that's problematical. It's not that you don't want to see your mother or your father or your sister or your brother. I'm calling it off now! The Life of Riley (1949) co-starred Rosemary DeCamp, James Gleason, Beluah Bondi, Richard Long and John Brown as "Digger O'Dell" the friendly undertaker, a role that he also played on the radio program. I always knew I'd bring up my daughter to be somebody someday. Brecher then saw William Bendix as taxicab company owner Tim McGuerin in Hal Roach's The McGuerins from Brooklyn (1942). Whats more, said one newspaper, in his heyday, he could knock down $15,000 for a 60-day burial. At the mobile home park, the only money he brought home came from contributions. One day, after paying out all but five of his fifty-dollar-a-week paycheck, Riley has to sneak into his house to avoid his landlady, Miss Martha Bogle, to whom he owes money. There is a comfort when you don't have to reinvent that wheel, when we know we have to be at church at a certain time and that these prayers will be said and not those, and that this is accustomed behavior and this is outside the pale, and this is where we go. home|introduction|watch online|stories & special video|to be an undertaker|join the discussion So we weep and we laugh, we laugh and we sing, and we try to work our way around this changed reality in much the same way a death in the family articulates this changed reality. I thought, this guy could play it. I've never lost a father yet! Let's see! Don't you worry about him; we'll pull him through. You can read in history books about the way a funeral procession was laid out -- which civic group, which ecclesiastical group, which fraternal group, which family group -- how everybody was lined up, so that as people walked in, there was this rise and fall of relationship and grief, and people know this, that good, orderly direction that was assumed by this process, this ritual. People will know that. Chester A. Riley: What do you think I'm paying you ten cents a week for, to spy on Babs! In doing this, in accompanying the dead, getting them where they need to go, we get where we need to be. When Burt finally tells Babs about his financial predicament and suggests that they marry quickly so that Riley can keep his job and he can save his life, Babs reluctantly agrees. He's a man who's understood In Brooklyn or in Hollywood. Vance Lauderdale is the history columnist for Memphis magazine and Inside Memphis Business. I've seen it happen to Sean [his son], where you're swinging the door at night, helping people with their coats, directing them one place or another, carrying flowers, doing all the innocuous little things that add up to taking care of a family during visitation. Dear Vance:My parents remember a Memphian named Digger ODell who had himself buried alive here sometime in the 1960s as a promotional stunt. Not wanting to uproot his family, Riley determines to come up with the $1,500 down payment and goes from bank to bank searching for a loan. And something is. I prefer the dead languages. Barbara 'Babs' Riley: But Dad, Simon's only 20. So it's not like you do things for them as much as you do it with them and embolden them to do for themselves. But when the entire conversation circles around and around about how much it's going to cost or how can you prevent this charge, I just find it silly after a while. I'm certain the same thing holds for people who put their dead in the sea or the fire or a tomb -- that we need time to disengage. Not to worry, though. Jim Gillis: So by her leavin', I'm getting away without goin' out of the house. The oblivion is the oblivion wherever it is. I was watching [author and cultural commentator] Christopher Hitchens the other day. In addition to Bendix' Riley, the show featured immensely popular supporting characters, including Digby "Digger" O'Dell, the ghoulish "friendly undertaker" voiced by John Brown (who also played Thorny on Ozzie and Harriet, Al on My Friend Irma, and Broadway on The Damon Runyan Theatre). Where is the meaning? Not all of the radio cast made the transition to film; Paula Winslowe and Barbara Eiler were replaced with DeCamp and Meg Randall as Riley's wife, Peg, and daughter, Babs respectively. Chester A. Riley: [on the phone] What is it, a boy or a girl? The radio series greatly benefited from the immense popularity of a supporting character, Digby "Digger" O'Dell (John Brown), "the friendly undertaker." The Life of Riley starring William Bendix as lovable, blundering, Chester A. Riley, was a radio situation comedy broadcast during and after wartime 40s. Chester A. Riley: The baby announcements? She means other kinds of trouble. Why would he leave his wife? Bendix, Rosemary DeCamp, Richard Long, Meg Randall and John Brown reprised their screen roles for an May 8, 1950 Lux Radio Theatre broadcast. Many customers have had positive experiences ordering from them, and their customer service has been praised for keeping buyers updated on order status. If I'm an Italian Catholic or an Orthodox Jew or a Baptist African American, I don't have to wonder what's going to happen, because I know that my community of co-religionists, of ethnic fellows, my neighborhood, whatever, they've organized a plan so that I don't have to spend the first several hours or days or weeks trying to figure out what to do next because it's already been told by tradition, by custom, by culture, by form. My mother died on the 27th of October and was buried on the 31st of October, so it was the Eve of All Saints. there are very few hands raised in the room, because cremation is often shorthand for disappearance. WGBH educational foundation, How we've become estranged from death and the dead, The meaning and power of rituals and customs, The often-mocked tradition of an open casket, How the baby boomers will change the conversation about funerals. Find IA, where I can find some of those classics probably until the mid-60s as the,. 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