Jeffrey Richards
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Filming radio genres i) comedy
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Comedy was consistently the most popular genre of radio programme. The primacy of verbal comedy put paid to any radio career for Harpo Marx, who never spoke in the Marx Brothers' films. So on radio in shows like Flywheel, Shyster and Flywheel the Marx Brothers were reduced to two: Chico with his malapropisms and cod-Italian accent and Groucho with his quickfire gag routines. There was also strict censorship, with sex, politics, race, religion, profanity and bodily functions all banned. The popularity of the domestic sitcom format was such that it revitalized the radio careers of George Burns and Gracie Allen. The comic domestic sitcom on British radio was the creation of the multitalented Mabel Constanduros. Radio picked up the series from the cinema and created Meet the Huggetts, a light-hearted family series which ran from 1952 to 1961 and starred Jack Warner and Kathleen Harrison as Joe and Ethel Huggett.

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