The Conspiracy

Comedian Fred Allen knows a lot about radio, but he doesn't always approve of the medium that gives him such a good living (TIME, April 7). Last week, in vacationing Critic John Crosby's syndicated column, Guest Critic Allen let fly at the "multiple forces [that] conspire to thwart" radio comedians. Sample Allen peeves:

The Writer: ". . . An ulcer with a pencil. . . . The weight of [his] head causes his buggy-whip backbone to bend forward, giving the impression that the writer is concealing a boomerang in the back of his coat."

The Censor: "... A man with no sense of humor who is so narrow-minded he thinks in strips. He comes to his job equipped with a blue pencil and the right of way. [He] can find dirt in an infant's glance. . . ."

The Studio Audience: "... A mass of negative flotsam. Open the door of any studio at any hour of the day or night and a faceless group will flock inside to participate in quiz programs, community sings, or to laugh and applaud as directed. . . ."

The Guest Star: "... A temperamental Hollywood glamor girl. . . . Her agent demands that the guest star's last three pictures, Zombie in the Oven, Chuck Wagon Clarisse, and She Couldn't Say Maybe, be mentioned in the dialogue. ..."

The Survey: ". . . On the basis of a few hundred phone calls, made each month, the survey arrives at a mythical figure which supposedly is the approximate number of alleged listeners tuning in the comedian's program. . . ."

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