The Jack Benny Program

- Season 6

(1955)

Jack is in good spirits about the new season until Don and his wife, Lois, come by and harass him about fat jokes. Then, it's an infuriating visit to Dennis' home where his mother insults Jack for not making her son the star of the show.

Jack illustrates how he relaxes after a show, but its more like La Vie en Cracked than La Vie en Rose. His masseur ties him in knots and rubs in rancid chicken fat, because Jack pays him only $3 a session. Rather than a swank Hollywood hot-spot, cheapskate Jack takes his chic date Gertrude, the switchboard operator, to an underground French restaurant crowded with sloshed Parisian sewer workers - who make Ed Norton look debonair.

Jack introduces Peggy King, the regular vocalist on "The George Gobel Show" who arouses Jack's ire when she tells him that George Gobel is "the best". In the second half of the show, Art Linkletter reprises his role as a children's interviewer from his show "House Party" and asks four youngsters about their romances. He then interviews Don Wilson, Peggy King, Rochester Van Jones and Jack Benny who pretend to be nine-year-olds. Throughout the program, Jack is harassed by an audience member who insists that he be entertained or provided with a new refrigerator.

Jack figures out that he's not a great violinist; Rochester and Mary plot to fool him into believing he is a great violinist with the help of Issac Stern.

"Jack Gives Johnny Carson Advice" about maintaining a long show business career through versatility, but Johnny turns the tables on him by displaying his many talents including singing, dancing and drumming.

Jack hears there's uranium for the finding in Death Valley, so he's off to buy gear for an expedition. At the camping store he duels his nemesis, the sarcastic sales clerk Frank Nelson. In the desert Jack's party confronts other prospectors, and some Mexican stereotypes a la Treasure of Sierra Madre.

Essentially a filmed radio show, a few chairs and a microphone on a stage, Jack and company re-create what was a tradition on his radio show, a skit where "Old Year" packs up and moves out and "New Year" moves in.

A dinner invitation gone bad causes Jack to seek legal advice with regard to firing his announcer, Don Wilson.

Jack tells the story of how he first met Rochester, while riding on a train.

Dennis Day presents Jack with a hand-crafted birthday gift and then sings "Autumn Leaves"; Don Wilson asks if his son Harlow can read a Lucky Strike commercial, then gets angry when Harlow can't remember the lines; Frances Bergen and William Holden demonstrate the proper way to do a movie kiss after Frances tells Jack he has "no sex appeal at all."

Jack is so mad at Rochester for falling asleep during his show, he sends him to his room without dinner.

Jack and the gang vacation in Palm Springs.

Jack's first visitor to his new Beverly Hills office is Executive Head of MGM, Dore Schary.

Know what this is about? Be the first one to add a plot.

Jack is frustrated at the passport office.