Milton Berle

Milton Berle, born Mendel Berlinger on July 12, 1908, in Manhattan, was an American actor and comedian whose career stretched across more than eighty years. He began as a child actor in silent films and on stage, later moving into radio, movies, and television. As the host of NBC’s *Texaco Star Theatre* from 1948 to 1953, he became the first major star of American television, known to millions as “Uncle Miltie” and “Mr. Television” during the medium’s initial Golden Age. He received two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for radio and one for television.

Berle was born into a Jewish family in a five-story walkup in Harlem. His birth name was Mendel Berlinger, but he adopted the professional name Milton Berle at age sixteen. His father, Moses Berlinger, was of German-Jewish descent and worked as a paint and varnish salesman. His mother, Sarah Glantz Berlinger, of Polish-Jewish ancestry, changed her name to Sandra Berle after her son became famous. He had three older brothers; two later worked on Berle’s TV production staff, and a third, Phil, became a programming executive at NBC.

Berle entered show business at age five in 1913 by winning a children’s Charlie Chaplin contest. He also worked as a child model, notably as “Buster Brown” for Buster Brown shoes, and appeared in silent films. He claimed his first film role was in *The Perils of Pauline*, playing a young boy thrown from a moving train, though this has never been independently verified. In his autobiography, he recalled the director assured him Pauline would save his life, but at the crucial moment a bundle of rags was thrown instead. He also said he played child roles in films such as *Bunny’s Little Brother*, *Tess of the Storm Country*, *Birthright*, *Love’s Penalty*, *Divorce Coupons*, and *Ruth of the Range*, and made trips to Hollywood for parts in *Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm* with Mary Pickford, *The Mark of Zorro* with Douglas Fairbanks Sr., and *Tillie’s Punctured Romance* with Charlie Chaplin. Film historians, including Glenn Mitchell in *The Chaplin Encyclopedia*, dispute his appearance in *Tillie’s Punctured Romance*, suggesting the role was likely played by child actor Gordon Griffith. In 1916, Berle enrolled in the Professional Children’s School.

Around age twelve in 1920, Berle made his stage debut in a revival of the musical *Florodora* in Atlantic City, New Jersey, which later moved to Broadway. By sixteen, he was working as a master of ceremonies in vaudeville. He also played small bit parts in several silent films during the 1910s and 1920s, though some are disputed. In 1932, he starred in the Broadway musical *Earl Carroll’s Vanities*. By the early 1930s, he was a successful stand-up comedian, modeling his style after vaudeville comic Ted Healy.

In 1933, producer Jack White hired Berle to star in the featurette *Poppin’ the Cork*, a musical comedy about the repeal of Prohibition, for which Berle also co-wrote the score. He continued songwriting, co-writing the title song for the 1940 film *Li’l Abner* and co-writing the Spike Jones B-side “Leave the Dishes in the Sink, Ma.”

From 1934 to 1936, Berle appeared frequently on *The Rudy Vallee Hour* and gained publicity as a regular on *The Gillette Original Community Sing*, a Sunday night comedy-variety show on CBS from September 1936 to August 1937. In 1939, he hosted *Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One*, where panelists finished jokes sent in by listeners. In the late 1940s, he canceled well-paying nightclub gigs to focus on radio. He hosted *Three Ring Time*, sponsored by Ballantine Ale, followed by a 1943 program for Campbell’s Soups. The audience-participation show *Let Yourself Go* (1944–1945) was slapstick radio, with studio audience members acting out urges directed at Berle. In 1946, he hosted *Kiss and Make Up* on CBS, where a jury from the audience decided contestants’ problems, with Berle as judge. He also made guest appearances on many radio shows in the 1930s and 1940s. Scripted by Nat Hiken and Aaron Ruben, *The Milton Berle Show* featured Arnold Stang, later his TV sidekick, along with Pert Kelton, Mary Schipp, Jack Albertson, Arthur Q. Bryan, Ed Begley, Brazilian singer Dick Farney, and announcer Frank Gallop. Sponsored by Philip Morris, it aired on NBC from March 1947 to April 1948, then ran an additional season with Texaco as sponsor, concurrent with his TV series, from September 1948 to June 1949. Berle later called it “the best radio show I ever did” and a springboard for his television career.

Berle first appeared on television in 1929 in an experimental Chicago broadcast, hosting in front of 129 people.