A Kind of Pollyanna

By all the rules of TV logic, My Little Margie (Wed. 8:30 p.m., NBC) should have quietly vanished after a brief stint as a summer replacement in June 1952. It was badly written, ineptly acted, and thoroughly panned by the critics (Syndicated Columnist John Crosby described it as "a little stinker"). Margie not only survived, "It flourished, even against such overpowering competition as Arthur Godfrey & His Friends. The latest ARE ratings give Godfrey's Friends a comfortable 52.5, but Margie has 28.1, up nearly three points from last month.

The plot has curious Freudian undertones: round-faced Gale Storm, 31, and her prancing-goat TV father, played by oldtime Silent Cinemactor Charles (Seventh Heaven) Farrell, 51, spend their half-hour each week trying to keep each other from falling in love with outsiders who might break up their cozy family of two. Margie has made the jump from television (sponsor: Scott Paper Co.) to radio, where Philip Morris has it on both CBS and Mutual. It is thus the first radio and TV show to span three networks. On radio the Nielsen ratings place it third, behind Lux Theater and People Are Funny, and well ahead of both Jack Benny and Dragnet. Most of the credit for the show's surprising success goes to ex-Sunday School Teacher Storm, a stable, sunshiny girl who says: "I guess I've always been a kind of Pollyanna. You make the best of a situation and have a good time doing it." Born Josephine Owaissa Cottle, she changed her name and got out of her native Texas by winning a nationwide Gateway to Hollywood movie contest which asked: "Who will be Gale Storm and Terry Belmont?" Says Gale: "If there was one thing I needed, it was a new name." Winner of the Terry Belmont stakes was Lee Bonnell, an Indiana boy who did not bother to change his name. The two prizewinners married a year later, and are now raising three handsome sons.

While her husband settled quietly into the insurance business, Gale labored on the wrong side of Hollywood's film tracks in westerns, quicky murders and musicals. "I was no Garbo," she recalls, "just medium lousy. But I loved it. They used to ask me if they could start a new picture or was I pregnant again." TV has brought her greater fame than movies ever did, but Gale insists: "My career is just the frosting on the cake, and I mean that." The girl who used to be Josephine Owaissa Cottle admits cheerfully: "I never had it so good."

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