GK: Mr. Fred Newman our sound effects man was not always in public radio today, he used to be in the insulation business. FN: NEWMAN INSULATION, FRED SPEAKING. HOW CAN I HELP? He helped people who were hearing things. Such as voices. FN LADY: I DON'T KNOW IF I'M CRAZY OR WHAT, BUT I KEEP HEARING VOICES. PUT YOUR EAR UP THERE. And he'd put his ear to the wall and, sure enough. (VOICE) And he'd install the right kind of insulation. (DRILL FOUR BURSS) And that took care of it. FN LADY: THANK YOU SO MUCH. Always a special insulation for a particular sound. For this---- (DRIPS) he'd do this (WRENCH TIGHTENING) and for this (MICE SQUEAKS) he'd do this (RATCHET, THEN TRAP SNAP) and for strange hums (SFX) and low vibrato he'd pump insulation into the walls (POWERFUL BLOWER) and for cicadas (SFX) he'd use a vacuum (SFX) and for ghosts (SFX) he'd do an exorcism:
FN CHANTING:
Ghost, ghost, go away.
Don't come back another day.
Gloria in excelsis.
Don't come to this house, go to someone
else's.
GK: And one day he got a call from the Como Park zoo. Somebody was flying a remote-control model plane over the zoo and driving the animals nuts. (SEAL FRENZY) All the animals were bothered by it. (MONKEY FRENZY) Primates and seals and the lion (SFX) and the elephant (SFX) and the giraffe (SFX).
He looked up in the sky and there was (MODEL PLANE BUZZING OVER) the plane and he simply aimed and (GUNSHOT) took care of it. Which impressed the zoo director. (FN JOWLY GUY) And he hired Fred to come and be a trainer. The zoo had a dolphin of course (SFX) who was extremely popular with kids but animal rights people were after the zoo to let the dolphin go. (CHANTING: NO MORE TORTURE, BE SCIENTIFIC. SEND THE DOLPHIN BACK TO THE PACIFIC). The problem was that the dolphin didn't want to go. He'd been trained to sing by his old trainer. (DOLPHIN SINGS: MOON RIVER, WIDER THAN A MILE) purely as a novelty act, but this song had awakened in the dolphin some incipient creative spirit and he now had ambitions to be a dolphin songwriter ----
DOLPHIN SINGS: O ONCE I LIVED IN A DOLPHIN TANK
THE WATER WAS WARM AND THE CHLORINE STANK
I LAY IN THE BOTTOM OF THE TANK AND SANG
I WAS IN LOVE WITH AN ORANGUTANG.
GK: And Fred had to tell him:
FN: YOU'RE NOT A VERY GOOD SONGWRITER.
DOLPHIN: I'm pretty good for a dolphin.
FN: And your voice is all squeaky and trembly.
DOLPHIN: I'm doing the best I can.
FN: IT'S NOT GOOD ENOUGH.
GK: So they flew the dolphin out to California to go back to its natural habitat.
BING BONG
FN LADY: Can I bring you a drink before take-off?
DOLPHIN: I'd like a Mai Tai. And do you have any goldfish?
GK: The Como Park zoo lost a lot of animals thanks to animal rights protesters and so Fred learned to do animal sounds so that zoo visitors would think there were animals hiding in those dark cages. He did penguins (SFX) and polar bears (SFX) and pelicans (SFX) and then he started doing animals on TV.
FN (AS SMOKY): ONLY YOU CAN PREVENT FOREST FIRES.
GK: And then he came on our show and got in the big money and now he has the place in California (SURF), the apartment in Paris (FRENCH SIREN), the horse farm in Kentucky (HORSE WHINNY), all thanks to sound effects.
Maybe you can get into the lucrative SFX field. Take this simple aptitude test. Can you do a dog bark? ---- the cry of a loon ----- can you do water dripping (AUDIENCE)
If you can, then you may have what it takes to succeed. Earn good money in commercials for office machines (COPIERS), cruise lines (SHIP HORN), NASCAR races (SFX), and coffeemakers (SFX). Fred did, and now he's turned over his business to his son Fred Jr. (FN TEENAGER: Hi.) and Fred is retired to a beautiful assisted living community in Phoenix (GEEZER SINGING: One pill makes you larger
And one pill makes you small
And the ones the doctor gives you......). He's very happy there. They play cards. (GEEZER: Acey deucy, jacks wild. A nickel to raise.) They watch TV (TV AUDIO). And if there's a problem (DRIPS), you just call maintenance. (DRIPS)