Your Coca-Cola Bottler presents Claudia. Music Claudia, based on the play and novels by Rose Franken, brought to you transcribed Monday through Friday by your friendly neighbor who bottles Coca-Cola. Relax, and while you're listening, refresh yourself. Have a Coke. And now, Claudia. Music I'll answer. I'll get. Probably for me. We'll be calling you at eight in the morning. We'll be calling you. What people? Oh, where are my slippers? You sure you don't want me to go? I'm sure. I know where my slippers are. Where? By the bed, yeah. Oh, you mind if I wear them? You'll break your pretty little neck. I'm coming, coming, coming, coming. I'd really laugh if it were for me. Not a chance. Hey, I just found your slippers, but they don't fit me. Stay where you are, you'll catch cold. Hello? This is Mrs. Naughton speaking. Oh, you have the wrong number. There's a wrong number, David. You know, I think we ought to have a phone in here. You do? I think it's silly to always have to go racing into another room to answer the phone. Well, don't race. Let me answer it. That is not the point. Oh. The point is that I'm home alone all day, and I have no company except a little black telephone. You are breaking my heart. No, seriously. Why should I have to run back and forth to it all the time? Why, I ask you. Oh, question of questions. Who will answer? David. I ask all of you standing there, your faces turned up to me like buttercups. Buttercups? Buttercups. Why should she have to run back and forth? A person just can't have a serious discussion with you kind of person. Not any old person, no. David, look. Why was a telephone invented? So that little girls like you would be able to bother their husbands at the office all day long. Exactly. And? So that when the husband decides he wants to talk to her, she can talk to him. You never spoke a truer word. But if I'm in the oven or the bathtub or in bed right now, I should have the phone with me. I don't think I'd like a baked phone or a wet phone or... I mean a phone is a convenient soul. The least it can do is to be convenient. Is that your last word on the subject? No. David, if I could make a wish, one wish, and be promised by my fairy godmother that it would come true, I would wish for clean sheets every day and a phone in every room. That's two wishes. They're the same thing. Same thing or not, your fairy godmother doesn't know what she's talking about. I know. Laundries are so expensive. There's still a shortage of instruments. Instrument? I don't want an instrument. I just want a phone. Well, technically, a phone is called an instrument. Oh, why didn't you say so? There's still no extra ones to spare. Any old fairy godmother knows that. I don't want an extra one. I want a regular one. Like the one in the living room. How many times do I... And in the second place, we're moving from here in a month, so there's no point in bothering to have them install one now. But we'll take them with us when we move. What? Well, certainly. You don't think I'm going to let them lie around here for some utter strangers to use, any more than I'd leave my furniture? Claudia, if you'll just take a second to listen, you cannot take a phone with you. Why not? I'm willing to pay for it, so why shouldn't I? It's mine. But it's not yours. Since when? Since always. You don't buy a phone from the telephone company, you merely rent it. Like an apartment? Like. Oh. Why? Because. What? Because that's the way it's done. Seems awfully silly to me. Pay all that money and then at the end you have nothing. I always thought you bought a phone. Well, you always thought wrong. Now may I get dressed? Well, I guess I'll get up. And while your coffee is perking, I think I'll call Mama. You just hate to see that phone lying around, not being used, don't you? Oh, it's such a waste. You know, I don't think you have any idea how much I use a phone every day. I call Mama. Twenty times. You. Twenty-one times. The butcher, the baker, the grocer. The cleaner. When it's raining, I never have to go out at all. Except I like to go out in the rain. And that's one thing you'll have to stop. No more walking in the rain. Dr. Rowland wouldn't approve. It's raining today. It's pouring. Then you stay at home all day and use the phone as much as you'd like. David. I might. I just might call the phone company and have them bring me an extension. Just one little extension? Would you mind? Call them if you like. It won't do any good. We'll see who's right. And darling, will you make my phone ring lots today because I'm going to stay in out of the rain all day. And I'd love it to ring and ring and ring when I'm in the oven. Coming. Oh, I hope it's who I think it is. Hello. I'm Pernille from the telephone company. And I'm Mrs. Norton. I've been expecting you. Please come right in. Well, thank you. I won't take much of your time. Oh, that's all right. I'm not going out today. I've nothing else to do. Well, now you called the telephone company and ordered an extension. Is that right? I have the order here. Well, you certainly are fast. Why, I didn't think you'd be here for days. My husband will be simply amazed. I was due up here anyway, Mrs. Norton. You were? Your husband applied some weeks ago for an instrument to be listed in his name. Oh, that was before we knew we were going to move. We're catching up with orders. Pretty heavy going. There's a phone in this apartment listed under the name of Lee. Lee? Oh, they were the previous tenants. Exactly. Well, you have no right to their instrument, Mrs. Norton, and I've come to remove it. Remove it? Oh, well, I suppose it's all right seeing as you brought ours instead, haven't you? Mr. Norton's order has been registered. I brought the new instrument with me, but the number's not yet connected. What does that mean? And why couldn't you just leave the old one and we could use it? We don't mind it being secondhand. Regulations, Mrs. Norton. We shall inform you when your new number will be connected. I don't understand. I will install a new instrument when you... but you may not use it until you're notified. You mean it won't even ring? The phone will not be working. Mrs. Norton, consider yourself temporarily without a phone. And you're taking away the old one that works. The telephone company apologizes for all inconveniences, and services will be restored to you as soon as possible. Oh, that's a big help. And I thought you were going to put in an extension. I'll be right with you, Roger. I want to give Claudia a ring first. We're done yonder in the Yankee tank. The bullfrog's come from the back bank. We're done yonder in the Yankee tank. Hello, Claudia? What's that, Operator? I was dialing 5 Plaza 5-5-5-9-7. Yeah. But of course there's such a number. It's my number. I've been calling it all day. Well, I'm sure that's a mistake, Operator. Please check it. We're done yonder in the Yankee tank. Everything's so complicated. Everything's so complicated. Hello, Operator. Yes, but I know there is such a number. I tell you that... But I... Disconnected? Why, that's ridiculous. I'll be a... Oh. I am a dope. We're done yonder in the Yankee tank. You nearly had me fooled that time. 9-7. Hello. Claudia? Now, don't pretend you're an operator. I know better and you can't fool me. Oh, the number's disconnected. Oh, sure. Yeah, you nearly did fool me, though. What? What's that? Well, I'll be a... I don't understand. I simply don't understand. Claudia! Claudia, what happened? Oh, David, I get it as if I'd been on a deserted island all day. I've been trying to call you, darling. You can't. We haven't got a telephone. Nonsense. I see it's sitting right there, just where it was this morning. But, David, this telephone doesn't... Well, you wait till I get the other operator. She's been trying to tell me that there's no telephone at this number. There isn't. That one's a ghost. Hello? Hello? Hello? There's no dial tone. David, he took the one with the dial tone away. He what? Who what? He what, who what? Sounds Chinese. Claudia, what's been going on here today? I've been trying to tell you. A man came from the phone company and took our... the one with the dial tone? His phone away because you asked for the one to be listed in our name. Because I? Yes, because you. That's what he said. I get blamed because you wanted an extension and the phone company was paying you back for being so greedy. You talk as if the phone company were God. Well, they took our phone away, didn't they? What's this one doing here? It's a fake. It's just there to make us feel worse. It's going to sit there staring us in the face, reminding us that, oh, David, it never rings. Now, darling, wait a minute. Now, don't let this get the best of you. People got along without phones for centuries. I don't see how. When he walked out of the house with our phone under his arm, well, I felt as if our best friend had gone away. Well, personally, I'm not the least bit sorry. You're not? Not the least little bit. Yes, it's fine for you. You're at the office all day and there you have dozens of phones. One. Well, right now it seems like dozens to me. I'm alone all day. I know, I know. We'll get it fixed up in no time. Now, you'll see. I don't even want any extensions anymore. Just one little phone. And I still don't understand why if we can have an instrument we can't have one that works. It'll work. But in the meantime, you and I are going to have a most wonderful weekend. Just the two of us with no interruptions. Why, we'll be so private, even Bluff and Shakespeare will feel their intruding. It'll be like going away, the two of us on a desert island. No bells, no phone. No nothing. You make it sound nice. It'll be nicer than nice. You'll see. You know, in a way I'm glad they took the phone away. At least if they took it away on a Friday and not on a Monday. Oh, David, it'll be an exciting weekend. Phone ringing. David, something rang. So it did. The phone. It couldn't be. No one knows our new number. I told you that phone was a ghost. It's the phone company telling us it's connected. That's what it is. Oh. Darling, would you rather believe in ghosts? I would, but let it ring. Let it ring its full head off. Phone ringing. Music. These programs star Catherine Bard as Claudia and Paul Crabtree as David. And the entire production is supervised and directed by William Brown Maloney. Parties are fun to give and fun to attend if the hostess feels completely at ease. One way you can be at ease when you're entertaining is to know that the bills won't be out of line. Simply order plenty of Coke, keep lots of it on ice, and relax in the thought that here, at five cents a bottle, you have refreshment for party goers of all ages. Coca-Cola was five cents in 1886. It is five cents today. And it's the same delicious drink people have long depended upon for the pause that refreshes. Every day, Monday through Friday, Claudia comes to you transcribed with the best wishes of your friendly neighbor who bottles Coca-Cola. So listen again Monday at the same time. And now this is Joe King saying au revoir. And remember, whoever you are, whatever you do, wherever you may be, when you think of refreshment, think of Coca-Cola. For ice-cold Coca-Cola makes any pause. The pause that refreshes. The pause that refreshes. The pause that refreshes.
