Show Business: Bottom of the Week

Author Ben Hecht, newly mellowed into the meek Wallace of TV interviewing, surrendered to impulse last week. In place of chatting with his usual guest, Hecht wrote a way-gone whimsy. The Three Echoes on a Cloud—a bull session on world problems between Helen of Troy, Empress Josephine and Joe Stalin, perched on adjacent clouds in limbo. Sample thought: “We’ll divide this into East Cloudia and West Cloudia.” Hecht himself played Stalin in full Red uniform with all the passion of a snowman in Siberia. Next week: Hecht as Casanova.