John Conte

Who was John Conte?

John Conte was a stage, film and TV actor, and later a television station owner.

Conte was born in Palmer, Massachusetts. His mother, Maria, emigrated to the U.S. from Calabria, Italy, with her lifelong friend Francesca Cuda, who had moved to Los Angeles, California before the Conte family. To be closer to Francesca, the family moved to L.A. in John's teens. After graduating from L.A.'s Lincoln High School he got jobs as a radio actor and singer. One of his first regular roles was on the Burns and Allen radio show in the 1940s.

In 1947, he appeared in Rodgers and Hammerstein's short-lived Broadway musical Allegro. He returned to Broadway in 1950 to appear in the musical Arms and the Girl.

His television career began as Master of Ceremonies on the 1951 late Sunday afternoon comedy hour, Star Time, co-starring Frances Langford and Lew Parker as John and Blanche Bickerson, as well as sound-effects master stand-up comedian Reginald Gardner. His own weekly solo skit on Star Time was as an hilarious, heavily accented Italian-American chef preparing bumbled recipes as he recited them along with frequent tangential references to "the homemade-a wine" fermenting in his bathtub visible from the kitchen. This led to a featured guest appearance with Sid Caesar on Your Show of Shows about a year later. He then hosted Matinee Theater, a live-drama series on NBC.