Irving Brecher pitched the radio series for friend Groucho Marx under the title "The Flotsam Family", but the sponsor balked at what would have been essentially a straight head-of-household role for Marx. (Marx would get his own series "Blue Ribbon Town" instead.) Brecher then saw William Bendix as taxicab company owner Tim McGuerin in Hal Roach's "The McGuerins from Brooklyn" (1942). Radio historian Gerald Nachman quotes Brecher as stating, "He was a Brooklyn guy and there was something about him. I thought, This guy could play it. He'd made a few films, like "Lifeboat", but he was not a name. So I took "The Flotsam Family" script, revised it, made it a Brooklyn Family, took out the flippancies and made it more meat-and-potatoes, and thought of a new title, "The Life of Riley". Bendix's delivery and the spin he put on his lines made it work."