[citation needed] Between graduating from WHS and entering Columbia, he studied drama at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.

[4] As early as 1930, Reed (billed as Teddy Bergman) co-starred with Herbert Polesie in Henry and George, a CBS program that featured "minute dramas, popular laughmakers ... interspersed with dance music selections".

Reed was "heard regularly on the Crime Doctor series,"[8] and "was the original Daddy to Fanny Brice on Baby Snooks".

Billed as Teddy Bergman, Reed appeared on Broadway in Double Dummy (1936), and A House in the Country (1937),[10] and Love's Old Sweet Song (1940).

[11] Porky's Romance; Days of Glory; Nob Hill; The Postman Always Rings Twice; Perfect Strangers; Emergency Wedding; The Redhead and the Cowboy; Here Comes the Groom; Viva Zapata!

Radio playwright and director Norman Corwin cast Reed as Santa Claus in the 1969 KCET television reading of his 1938 play The Plot to Overthrow Christmas.

[12] In May 1932, Reed married Finette Walker[13] (1909–2005), a Broadway actress whom he met at television station W2XAB (later WCBS-TV) in New York City.