Weekly television digest (Jan-Dec 1960)

VOL. 16: No. 50 5 NETWORK SALES ACTIVITY ABC-TV The Bing Crosby Show, Mon. March 13, 9:30-10:30 p.m., one-time special, full-sponsorship Oldsmobile (D. P. Brothers) The Law & Mister Jones, Fri. 10:30-11 p.m.; The Islanders, Sun. 9:30-10:30 p.m.; Walt Disney Presents, Sun. 7-7:30 p.m.; The Roaring 20’s, Sat. 7:30-8:30 p.m., part. eff. Jan. Simonize (Dancer-Fitzgerald-Sample) Daytime Programming, Mon.-Fri., participations eff. June Welch (Richard K. Manoff) Carter (Ted Bates) NBC-TV NBC Special News Reports, as events develop, full-spon. Gulf Oil (Young & Rubicam) The Coming of Christ, (Project 20), Wed. Dec. 21, 8:30-9 p.m., full-sponsorship U.S. Steel (BBDO) Tournament of Roses Parade, Mon. Jan. 2, 11:30 a.m.-l:45 p.m., full sponsorship. Minute Maid (Ted Bates) The Shirley Temple Show, Sun., 7-8 p.m., part. eff. Jan. 1. National Biscuit (Kenyon & Eckhardt) Sing Along with Mitch, alt. Fri., 9-10 p.m., part. eff. Jan. 27. P. Ballantine & Sons (William Esty) Laramie, Tue. 7:30-8:30 p.m.; Outlaws, Thu. 7:30-8:30 p.m., part. eff. Jan. Pepsi Cola (BBDO) The Outlaws, Thu. 7:30-8:30 p.m., part. eff. late Dec. Bristol-Myers (Ogilvy, Benson & Mather) Riverboat, Mon. 7:30-8:30 p.m., part. eff. immediately. Warner-Lambert Pharmaceutical (Lambert & Feasley) Senior Bowl Game, Sat. Jan. 7, participations B. F. Goodrich (BBDO) American Tobacco (Sullivan, Stauffer, Colwell & Bayles) Ebonite (John C. Dowd) Colgate-Palmolive (Ted Bates) Schick Safety Razor (Compton) Whitehall Laboratories (Ted Bates) Daytime Programming, part. eff. Dec. 21 and Jan. 1 resp. Cracker Jack (Leo Burnett) MentholaUim (J. Walter Thompson) National Football League Championship Game, Mon. Dec. 26, part. Philip Morris (Leo Burnett) Astaire Time, Mon. Feb. 20, 8:30-9:30 p.m., full spon. Chrysler (Leo Burnett) New Central-African Bureau will be opened by CBS News as part of a general expansion & re-alignment, says CBS vp John F. Day. The new African news post will be in Nairobi, Kenya and will be headed, shortly after Jan. 1, by CBS News correspondent Blaine Littell, now stationed in N.Y. Serving with him will be cameraman Jean Reitberger, now stationed in Paris. In other CBS News shuffles: Correspondent Richard Kallsen, currently as signed to Havana, will transfer to the Paris bureau. Lou Cioffi, now in Paris, will join CBS’s Washington bureau. George Herman will become CBS News White House cori’espondent. Malcolm R. Johnson will be Washington editor-in-chief, a new post. And Daniel Bloom, producer of The World Tonight, has been named to the newly-created N.Y. position of managing editor, radio news. Programming NO APPEAL FROM BLOCK-BOOKING DECISION: Featurefilm distributors won’t appeal the Dec. 2 decision by N.Y. Federal Judge Archie 0. Dawson that TV sales of features in you-must-buy-all blocks are illegal. The general feeling of most film companies, who are now feeding pictures slowly into the market in small packages, with each picture individually priced (Vol. 16:49 p6), is that the decision is largely academic. Strengthening this thinking was the denial by Judge Dawson of a govt, motion to make feature-film contracts negotiable on a retroactive basis. On the subject of post-1948s. Judge Dawson ruled that defendants in the trial be restrained from following “certain of the procedures which they followed with reference to the pre-1948 films, and which are found in this opinion to be violations of the anti-trust laws.” The trial windup marked the end of a long legal trail (Vol. 16:9 pl2 et seq.) in which the govt, had charged 6 leading distributors with refusing to license pre-1948 pictures on an individual film & station basis: Loew’s Inc. (now MGM), C&C Super Corp. (now TV Industries), Screen Gems, Associated Artists Productions (now absorbed in UAA), National Telefilm Associates and United. Artists. The defendants. Judge Dawson held, had violated Sec. 1 of the Sherman Act. There’ll be no punitive action taken against the defendants as a result of the “guilty” judgment. It is primarily a cease-&-desist ruling. Judge Dawson denied the govt, the application of Sec. 5 of the anti-trust laws, under which the Court’s decree would have applied as a presumption of guilt in a civil triple-damages action. Also, by denying the govt.’s move to make TV station contracts renegotiable. Judge Dawson saved the defendants from possible financial losses that might occur (plus a probable mountain of paperwork) if contracts had to be worked out all over again on a price-per-picture basis. What the ruling does mean to station management & film buyers is that distributors — most of which have long since dropped the practice, anyway — can no longer insist on “block deals” whereby stations must buy several bottom-of-the-barrel features in order to obtain a few choice features. Now, picture-by-picture pricing will be mandatory, although there’s nothing to prevent a station from buying a complete package group if it wants to. AFTRA-SAG contract talks with networks and agencyadvertiser representatives continued last week, following decision by both sides in the recent near-strike to work out a new talent pact (Vol. 16:49 p2). Although the contract isn’t official (many details are still being discussed and the unions must ratify it in any case), it shapes up something like this according to N.Y. sources: (1) It will be a 3-year contract, in line with union demands. (2) SAG actors in commercials will now have pay scales & residuals raised to parity with AFTRA actors in taped commercials. (3) Commercial scales have been raised, largely due to AFTRASAG’s proposed “unit system,” so that the potential earning of performers in commercials has been raised about one-third. (4) There are improvements, from the talent point of view, in working conditions & rehearsal hours, Corinthian stations will field their own team of local newsmen to cover the Inauguration and the first week of President-elect Kennedy’s administration, on the pattern of their local coverage of the political conventions, which drew full sponsorship on all 5 Corinthian stations.