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FILM
NTA STARTS NETWORK COMMERCIAL IN APRIL; P. LORILLARD SIGNED
NTA Film Network will begin commercial operations on April 1 on a full sponsorship basis. It also was announced last week that P. Lorillard Co. had signed to join WarnerLambert Pharmaceutical Co. as co-sponsors of one and one-half hours of feature film programming on 128 stations.
Ely A. Landau, NTA Film Network president, said the contract calls for Lorillard to sponsor one-half hour of the one and onehalf hour weekly segment. Warner-Lambert previously had signed for the one-hour portion [B«T, Feb. 4]. Lorillard's investment for the 39-week period was reported to be about $1.4 million.
The film network has been operating since Oct. 15 without a network sponsor, though station affiliates have been permitted to sign local advertisers. The films to be shown on the NTA network, starting April 1, will be from the 20th Century-Fox library, acquired for tv distribution last year by National Telefilm Assoc., parent company of the network. The NTA Film Network is owned 50% by NTA and 50% by 20th CenturyFox, though NTA retains operational control.
Lorillard will use the NTA Film Network to advertise all Old Gold cigarettes. The agreement was negotiated by Nicholas E. Keesely, senior vice president in charge of radio and television for Lennen & Newell, New York agency for Lorillard, and William Koblenzer, NTA Film Network sales manager. Cy Kaplan, network sales executive, was credited with having initiated discussions with Lorillard.
Mr. Landau said that the agreement with Lorillard and Warner-Lambert marks "the first time in the history of television that a network dedicated exclusively to film presentation has become a commercial reality." He noted that the commercials of the advertisers will be integrated on film and said they will be able to make changes on individual stations to conform to local marketing patterns.
The film network, according to Mr. Lan
dau, covers about 90% of U. S. television homes. The affiliated stations have been carrying the feature films largely on weekends and in time periods usually after 10 p.m. local time.
An all-out advertising and exploitation campaign will be conducted by the NTA Film Network, Mr. Landau reported, using both consumer and trade publications. One of the first promotional efforts on behalf of the network will be a "showmanship" contest for promotion managers of station affiliates, with the first prize an all expense-paid, two-week trip to Paris. The contest was conceived by Martin Roberts, promotion director of NTA.
Other prizes include a color tv set, portable tv sets and polaroid cameras. Mr. Roberts set the stage for the contest with a series of teaser mailings to eligible promotion managers throughout the country. The mailings contained a miniature roulette wheel, a book on the French language, a French coin and a do-it-yourself kit.
Better Movie Product Urged by S. H. Fabian
THE fight for audience supremacy between television and theatre motion pictures has created a challenge to movie-makers who must give the public a better film product, midwest movie distributors were told Wednesday.
Speaking before the convention of Kansas-Missouri Theatre Assn. members at Kansas City, S. H. (Si) Fabian, president of the Stanley-Warner Corp. national theatre chain, repeated his stand taken last summer at the Theatre Owners of America convention in New York. He said that "television may not be doing itself any permanent good by the use of film libraries . . . that our old film on television in competition with live tv would accentuate the sharp difference in quality . . . and that it's possible this spread
< LEWIS GRUBER, president of P. Lorillard Co., signs for one half hour weekly on the NTA Film Network of 128 stations beginning the week of April 1. Finalizing the contract are (I to r) William Koblenzer, NTA Film Network sales manager; Ely A. Landau, president, NTA Film Network: Dale Anderson, vice president and account supervisor of Lennen & Newell which handles P. Lorillard; Mr. Gruber; Manuel Yellen, vice president in charge of advertising for P. Lorillard; and Nicholas Keesely, senior vice president in charge of radio and television at L & N.
of movie booking on tv stations [is driving out] the live tv shows."
To underscore this, Mr. Fabian quoted Brig. Gen. David Sarnoff, RCA board chairman, " 'If the motion picture industry, or its agents, succeed in making movie films dominant on tv networks and stations, then American television broadcasting will become a national movie screen, just as some radio stations have become a phonograph.' "
Because "this is happening right now," Mr. Fabian told the exhibitors, tv "is educating a vast public in the differences between hastily produced television shows and the completely satisfying entertainment available in motion picture theatres." He continued: "This competition from our own vaults is tough to take now; but in the long run, it may be helping to create audiences for the vastly superior, new, modern, theatre entertainment."
This fact plus "changing trade practices" such as increase in two-a-day reserved seat productions, longer films, added "art-house" revenue and the change in taste, may speed the day, Mr. Fabian said, when Hollywood once again will be master in its own house, and even in that of television."
FILM COMMERCIALS: $35 MILLION FIELD
TELEVISION film commercial production during 1956 grossed $35 million, according to estimates announced today (Monday) by Ross Reports-Television Index, New York industry information service. The total is projected from production reports included in the "1956 Survey of Tv Film Commercials" published by the research organization.
Rises in costs and production values during 1956 resulted in the current dollar volume, a $10 million increase over last year's estimate of $25 million. In each year, approximately 10,000 new film commercials were produced.
Ross Reports-Television Index also stated that Transfilm Inc., New York, was again the largest tv film commercial producer in the country, accounting for 8 to 9% of the total dollar volume for the industry. Other volume producers are Universal Pictures Co. Television, Universal City, Calif., and New York; Hal Roach Studios, Culver City, Calif.; Sarra Inc., New York and Chicago, and MPO Television Films Inc.,
Page 46 • March 4, 1957
Broadcasting • Telecasting