Broadcasting Telecasting (Apr-Jun 1958)

PRETESTED the adventures of BRAND-NEW! FIRSTRUN! SUCCESS I Saturday Evening Post Over 650,000,000 readers of Norman Reilly Raine's 65 Tugboat Annie stories! 27-year run continues by popular demand. SUCCESS! Mot/on Picture Feature Box-office record-breaker in the top motion picture theatres. N. Y. Times— "story superior" —"a box-office natural." SUCCESS! Chicago Audience Test 92% of Lake Theatre audience rated "The Adventures of Tugboat Annie" a TV favoritecertified by Haskins & Sells, C. P. A. SUCCESS! CBC TV Network R. B. Collett, Adv. Dir., Lever Brothers Limited, writes: ' 'excellent viewing audience' ' — "general public, through mail and telephone calls, indicates strong appeal for every member of the family." Tugboat Annie outrates such shows as Perry Como, Gunsmoke, Wyatt Earp, Dragnet, Climax, Disneyland and many, many others in Canada network markets. TELEVISION PROGRAMS OF AMERICA, INC. 488 MADISON • N.Y. 22 • PLaza 5-2100 Page 14 • April 7, 1958 IN REVIEW THE CASE FOR THE COLLEGE The noteworthiness of CBS Radio*s The Case for the College is not that it was an interesting, well-done profile on higher education. Such programs are a familiar part of the broadcast repertoire — increasingly so since Sputnik put the whole country on a science and/or education kick. It was noteworthy not for how it was done, but why. This was not public service in intent, whatever its results may be. It was an hour-long commercial for higher education in general and Harvard U. in particular. It was paid for at commercial rates. In format the show — somewhat disappointingly— was just what you'd expect: interviews with students, before and after their Cambridge exposure; statements by professors; excerpts from classes; reflections of distinguished alumni. At regular intervals there were commercials, called just that, telling listeners that higher education is suffering from financial anemia and encouraging them to contribute ( 1 ) to the schools of their choice or (2) to Harvard. Harvard, whose financial resources are the largest in the U. S., is not given to putting up hard cash where it expects no return. That it put such hopes on network radio testifies to its regard for the medium. One hopes it will be justified. Production costs: $16,000. Sponsored by Harvard U. through BBDO on CBS Radio, March 28, 9-10 p.m. Executive producer: Laurence O. Pratt; producer: William F. Suchmann; coordinating supervisor: George D. Crothers. Participants: Secretary of Defense Neil H. McElroy, Sen. John F. Kennedy, Barbara Ward, Leonard Bernstein. NO WARNING "More heart than head" is the way his wife describes the taxi driver hero of "Emergency," first program in the No Warning half-hour series of filmed dramas which started last night on NBC-TV. That phrase is a pretty good description of the first program itself. Hearing over the radio that an unidentified boy is in the hospital, with his parents being sought for permission for a needed operation, the cab driver calls home, is assured that his son is safely at a neighbor's but goes to the hospital anyway. Moved by the helplessness of the injured boy and by the insistance of hospital attendants that there's no time to waste, the cab driver poses as the father and signs the authorization for surgery. As he gradually realizes the implications of his impulsive deed, tension mounts to the climactic meeting with the boy's real parents. Elisha Cook's excellent performance as the emotional hero, aided by a fine supporting cast, Charles Smith's incident-packed story and Fletcher Markle's fast-paced direction, swept the viewer along on an emotional ride ignoring, if not forgetting, some pretty big holes in the plot structure. If "Emergency" is typical of the rest of the series (each program will have a different writer, director and star), No Warning may fully realize the formula of "pure suspense shows without violence" set by Al Simon, its creator-producer. The new series, as well as its new title, started out as an appreciable improvement over its forerunner of last year, Panic, which never quite lived up to the promise of taut suspense implicit in its title. Production costs: Approximately $35,000. Sponsored alternately by Royal McBee Corp. through Young & Rubicam and P. Lorillard Co. through Lennen & Newell on NBC-TV, Sun., 7:30-8 p.m. Producer: Al Simon; assoc. producer: Herbert Browar; writer: Harold Swanton; director of photography: Arch R. Dalzell; filmed at McCadden Productions, Hollywood. Cast (for first episode): Elisha Cook, Peggy Webber, Paul Harber, Louise Lewis, Jimmy Wallington, Virginia Gregg, Kay Stewart, John Phillips, Hugh Sanders, James Gavin, Olive Sturges, Gary Hunley, Walter Reed, Dean Howell, Kay English, Ralph Reed. BOOKS THE TECHNIQUE OF FILM AND TELEVISION MAKE-UP, by Vincent J-R Kehoe; Communication Arts Books, Hastings House, 41 E. 50th St., New York. 260 pp. $9. This comprehensive treatment of makeup techniques for both color and black-andwhite processes would seem to be a must addition to the practitioner's library. Mr. Kehoe provides detailed information for a multitude of make-up problems, from "progressive old age" to "prosthetic noses." The book is lavishly illustrated, clearly written and excellently annotated as to specific materials suggested for various jobs, even to where these materials can be obtained in both the U. S. and Great Britain. Though probably of little interest to the average reader, Mr. Kehoe's book is a professional handbook that could be of value to anyone interested in theatrics. BRAINSTORMING, by Charles Clark; Doubleday & Co., 575 Madison Ave., New York. 262pp. $4.50. Engineers using talcum powder to allow for smoother operation of their slide rules, housewives using their aluminum Aunt Jemima Cornbread package as a baking pan, and even that rare adman who forsakes his martini on the rocks for Campbell's on the rocks — owe it all to "brainstorming." These and other examples cited in Mr. Clark's book exemplify the effect brainstorming has had on the development of new products and services and new uses for established products. The extent of that effect should surprise the reader of this book. Brainstorming was conceived by Alex Osborn of BBDO. The author of this book, a friend and collaborator of Mr. Osborn on the latter's books, has made this volume a concise, how-to-do-it manual on "brainstorming." It is not a piece of entertainment, to be read lightly; nor is it a "hidden persuaders" type "expose." It is simply a guidebook to a "science" for which there can never be a written text. Broadcasting