Broadcasting Telecasting (Apr-Jun 1958)

PRETESTED the adventures of BRAND-NEW! FIRSTRUN! SUCCESS! 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! Motion 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 14, 1958 IN REVIEW THE BOB HOPE SHOW If a semblance of international unity is ever achieved in the present day, Bob Hope and his crew can feel they have contributed a small but important part. On Saturday April 5. NBC-TV presented The Bob Hope Show filmed entirely in Moscow. For one hour the viewer was taken through Moscow's streets, subways, into its theatres, ballet centers, circuses and U. S. Embassy. Top Russian acts such as Popoff the clown, famed ballerina Galina Ulanova, comedian Arkadi Raikin and the festival of dances of all nations were shown in an interesting and fast-moving bill. Mr. Hope's dry wit was in top form as he "entertained our civilians abroad" at the American Embassy. He chided the Russians ("I was thrown out of the Kremlin yesterday. I thought the star on the door meant it was my dressing room") as well as praised them for their cooperation in the current entertainment exchange program. At the conclusion of the program, Mr. Hope showed some film of Russian children at play with American children (those of Ambassador Thompson) and at play together and made his plea for international understanding and secure futures for "kids, who, all over the world, are just kids." Mr. Hope's approach was warm and sincere and the show was an enlightening venture behind the iron curtain. All concerned deserve congratulations for this outstanding effort. Production costs: $200,000. Sponsored by Johnson Motors through J. Walter Thomspon Co. and Dutch Masters Cigars through Erwin Wasey, Ruthrauff & Ryan on NBC-TV, 9-10 p.m. April 5. Director: Mort Lachman; executive producer: Bob Hope; producer: Jack Hope; writers: Bill Lackin, Lester White, John Rapp, Charles Lee, Gig Henry; associate producer: Kent McCray; director of photography: Ken Talbot. OMNIBUS "The Lady's Not for Burning" is quite a goodie to find in an Easter basket. Omnibus produced the morsel at an ideal time and served it up with style. For those who had never met Thomas Mendip and Jennett Jourdemayne, the Omnibus version of their adventures around the noose and stake was an introduction under favorable circumstances, with at least one advantage over the theatre. It was easier to catch all of the lyric lines in the living room than in the third balcony surrounded by a laughing audience. The rest of the April 6 audience — those who were already familiar with "The Lady's Not for Burning" — could breathe easy as the play opened in what looked like the original stage setting and the characters appeared intact. Adapter Walter Kerr used a judicious pair of shears to scale the play to tv size. The lines on the cutting-room floor may grieve the Fry fan, but surely the most devoted will concede that 90 minutes of Fry is incomparably better than no Fry at all. The cast made the most of their charac ters— plum roles all. Christopher Plummer, Mary Ure and company showed a fine and enthusiastic regard for their material. The production was a faithful version of a rare script. Production costs: Approximately $80,000. Sponsored by Aluminium Ltd. through J. Walter Thompson and Union Carbide Corp. through J. W. Mathes on NBC-TV, April 6, 4-5 p.m. EST. Produced by Robert Saudek Assoc.; director: Stuart Vaughan; adapted by Walter Kerr from Christopher Fry's play. Cast: Mary Ure, Christopher Plummer, Bryarly Lee, Anne Shoemaker. NBC OPERA Composer-conductor-critic Virgil Thomson commenting on the 1790 premiere of Mozart's opera buffa, "Cosi fan tutte," has noted that Viennese society fell deaf to Mozart's pleas "for tenderness, for humane compassion and for an enlightened and philosophical toleration of human weakness." But thanks to the magnificent work of the NBC Opera company and the Ruth and Thomas Martin Anglicized version of "Cosi" — somewhat less satisfactory to those purists who might have missed the original lyrics — the tv premiere was accorded a reception far more universal than the original. The times are different; so is the audience composition. The remarkable thing about last Sunday's telecast — marking the end of the repertory company's 9th season — was that it came off so well. "Cosi" is a difficult opera; it would tempt many a director to go another inch — square into the abyss of farcical slapslick a la Johann Strauss' "Fledermaus." However, directors Peter Herman Adler and Kirk Browning stuck to the script for the entire two-hour session, trimming only where expedient. Phyllis Curtin (Fiordiligi) and Frances Bible (Dorabella) lack a certain Viennese crispness Mozart seems to ask, but nonetheless both were in fine and rare form — as singers as well as actors. So were the others — Helen George (Despina), John Alexander and Mac Morgan as the enticed lovers, and James Pease, playing Don Alfonso, the agent provocateur. Yet, putting aside the question of whether this presentation and others in the series is public service — which it certainly is — one would do well to ask, is it opera? It strives to be but doesn't quite make it. The reason is simple: electronic opera is too mechanical; it tends to make sound subservient to sight and above all, there isn't a tv set on the market that will do justice to the fine voices and the crisp, brilliant music that came out of NBC-TV's Brooklyn studio. NBC-TV has done more than its share of the work; perhaps the parent RCA will complement its division's efforts by pioneering compatible sound at economy prices. Production costs: $80,000. Sustaining, on NBC-TV, 2-4 p.m. Sunday April 6. Producer: Samuel Chotzinoff; musical direc Broadcasting