Cinema Canada (Nov 1977)

SPOT LIGHT on prudence emery As producers become increasingly agressive about selling their films during the production period rather than waiting for a film’s release, the role of publicity has become more and more important. Prudence Emery, publicist, has had the lion’s share of the big co-productions done recently in Canada. The interview below is an effort to capture the spirit of the lady — her apparently boundless energy, her professional attitude, and her thoughts about her own job and the production scene as she has experienced it. I worked for Expo in Montreal, the Corporation and Visitor Services. And then I did the Press visits that Expo sponsored, which meant setting up everything. You know, when the guests arrive at the airport, their food, their booze, their tours, their speakers, but not press kits. Just the basics. For Time magazine, I did a big set-up — a two-day visit — but I also took around celebrities, like Hugh Hefner, Liberace, Twiggy, and Edward Albee, whom I got to know very well; we’ve been friends ever since. So I had this funny mixture. That was a good experience. I discovered I had a talent for organizing which I hadn’t known before. This is vaguely how I got into PR. Then I got on a plane in January ‘68, just a charter flight to London, ‘cause I love Montreal and I thought I’d really like to stay in the city. And in England, I was invited down for the weekend to Sir Hugh Wontner’s home. He was the Chairman of the Savoy. His daughter happens to be married to my cousin, Victor Emery, who everybody remembers as Canadian bobsled champion. (I mean, that’s some years ago. He’s a gold medal bob-sledder.) And I told a funny story at lunch, and at tea time, everybody discreetly withdrew from the sitting room, and Sir Hugh asked me what my plans were. I said I was going skiing and then going back to Montreal. He said, “How would you like to come and work at the Savoy?” So I said, “OK”, without a thought. And I stayed there 5% years. 8/Cinema Canada Cinema-Canada: And you stayed there 5 years, and then decided to come back? Prudence Emery: I decided to come back because working at the Savoy was like being on a ship at sea in first class, forever. Which means it was quite unreal. I met every famous person in the world... Noel Coward, Liza Minelli; and the staff was super. But you know, every year the same people came back and I sat in my office and had a staff of debutantes; and all they did was exchange recipies and boyfriends as far as I could see. We were there just to keep the press out of the corridors and help them if we could. It was glamorous, but it wasn’t very creative. And all of a sudden, I thought, “I want to do something else.” And I wrote to various people, including Bill Cunningham. He was an old friend, and he wrote back and said, ‘We’re starting this network Global Television. Can you fly over for an interview?”’ So, I did, and I got the job. Cinema-Canada: Did you work at Global long? Prudence Emery: | started with them in July before we went on air. That’s July ‘73. I was Manager of Public Relations. I set up all the Press visits across Ontario, and we had a good time, actually. That was really fun. When we started, we had 17 independent producers working for us. This was Al Bruner’s pipe dream, and Al Bruner is a wonderful ideas man. But he wasn’t a good practical man, in terms of administrating something. But he’s wonderful, and a good salesman. The people that were around him at that time just couldn’t control the financing properly. The original concept was good because it gave a lot of employment to a lot of people. In the beginning we got all the Quebec films. I was down here viewing, nonstop, I can’t remember how many Quebec films. We had them all dubbed; we viewed them on our network, which was wonderful exposure for Quebec because it had never had so much exposure in Ontario, which is a big market after all. Once we went on air, it was sort of turning peculiar. You know, people became ‘territorial rights’ conscious. Then a journalist wrote a very bad review in Variety of our entertainment show called “Everything Goes’’. In fact, it was a terrific showcase for a lot of kids who had not been used in Toronto by the CBC, and one of those kids is now on NBC Saturday Night, Danny Aykroyd. We gave them a lot of exposure, and they were working hard; it was a good straightfor ward entertainment thing. But this review in Variety killed a lot of sales. I went and saw the president, Al Bruner, and said, ‘“‘Let’s write to the editor and tell him what we’re really doing.” By that time he knew, though I didn’t, that the take-over was coming and that things were in a very bad way. And he said to me, “I think you had better cover yourself. There’s a job going at Inn on the Park as a PR.” I thought I was being fired and was very upset. So, I came down to Montreal for a week, and I went to the Film Board and they offered me a job. Then I read in the Globe and Mail that I had resigned, which really pissed me off ‘cause nobody had consulted with me.