Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1955)

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Motion Picture Daily Tuesday, December 27, 1955 Jelevision Today Who's Where ERIK HAZELHOFF has been appointed director of program sales for NBC-TV, it is announced by MICHAEL H. DANN, vice-president of program sales for the NBC Television Network. HARBEY V. FONDILLER has joined the publicity department of WRCA-TV, New York, as a staff writer. LEE BLAND, DAVID W. DOLE and GORDON MINTER have been 1 named vice-presidents of the Leo Burnett Company, the first in charge of the broadcasting production division, the second of the broadcasting business division and the third head of film production. Mr. Bland and Mr. Dole have quarters in Chicago, Mr. Minter in Hollywood. RICHARD L. LINKROUM has been appointed executive producer of NBC-TV participating programs, it is announced by MORT WERNER, vice-president of national programs. He also announced these promotions: GIRAUD CHESTER to general programming executive; ALVIN COOPERMAN, program supervisor, and RICHARD B. JACKSON, manager of participating programs. DAVID SAVAGE, E. H. EZZES, MONROE MENDELSOHN and JOEL SPECTOR have been named to a special program development committee for Guild Films, to work in conjunction with the program department. The announcement was made by RUBE KAUFMAN, Guild president. Man in Street Cocks a Keen Eye Back Over His 1955 TV Tube CHICAGO CHICAGO: WGN-TV's exclusive western features, starring Gene Autry and Roy Rogers, and eight half-hour film shows topped their October quarter-hour ratings. The Autry-Rogers films, Mondays through Fridays from 7 to 8 P.M., racked up considerable gains, according to the Telepulse report for November. • In forecasts of the 1956 market for color TV receivers, television manufacturers have made some interesting predictions here. Their predictions ranged from 150,000 to 300,000 sets. The 150,000 sales forecast was made by Dr. W. R. G. Baker, General Electric Company vice-president. About a week ago, H. Leslie Hoffman, president of Hoffman Electronics Corp. and of the Radio-Electronics-Television Manufacturers Association suggested 300,000. Don G. Mitchell, president of Sylvania Electric Products, Inc., who said, "Color is on the way after a slow start," came up with a forecast of 200,000. Robert W. Galvin, executive vice by VINCENT CANBY TO LEARN SOMETHING of the general public reaction to the TV season to date, Television Today sent out a roving reporter to talk to the man in the street. The following are excerpts from an interview with Harry , Queens resident, 40 years old, married and the father of two children. The time: 2:30 P.M., EST, Wednesday, December 21, 1955. The place: northeast corner of the Avenue of the Americas and 50th Street, New York City. Q.: Your occupation? A.: Man in the street. Q.: That's your occupation? A.: It's a living. Q.: Do you keep your ear to the ground? A.: Certainly. Q.: And your finger on the public pulse? A.: Constantly. Q.: Very good. Do you watch television? A. : Yes. I also listen to the radio and can give you my list of the 10 best movies of the year. That's what you guys usually want about this time. Q.: We're just interested in television. Now Mr. ? A.: Just call me Harry. My wife's Alice and my kids are Benjy and Maud. Q.: All right, Harry, what would you say ivas the most important single development about television in the last three months? A.: Color. The big increase in color telecasts. Q.: How do you like them? A.: Terrific. Of course, I see them in black and white. Q. : Are you planning to buy a color set? A.: Are you kidding? On my pay? Q.: What would you say was the second most important development? A.: Over-all-wise? president, Motorola Corp., also is of the opinion that color TV set sales will approach 200,000 sets in 1956. Recently, David Sarnoff said that Radio Corp. of America alone would produce 200,000 sets next year. For the more distant future, Mitchell of Sylvania said it would take about six years for color TV unit sales to catch up with those of black-and-white sets. Motorola's schedule shows industry sales at an annual rate of 1,000,000 color sets by the middle of 1958. • Fred Niles has announced here his resignation from Kling Film Productions, effective December 15. He has been with the firm as executive vice-president since he launched it in 1947. Robert Eirinberg is president of both the film company and the parent firm, Kling Studios, Inc. Q.: Yes. A.: The move into television of the Hollywood film people. Q.: What's your impression? A. : Like you guys say, waitand-see. Q.: Wait and see? They've been on for three months. A.: Well . . . They were pretty shaky to begin with, the MGM Parade, Warner Brothers Presents and The 20th Century-Fox Hour. Now, however, they all seem to be getting better, although the MGM Parade still is too fragmentary. You must know that Warners are scuttling the "King Row" bit and 20th-Fox will soon start presenting original stories. So it's still, wait-and-see in my book. Q.: Do you think the network program schedules have turned out to be as exciting as they sounded when they were announced. A.: Mostly, yes. Q.: Which in particular? A.: NBC-TV's Producer's Showcase series and those Ford Star Jubilees on CBS-TV. Also my kid, Benjy, has flipped over ABC-TV's Mickey Mouse Club. He can't tell the show from the commercials, which is just as well, perhaps. He hasn't taken off his Mickey Mouse hat in two months. I'm afraid he's going to lose his hair. Q.: Which are your favorite spectacidars? A. : All of them. Maybe especially NBC's "Our Town," with Eva Marie Saint and that "Love and Marriage" song; Joe Ferrer as "Cyrano." CBS-TV had some sparklers too, Mary and Noel, "The Caine Mutiny Court Martial," and the Judy Garland show, though all the talk about her health made me so nervous I was a wreck at the end of the show. That's something the publicity boys might consider. On the whole, however, these shows point up the potential of TV as just about the greatest and most influential medium of entertainment the world has ever known. It gives you an eerie feeling to think about it but, as a man in the street, I'm not supposed to say that. Q.: Why not? A.: My principal function is to report facts. A survey bureau calls me up and asks me what I'm looking at. They don't want to know why. Sometimes I'm looking at a certain station just because I'm waiting for the next show to come on. Things like that. Q.: What are your favorite new shows? A.: CBS-TV's Phil Silvers and half-hour Honeymooners series. I also get a charge out of Alfred Hitchcock. NBC-TV's Wide Wide World is a fascinating business, although I'm beginning to think that all they do in Juarez, Mexico, is dance in the village square. Also tops is Fred Coe's Playwrights '56, on NBC-TV, which still doesn't give the actual playwrights the prominence they deserve but does give men in the street like me pretty meaty stuff to ponder. Alice says she likes NBC-TV's Matinee Theatre, which must be true because she's usually glassy eyed when I get home. She's very conscientious about watching shows for the housewife. Q.: How about some of the simpler new shows? A.: Like Jane Wyman's Fireside Theatre? Good stories, soundly acted and produced. Navy Log? Likewise, with some especially good action photography. In some of the others, Wyatt Earp, Crossroads, Frontier, it all depends on the night you watch. Q.: Any remarks about the holdovers from last season? A.: I wouldn't be a man in the street if I didn't. I'd say that Robert Montgomery, Herbert Brodkin (of Goodyear and Alcoa) and the U. S. Steel people are doing an amazing job of coming up with intelligent scripts, considering the rate with which they are devoured. Ed Murrow has also done two fine, expanded See It Nows and Maurice Evans and Alistair Cooke have carried on with taste and intelligence. So has Studio One. Q.: How about the situation comedies ? A.: We never miss one and can hardly tell one from another. Q.: The jackpot programs? A.: Alice and I are not basically venal. We found that out with The Big Surprise. Q.: What about Hope, Berle, Raye, Skelton, Benny, Gobel? A.: We watch them all, and sometimes wonder why. Q.: Well, Harry, I guess that just about covers it. Have you any miscellaneous thoughts? A.: I still got that list of the 10 best movies. Also my ideas on whether or not Ike will run, the real meaning of the shakeup in the British cabinet and how I feel about Third Ave. without the El. Will you buy them? Q. : Not today, thank you.