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Laughter is contagious. Television is intimate. And, we’re afraid, never the twain shall meet. In a crowded theater, a small joke will start someone giggling and before you know it the whole place is ring¬ ing with whoops of laughter. In a liv¬ ing room a small joke is a small joke. Pop may smile, Mom may grin, and Junior may chuckle, but generally TV comedy is enjoyed in comparative sil¬ ence. Television is meant for living rooms and for the living rooms’ ap¬ preciative but quiet viewers. Only one or two of all the situation comedies made in Hollywood are filmed before audiences. Usually the actors go through their paces before the cameras on closed movie sets. The film is then processed and taken to a theater on a side street in Los Angeles where it is shown. The audience, which got in free, submits to the con¬ tagion of laughter and guffaws itself silly. Said guffaws are recorded, printed on the film, and the show is ready for “intimate” telecasting. We sit in our living rooms and watch what appears to be mildly amusing stuff. But we hear roars of laughter that puzzle us. Are we really seeing the same show the theater audience howled over? Unfortunately, while laughter may be contagious in a theater, it isn’t virulent enough to infect us over any distance. Theater audience laughter may, in some measure, help a good situation comedy. It makes a mediocre one downright silly when viewed in a home. If television really is an intimate medium, as the industry bigwigs in¬ sist, why clutter it up with canned laughs? Laughter simply is not con¬ tagious when the germ is supposed to jump from a recorded audience of 500 in Hollywood to three people in a Keokuk, la., living room. Or is it that the TV moguls don’t trust us viewers to know, without benefit of laugh cues, what’s funny and what isn’t? TELETYPE New York . 3 ARTICLES The Heart of Strike It Rich . 5 Kraft Theater: 104 Hours of Plays . 8 Edward R. Marrow: They Call Him Ed .10 Arthur Godfrey Cracks Down ...20 In The Cast: Larry Keating .20 SPECIAL FEATURE D'Alessio Drawings: An Artist Looks At TV .18 CLOSE-UP Marjorie Reynolds .15 REVIEWS Letter To Loretta .13 Topper .14 WOMEN IN TV Arlene Francis' Diet .22 SPORTS Red Smith Reports .23 COLUMN Fine Tuning .2 1 Walter H. Annenberg, Editor Merrill Panitt, National Managing Editor Harold B. Clemenko, Regional Managing Editor Michael J. O'Neill, Advertising Director James T. Quirk, Publisher TV GUIDE is published weekly by Triangle Publications. Inc.. 333 South Broad Street. Philadelphia 7. Pa. Kingsley 6-0807. Entered as second class matter at the Post Office at Philadelphia, Pa. Subscription Rates: in the United States 1 year $5.00. 2 years $8.00. 3 years $11.00. single copy 15c: in Canada 1 year $8.00, 2 years $10.00. 3 years $14.00: in Pan-American Countries 1 year $7.00.2 years $12.00, 3 years $17.00: in other For¬ eign Countries 1 year $8.00. 2 years $14.00. 3 years $20.00. Copyright 1953 by Triangle Publications. Inc.