TV Guide (September 25, 1954)

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BIG Shows For BIG Screens IVot only living rooms will offer ex¬ citing television this season. Some impressive programs are planned for movie theaters, too. Large-screen theater TV’s 1954-55 season got under way on Sept. 15 with an encore of its biggest money¬ maker the preceding year—Rocky Marciano vs. Ezzard Charles. Telecast ticket-buyers are being promised the glittering spectacle of the Metropolitan Opera’s grand open¬ ing Nov. 8 (available to home owners gratis in earlier seasons), a group of concerts by the New York Philhar¬ monic Symphony, beginning Oct. 7, and at least three Notre Dame foot¬ ball games. One theater TV production outfit also has arranged to telecast a top comedy hit, “The Seven Year Itch,” direct from its Broadway stage, but is currently involved in a hassle about conflicting movie rights. In theater TV, shows are projected on the full-size screens of local movie houses; and viewers of these programs, which are not available in the living room, are charged varying prices. When engineers some seven or eight years ago perfected the means to project a TV image as large as 18x24 feet, the movie magnates took over. Crystal ball communiques predicted super-duper, all-star extravaganzas that would make home TV seem as inferior as home movies. There would be weekly pickups from Broadway theaters, sports classics, concerts, bal¬ let, opera, and fabulous profits for all. However, theater TV ran smack into the old chicken-and-the-egg problem. Theater managers would not invest in big-screen TV equipment (costing as much as $15,800 per thea¬ ter) unless they were promised a steady flow of theater TV events. And program producers, sports promoters, etc., could not stage mammoth shows unless they were assured a profitable network of theaters. Union and royalty problems were added road blocks. Looming as the biggest threat of all is pay-as-you-see TV, now being tested. While several systems of home- installed, subscription TV are tech¬ nically feasible, the Federal Communi¬ cations Commission still hasn’t indi¬ cated how it feels about charging the public for programs beamed over the airwaves. When and if pay-as- you-see gets a green light, however, theater TV may face trouble. There are now some 31,000,000 TV receivers in use around the country, each a potential box office for special events. No theater TV network could match so large a box-office “take.” Meanwhile, some 100 theaters in 60 cities currently are equipped for big-screen TV shows. As many as possible will be linked for each of the big events coming up for theater TV this fall. If these theaters show suffi¬ cient profit, more movie houses may be persuaded to buy equipment. Other¬ wise, theater TV could easily abandon its entertainment plans and concen¬ trate on such private affairs as across- the-airways sales meetings. Always held during the pre-noon hours, before the movie houses open for business, these get-out-and-sell rallies mean new off-hours revenue. 27