Variety (Jul 1948)

<2 Progressive Party in Bum Over Webs' Philly Convention Coverage f^^etlncgday, Jwly 28 , 194» Monroe's Fall Status For Camel Stfll in Doubt By JERRY GAGHAN Philadelphia, July 27. Progressive Parts' spokesmen were bitter about the radio cov- erage given the Philadelphia con- clave and were particularly salty over the scant treatment allegedly handed them by CBS during the opening sessions. Edward R. Frisbie, radio and television director foi', the Na- tional Wallace for President Com- mittee, bitterly assailed the CBS bosses. "They exercised their so-called editorial and managerial discretion to convince themselves that our convention- lacked color." Frisbie said, shortly after the pander monium that marked tlie appear- ance ot Candidates Wallace and Taylor with their families^ Satur- day afternoon. "NBC gave us the fairest break," Frisbie ssid. "Each of others were progressively wcfi"se. Special events were completely lacking. All the . /Philly Boxscore Here's the recap on network coverage of the Progressive Party convention: ABC—Eight hours 30 min- utes of AM coverage; 26 hours, 30 minutes of TV time; $26,619 .in AM commercial program cancellations and $30,000 operating costs. CBS—Six hours 55 minutes of news programs originated from Philly; 25 hours, four minutes of TV time; cost fig- ures not available. DuMont—10 hours 15 min- utes Of TV time, entirely fed by pool; no commercial can- cellations; web shared pool costs. ■ Mutual—Nine hours of AM time; no commercial cancella- tions; $5,730 in operating costs. . NBC—Nine hours 35 min- utes > of ^ AM, time, including . seven hours, five minUtes. of convention, proceedihgfe; esti- mater $75,000 in costs for can- cellations and operation. Fate of ■ the. Vaughn Monroe CBS show hi the fall is still up in the air. It's currently doing , summer duty for R. J. Reynolds over the Saturday night mixup m j (Camels) in the Screen Guild Mon- acceptance speech tnne. ! nigjn time on CBS, but ap- 1 Candidate Henry A. Wallace i|)arently William Esty agency! was scheduled to address the | hasn't decided as yet on whether Shibe Park thousands at 10 p.m. i it returns to a regular fall berth, and all four nets planned their [ Ciggie outfit has bought Jimmy evenings on that listing. ! Durante for the fall, which, if The nets again pooled for the 1 Monroe stays, gives it four net- convention and Mutual was in work programs, others being How NBC CBS FaH Schedule Lines Up The between-season jockeying among sponsors is practically ended, ivith most of the changes involving bigtime personalities on the NBC and CBS kilocycles. While there will proboblj/ be a few additional changes on top, here's Ji'6w tlie NBCCBS commercial .programmingi picture shapes up for the 'iB-'i9 ride. ■ ■•• CBS NBC Sunday local Stations pulled out shame- fully, their,rooms are e^npty'and there was not an attempt at cov- erago; ' ' 'n'hese are the same people, x\li'i are boasting about the job radio did at the other two conven- tions." CSS, afeeording to Frisbie, didn't pui on a single live program frpm the convention until the Wallace acceptance speech in Shibe Park, Saturday night. • . . • ''That sanie network ; gave up hours of time and cancelled valu- able commercial progi"ams . to show the machine-made demon- stration in favor of dark horses and favorite sons at the other conventions,'.' Frisbie said. Says CBS 'Welched' "Well, the American people are just as curiou.s about this new party. They want to know what it stands for, who are its leaders, what its delegates have to say. It was a public service to bring this convention to the people, and CBS welched on that public service co'Tipletely." '.^'.\dio coverage the opening n". It of the convention ran as fol- ' lov.'.'i: N.BC covered from 9 p.m. until 10:30. ABC came in for the keynote address of Charles P. How- ard. Iowa publisher, from 9:30 to 10:30. Mutual came in for key- noie at 9:30. but cut it oft at 10 p.m. .'^^cording to Frisbie, Mutual cut 011 the convention because of its "I'cc't the Press" show. "They of- fei'od to let me put Sen. Glen Taylor on 'Meet- tlie Press', wanl- ias me to go into competition with my Own keynote speaker," Fxjshie added. dBS, according to the log, ran commentator Quincy Howe, from 11:10 to 11:15. Saturday altev- hoon, three of the networks fABG, MBS and NBC) stayed with the con- vention from 2 p.m. until 5 o'clock and after, CBS was still laying oft' and didn't pick it up until the 10 o'clock acceptance speech in * Shibe Park, when all the others wei'e again with it. If Progressive Party people did * bum, the radio crowd used some iancy expletive (off the air) charge for this one. NBC did the GOP; CBS handled the Demos. At 9:30 Cliff Harris, technical su- pervisor at WIP in charge of the field setup, got word from the Progressive stalf that Wallace couldn't appear until 10:30 as the program was running far behind. schedule. Whether it was planned or not, the delay proved a great break for the Wallace followers. Mutual had to pick up the show anyway, and ■ at that particular moment William Gailmpre was making a special pitch for funds. It lasted most of the haU'hoiir. $50,000 was collected from the audience. The long arm of coincidence no doubt, b''id Mutual sacrifice its Chicago Theatre, of the Air (Col. Bertie McCormick's show)' in favor of the convention collection. Coincidence didn't rest well with the WIP and MBS crowd present, who were shortly to hear Gailmor tell' the crowd that the reason they-had to- dig- in .and contribute was that radio pro- grams had to be paid for. Gailmor later clarified "the reniark by ex- plaining he meant radio programs after the present one, which was for free. Physically, . none of the nets turned out in the force tliey dis- played at the previous conven- tions. Although there was plenty Of brass around. Davidson Taylor, CBS vice president in charge of public affSrs, headed that chain's contingent. Thomas Velotta, vice president in charge of news for ABC was on the .Shibe Park infield with his crew. .BiU, Brooks, ivp ip . charge of news for NBC, found'two -Con- ventions too much, and ducked out on' this one. Frank McCall, NBC's director of news operations, took over in his stead, with the help of Ann Gillis, Brooks' girl friday. • Screen Guild and Bob Hawk. | Camels, however, may decide to cut back to three shows. Tom Luckenbill, Esty radio vee^ p-ce, ' is also undecided as yet whether Hawk, currently ' heard Thursday hights on NBC, switches place's with Screen Guild. NBC To Cover Commies' Convention, So Other Webs Will Go Along What to do about covering the Communist Party • convention in "Madison Square Garden next Mon- day, (2i had . the • networks' news chltefs in a .tizzy this week; The CP had requested coverage of all of the ; webs. But was the party still legal? What ' with its top echelon under Federal indictment, charged with advocating overthrow of the'Government, could the webs justify airing talks by CP Pres- idential candidate,. William Z. Foster - and other indicted party members? On Monday (26) the nets were unanimously undecided. ABC and Mutual had told .the CP they'd have to know in how many states the party would be on the ballot; both nets had received "ambigu- ous" , replies, and had reiterated their request, but received no answer. It was a case all around, it seemed, of none of the webs being anxious to commit itself un- less the others did. I.ale Monday (26), however, NBC let it be known that it would give the convention "some" coverage^ didn^t say how mi)ch. Whether this included TV also wasn't immedi- ately indicated. Yesterday (Tues.) ABC. announced it would pick up 15 minutes of F'oster's keynote ad- dress;; CBS said it would carry the CP candidate's acceptance speech, "if- they nominate somebody." And Mutual said it also would give the Commies "some" coverage. CorwinBackTo Radio With 1 Series for CBS The question of wliether Nor- man Corwin was returning to radio or had decided on a career in films was answered by Corwin himself • last week, when he checked in at CBS hdqs. in NeW: York for a several weeks' series^ of huddles with web execs on his" '48-'49 plans. Corwin, who has been living on the Coast for the past year, where he did a screen treatment of "All the King's Men" for Columbia Pictures, discloses that he's not only returning to radio and CBS, but is projecting an ambitious series for .the, network's upcoming semester. rPlanS for the series are be<ng. crystallized during bis stay here. On Aug. 18 Corwin leaves for a three-week trip to Europe as part of the One World organiza- tion's contingent whicli will spread out on "the Continent to dedicate a series -of' FioreUo' LaGnardia 'memorials in the capitals and to scan the t'adio ahd'other cultural horizons. After his European junket. Cor- win returns to the Coast to start work on a filih adaptation of his "M.ary and the Fairy" radio play,, which , he'll do with Charles Feld-: man. .As for '*King'S :Men," which deals with the Louisiana political scene, Columbia is apprehensive about it, says Corwin, because of "pressure" from' 'the southern state. Tuesday CBS Old-Faithful Cancels Sat Hme One of the "old faithfuls" on CBS,' which over the past decade has been spending approximately $250,000 a year in CBS time for its "Stars Over Hollywood" Saturday matinee show (12:30), has decided to cancel out. Outfit is Bow- cy's, the dairy operation, and al- though the program has consist- ently paid off with a solid rating (latest is 6.1, topping every other .show in the; Saturday daytime i sweepstakes), the company is re- ported bowing out because of the current price squeeze. ' Stars" fades after the Sept. U broadcast. It's an MCA booking. CBS' plan is to move up the succeeding shows. "Grand Central Station, ' "County Fair" and "Giv;e and Take," in order to make the 2 p.m; period available for 'spon- sorship. CBS' Judy Holiiday Show CBS last night (Tues.) auditioned a domestic situation comedy star- ring Judy Holiiday, with Charles Irving in the role of her husband. Thirty-minute house-built pack- age is being produced by Irving Mansfield, with Ed Downs direct- ing and Sidy Zilenka handling the scripting assigntnent, • , HAWAII CHARMS HYAMS After 13 Years With CBS Mnsicol- ogist Is Not Returning: Ben Hyams, for 13 yeai-s staff musicologist with the CBS pro- gram department, has resigned and decided to spend tlie balance ot his life in Hawaii. He went there nearly a year ago on leave of absence for his health but lias just elected to waive right of return. In Honululu Hyams is directing a Sunday night symphony broad- cast and has joined the staff' of a local advertising agency. Hoist & Cummings. ' Present CBS staff musicqlogist is David Bamdolph. , ■■. . ■■■■■■ ■. .• •, . , . . <1 1 <: t.Jia Saturday 7:30 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:30 • 10:00 10:30 For Sale Sing It Again (For Sale) Sing It Again . (For Sale) Morey Amsterdam (For Sale) Pays To Be Ignonint (Co-op) For Sale For Sail! Sat. Night Serenade (Pet Milk) H'wood Star Preview (Anacin) Truth Or Conseq. (P & G) Hit Parade (Lucky Strike) Can You Top Xhis (Colgate) Judy Canova (Colgate) Grand Olc Opiy (Prince Albert)