Variety (December 1950)

By BOB STAHL Television networks Will be able to IraUe in their red ink for black by this time next year. That’s the opinion of Sylvester L. (Pat) Weav- er NBC-TV exec veepee, who main- tains that program costs, which sky rocketed to new heights during 1950, will level off during the com- ing year. As a result, he said, net- work program execs will be able to operate within their budgets and the webs should consequently start earning profits. Weaver, of course, spoke only for NBG but NBC’s progress will undoubtedly carry through for the rest Of the in- dustry. • Detailing video’s past and fu- ture progress in a year-end ihter- vieAV with Variety, Weaver averred that the medium literally came of age during 1950. He pointed out that it emerged as a vital phase of show business--and of big busi- ness—by developing on all fronts^ hitting the top categories in stars, writers and production, as well as in money both spent and received. “After a year’s shakedown, tele- . Vision has become big business and now we must really worry about it,” Weaver said. “But we’re already reaching one-third of the country’s population and they aren’t kicking about the quality of our shows. That should prove that TV’s basic fare is comparable in quality either to radio or films.” On the monetary front, the NBC e.\ec declared* that TV is big enough now not to be hurt by the war sit- uation. He indicated his belief that other forms of bankrolling may be affected, declaring that “advertising nay be hurt.” But, he added, the present situation should not impede TV’s growth, even though production of receivers will undoubtedly be curtailed drastical- ly. As for program costs, he said they will stabilize during the com- ing year,, “relative to current prices, of course.” Weaver noted that the Television (Continued on page 28) Pabst Pulls Kine On Fatal Bout Because of; the death of boxer Sonny Boy West from injuries sus- tained in the ring last week, CBS has ordered all affiliate stations which usually carry kinescopes of its weekly boxing matches to can- cel this week’s kine. Order was wired out to the affiliates over the weekend at the request of Pabst Beer, which sponsors the fight pickups. Pabst reportedly believed it might be accused of poor taste, It tlie kine were to be transmitted as scheduled. Since the fight was part of i ^ Wednesday night series, th< aifiliates will be forced to fill th< tune with local programming o: some sort. As far as the financia end of the cancellation is con corned, there will be no billing o: a^i.v kind made." CBS will noi charge Pabst for the kine and wil bypass the time charges to th( bankroller. Affiliates also reported |v will not bill CBS for the tim( fees. WNVe IN QUEST OF 7G VIDEO HANACER ; Seymour Siegel, head of New ork City’s radio and tele actlvi- lo.s, is hunting for a new topper $7,000 annually) for the ty s Tv and film production unit, lom which Clifford Bvahs is re- While headihg up the nit Evans also held the position of vsista^nt to the deputy mayor, at .$12,000 annually, a job mch will be taken over by Harry Municipal Unit has lensed sev- vidpix- for local tele outlets nd .subsequent exhibition in the- Aiir’’ ^^Kools, churches, etc., and aibo produced live TV stanzas. 4- On the Eve of New Vistas ly FCC ChQirinqn „ Wayne Coy ♦ if One of tht Mony Editorial Ftafurtt In fht Forthcoiniiiig 45th Anniversary Number of P^niETY OVT NEXT WEEK Is Click in D.C. Washington, Dec. 26. In a special telecast direct from Detroit to Washington, WWJ-TV presented its widely-heralded edu- cational program to 100 guests from Congress, the Army, State and Commerce Depts. and five of the seven members of the FCC. Guests watched the weekly U. of Michigan Television Hour on four screens in a Wardman Park hotel suite. At the same time, NBC re- corded the show in New York as an example of what the nation’s telecasters have been seeking for months: a way to'use the new me- dium for formal education. Along with thousands of regular Detroit area viewers, the Washing- ton group witnessed final illustrat- ed lectures on human biology and on the psychological problem o| hobbies as a new means of liveli- hood for the growing number of elderly and retired persons. They then Watched a video tour of the university’s speech depart- ment and a demonstration of how war veterans and others subjected to brain injury are treated for aphasia, FCC Chairman W^ayne Coy’s comment was: “One word—terrific —describes what WWJ-TV is doing. All of us are tremendously im- pressed with the idea. I would like to see the program carried one step further and have the students in the university’s radio and television (C!ontinued on page 28) Grappler Tourney For Men After Femmes Click Cincinnati, Dec. 26. Crosley’s tri-city TV web kicks off this week with a men’s heavy- weight wrestling tburnameht which president /Robert E. Dun- ville said was prompted' by popu- larity of its elimination tourney for femme grapplers inaugurated early this month. Saturday night matches in the men’s elimination series will orig- inate in the studios of WLW-D, I Dayton, and in Cincy’s Music Hall arena for pickups by WLW-T. Stakes of $5,000 will be split with $2,500 in cash and a $1,000 cham- pionship belt for the winner; $1,000 to second, and $500 to third-place finishers. Winner of the gals’ competition meets Mildred Burke for a $2,000 purse. A1 Haft, matchmaker for both tourneys, said the men’s also is open to all comers, with no limits on size or age.' Bouts are on a bne-fqll, 60-minute time limit basis, with three defeats causing elimination. Crosley video stations, Including WLW-C, Columbus, offer one Fri- day aiid two Saturday wrestling programs weekly.' By GEORGE ROSEN It’s Procter &. Gamblei vs. Lucky Strike in TV billings supremacy among the major clients, as televi- sion brings to a close its most affluent year. P&G, in nosing out the ciggie client for topdog position among i the heavy spenders, winds uP 1950 with total TV expenditures (pro- grams and time) of about $8,000,- obo. That’s over and above the ap- proximate $22,000,000 P&G spends annually on shows and time Costs in radio as the. No. 1 advertiser. (There’s been no diminution in. P&G’s AM programming since mov- ing into the TV forefront). Lucky Strike is only slightly be- hind P&G. Although the ciggie company, has fewer shows, they are more expensive ones. Luckies, too, splurges an approximate $2,000,000 bn TV spots, while P&G puts the accent on programming. Significant is the “history-re- peats-itself” aspect of the P&G emergence into supremacy,’ Virtu-, ally clinching its undisputed lead- ership in the longtime P&G vs. Lever Bros, rivalry. Just as, in radio, it was P&G that set -the pat- terns in daytime radio and night- time strip shows, and grabbed off the valuable time' franchises, the same story applies today in TV, with a situation that finds Lever Bros, practically frozen out of NBC and CBS on daytime franchises. Lever Moves Slowly With the exception of its own two CBS half-hour nighttime shows, “Lux Television Theatre’’ and “Big Town,” Lever has been slow in moving intq the TV picture, up to now completely bypassing the bid for daytime audiences. On the other hand, P&G has spread itself wide over the video kilocycles. It is entrenched in the daytime pro- gram sweepstakes with the $15,000- weekly budgeted “First Hundred Years” on CBS-TV; it has bought into the Kate Smith NBC video show on a five-times-a-week basis. On the after-dark channels, it spon- sors “Beulah” on ABC-'TV; the $32,000-weekly budgeted “Musical Comedy Time” on NBC-TV, and the Tuesday night “Fireside Theatre” vidpix series on NBC-TV. With an approximate time and talent budget of $1,500,000 annually on each, it represents a total outlay of close to $8,000,000. ■ Luckies," in the runnerup spot, has’ such expensive items as the Robert Montgomery dramatic se- ries on NBC-TV; the Sunday night “This Is Show Business” on CBS- TV; the Saturday night “Hit Pa- rade” on NBC-TV,'and the sched- uled appearances of Jack "Benny, who has already . done one video show. Further, Luckies has a tal- ent-production hut for its variety of “Be Happy-Go Lucky” commercials that approximates full program costs. SHOE CO. TAKES NEW KID QUIZ SHOW ON ABC-TV The Sam Smith Shoe Co., of New England, has negotiated a deal, via Dancer, Fitzgerald & Sample agen- cy, for a two-day-a-week spbhsor- ship of a kid show on ABC-TV. Starting Feb. 16, the shoe com- pany will be represented by a kid quiz program featuring A1 Ganna- way, It will be a 15-minute pro- gram, getting a late afternoon showcasing on Mondays and Wed- nesdays. Balto Has 252,200 Sets Baltimorej Dec. 26. Baltimore’s television set ^ure reached 252,200 as of Dec. 1. Sales for the'month of Nov. totaled 11,- 750. Television set figure a year ago In Baltimore Was'112,517. * ♦ ■, NBC'c TV Chief S. L. (Pat) Weaver Ditcatftt TV and the Intellectual A ProvoeoHve Byline Feature In the 45th Anniversary Numher : of--, P^filETY OVT NEXT WEEK ■ Chicago, Dec. 26. Flurry of cancellations or threats of same the past few weeks have left Chi tele show packagers sing- ing the “option blUes.” Rising costs and uncertainty over what the new year will bring in the way of emer- gency controls and restrictions, have caused the axing of several of the relatively high-budgqted live local TV programs. Although the failure to renew options has left the package build- ers and agencies with unsold prop- erties on their hands, situation hasn’t had too much effect ubon | the four tele stations as far as rev- enue is concerned. In mosf^ cases they’ve been able to peddle the time to clients using smaller-budg- eted film shows. With the four stations all now charging $1,000 for an hour of Class A time and the looming hike in talent rates coming out of the Current local Television Authority negotiatioiLs, some of the bankroll- ers are claiming they’re being priced out of the medium. But a closer scrutiny of the withdrawals shows that many of them were in just for pre-Christmas promotiou Network Competition Most of the shows that have been dropped or are bowing out have been slotted in the highly competi- tive prime evening time. As a re- sult, the local ventures have run into trouble snaring respectable ratings against network offerings. (Continued on page 28) Turns Yens Tele Show; Wants Fannie Brice For AM Counterpart Tumsi which sponsors the Fannie Brice radio show on NBC, is also looking for a TV property, and has set its sights on wooing the comed- ienne into video. Turns hai notified; its agency. Dancer, Fitzgerald & Sample, that it’s set to make the TV plunge in ’51 and has indicated that a teevee; counterpart of Miss Brice’s AM program would suit the client fine. It’s now a case of D-F-S con- vincing Miss Brice to make the transition. If she consents, show would be filmed on the Coast. Billie Burke’s Vidpic Hollywood, Dec. 26. Billie Burke will get $600 for a one-day stint before the television cameras next week in “Dear Aman- da.” Thirty-minute vidfilm being made for “Bigelow Theatre” is a William Morris package, and the agency will peddle it as a series starring Miss Burke. Bob Sodeberg, who is scripting, Will get $500 for the chore. ► Chicago, Dec, 26.. Did CBS prexy Frank Stanton offer to peddle the Web’s color teevee system tor $3,000,000 in 1949 or did he not, remains the question of the week here. The fuse to this latest bomb which blew the color controversy back Into the headlines was lighted by a state- ment made Wednesday (2Q) by Ross D. Siragusa, prexy of the Admiral Gorp. Tele set manufacturer declared in a Chi luncheon speech that Stan- ton had offered him the CBS tinted video device!, “lock, stock and bar- rel for $3,000,000.” The statement was denied in ad- vance by CBS topper, who had read a .handout of the Siragusa speech, Stanton telephoned the Chi manu- facturer from N. Y.^ Warning him if het repeated the statement during his .Wednesday talk, he (Stanton) would publicly label it false. Stanton’s denial read: “After reading the advance handout on , Siragusa’s talk, I phoned him to say that I have never made Admiral such an offer. He contended that during the spring of 1949, I perr sonally had made an offer to him personally, 1 advised Siragusa that I was in Europe at the time he said I made the offer. Moreover, I had no conversation, meeting, or correspondence with Siragusa on any subject during 1949. And I have never made any offer to Sir^ agusa on color television at any time. Accordingly, if Siragusa makes a statement about my offer as in the publicity handout, it i» false.” A Chi CBS publicity department staffer was sent to the luncheon to monitor Siragusa’s talk. Admiral chief stuck closely i6 his advance text. Siragusa led up to the controver- sial statement by declaring that his company does not believe the CBS system to be the. answer to color TV. “f could go into a great deal of . detail on ittie deficiencies of the CBS System. I think the most force- ful way to summarize my views about it, however, is to tell you that in 1949 Frank Stanton, presi- dent of Columbia, offered to sell Admiral its color system lock, stock . and barrel for $3,000,000,” he said. (Continued on page 26) UnderhOI Quits CBS-TV G Jtt. Post Charles Underhill, general man- ager of the television department at CBS, has turned in his resigna- tion to board chairman William S. Paley. That makes the second ma- jor year-end checkout, with Robert P. Heller, director of AM program- ming for the network, also having tendered his resignation to join the Lou iCowan package operation. A few months back Underhill Was transferred as director of TV programming (the video counter- part of Heller’s job under program veepee Hubbell Robinson, Ji*.) to the newly-created general manager spot, with Harry Ommerle desig- nated as UnderhilTs successor, Underhill's future plans are un- determined, ‘RANGER’MINTED TWO-WAY RIDE FOR GH Because General Mills has been unable to decide what show to put in its newly-acquired Friday night CBS-TV time, it looks like the filmed “Lone Ranger” will get an interim two-way ride on Columbia and ABC-TV. , GM purchased the CBS time last week, through Knox-Reeves agen- cy, to plug its Wheaties product. Same client has the “Ranger’’ Series on ABC via Dancer, Fitzgerald & Sample. Latter is loaning out the coWboy pix to Knox-Reeves pend- ing some conclusion ou the regular Friday CBS stanza.