Variety (December 1950)

28 RAllIO-TilLEVlSIOlV Wednesday, December 27» 1950 Tele Followups Continued from page 23 role, that of the materialistic but understanding innkeeper. An ex- cellent biting performance was that of Dan Morgan as the cynical and tired thief, Ditmas, Who is given faith. after he catches a glimpse of the Child. Ann Marno and Elizabeth Ross are good as the two servant girls, and Horace Bra- ham excellent as the narrator, Sets, camera work and staging wer uniformly good. Cal Kuhl and Fielder Cook can take a couple of deep bows' for their production and direction. CBS-TV's “Suspense,” as its con- tribution to holiday cheer, staged a warm-hearted adaptation last Tuesday night (19 > of a Damon Runyon short story; titled “Danc- ing Dan’s Christmas.” As adapted by Halsted Welles, the script re- tained just enough suspense to re- tain the integrity of the title. Otherwise, it was a pleasant bit of. Runyonesque nostalgia harking back to the speakeasy-and-Prohibi- tion era when Runyon could kid about a couple of gangsters putting the. finger on a romantic jewel- thief: As played by a fine cast, foplined. by Wally Cox and Ethel GriffiQS, the show had in it much of the charm of Broadway's cur- rent Runyon offering, “Guys and Dolls.” ■ • Story was uncomplicated fluff, about a beauteous hostess in a speak, loved by the gang chief and •‘Dancing Dan,” the jewel-heister. Through, playing Santa Claus for the gal’s aged grandmother, Dan succeeded in getting the doll and eluding the mobsters. Cox, in what \\'as probably his first straight role on TV, did a neat job as one of the speak’s habitues.' Miss Grif- f ies scored as the sentimental grandmother and Cloris Leachman achieved just the right Runyon flavor as the gal. Robert Webber turned in a fine characterization of Dan, and Cliff Hall was good as the saloon-keeper.. Paul ^Tipton and Harold Gary, as the two gangsters; Joe Sweeney, as a tipsy Santa, and Joe Bushkin, practically 1 . playing himself as the speak’s 88’er, all registered solidly. Show was backgrounded by some standout sets lined up by producer- director Robert Stevens, including probably the best simulated snow yet seen on TV, which was worked up by CBS special effects chief John DeMott and his crew. Miss Leachman, incidentally, was spotted in one scene putting on her clothes over a chemise. It was the kind of thing that would never have gotten by the film industry’s ' Production Code guardian?, but it i fit right into the TV story. KMA Asks 39G Tax Refund Des Moines, Dec. 26. May Broadcasting Co., operator of KMA, Shenandoah, has filed suit in federal court asking $39,328 tax refund, charging that the Iowa collector of internal revenue “er- roneously and illegally” assessed and collected too much excess profit tax from the company for the years .1942 to 1945. Amounts the company claims are due are as follows: 1942, $5,- 466.70; 1943, $7,770.04; 1944, $15,- 819.95 and 1945, $10,271.33. Eileen BARTON December 25-29 PALACE, Youngstown, Ohio December 30-31 PALACE, Toledo, Ohio Dir,: Music Cprp. of America NBC-TV’s "Lights Our went out on a new supernatural tangent Monday night (18) by presenting a story of a dead soldier returning to help some of his buddies out of a Japanese trap in the last war. While the fantastic aspects of the yarn hit somewhat too closely to ! home to make it very believable, the neat production given the show by Herbert Swope, Jr., coupled with some good perform- ances under the direction of Lau- rence Schwab, Jr., made for an in- teresting half‘'hour. Lee 'Tracy turned in. his usual capable thesping job as the hard- bitten but sympathetic sergeant, responsible for springing his! squadron out of the trap atop a mountain in the Philippines. Rob- ert Hull overplayed slightly as the war correspondent fresh from the ! States, while William FrCe scored, i as a GI from Texas. Verne Collett registered strongly as the young soldier too terrified to take his turn at watch, with Biff Elliot do- ing a good job as his back-from^ the-dead brother. Tom Jewett’s sets helped create the battlefront illusion. Harry Muheim scripted the yam. ‘Pat’ Weaver Continued from page 21 Worthington Miner’s “Studio One” two-part production of Louisa May Alcott’s “Little Wom- en” offered the moving second in- stallment, “Jo’s Story,” Monday (25) on CBS-TV; It registered j with an emotional impact, with the sensitive adaptation of Sumner Locke Eliot and the realistic direc- tion of Lela Swift pointing up the warm, human values in the classic.. The hesitant romance between Jo and Professor Baher, for instance, I was put in the framework of his I stressing the importance of per- sonal integrity, of her learning to write truthfully rather than turn- ing out money-making pot-boilers. [ Rent Smith played the German professor with appealing restraint. Nancy Marchand gave Jo dimen- sion, as she grew from a spirited but cautious New England girl into a thoughtful, mature young woman. There were many touch- ing scenes, one of the more out-V standing being that in which Beth, well thesped by June Dayton, told Jo she knew death was approach- ing. Others in the topflight drama- tization included Mary Sinclair. Lois Hall, Peggy Hillias, Richard! Purdy, Elizabeth Paterson, Henry Bernard, John Baragrey, Berry Kroeger, Una O’Connor and Doro- thy Blackburn. Authority contract, which set up the first minimum scale for video talent, has claidfied that situation. Agreements with other unions and guilds'in TV have also been ad- justed during the last year, he said. “As a result,” he declared, "stag- ing, productioh and talent costs should be foreseeable and there- fore controllable. Now we’ll be able to set up a budget and do our show within that budget as best we can.” Crystal-bailing for 1951y Weaver predicted more individualizing in programming, with the various stars all finding ways to stylize their own personalities. "The rest of the show/' he said, "will stem from what they do. Our big musi- cal shows don’t necessarily have to be either revues or vaudeville./We have hot been forced into any revue formula. That's a misconcep- tion, which only a few people ever took seriously.” NBC exec conceded that not much has been done to improve the quality of dramatic productions during 1950, explaining that "man- agement has had to go hack to take care of new money problems first.” He declared that much which can be done to develop TV drama must , be done in an experimental form. ; “It’s unlikely,” he said, "that spon- sors will go for experinientation. What we may do is package a show in audition form and then try to sell it to sponsors.” He noted, too, that TV will probably find sustain- ing time opening lip next summer, wbicb can be utilized for experi- mental programming. - WWJ-TV ; Continued from page 21 THAT REGISTER IN DETROIT We're proud of the successful cdrripahy we keep on WJBK-TV AMUROL TOOTHPASTI BENRUS WATCHES BORDEN‘S DAIRY CAMEO CURTAINS COCO-WHEATS DOMESTIC SEWING MACHINE CO. FLEX-IET WATCH BANDS GERBER POPCORN PACKAGE national carbon OVALTINE (WANDER CO.) PINAFORE CHICKEN SMITH agricultural CHEMICAL CO. Follow these leaders and boost your sales! WJBK-TV, a CBS and Dumont affiliate. WJBK-AM‘TV-DETROIT NATIONAL SALES HEADQUARTERS.; 488 MADISON AVENUE NEW YORK 22, ELDORADO 5-2455 Represented Nationally by THE KATZ AGENCY. INC. courses, taken into tbe production end. “Along with tbe need for well- planned. adult education, the tele- vision industry needs vehicles to train young men for its expanding technical staffs.” FCC Commissioner Frieda Hen- nock, who advocates reservation of specific video bands for school use* pointed to the WWJ-TV Venture as a means of helping 13,000,000 Americans who have never received formal education. "Every video set,” she said, “can become a class- room, and I, for one, would* like to see every station in the country duplicating the Detroit effort-morn- ing, noon and night.” Col. E. M. Kirby, chief of radio and television for the Dept, of the Army, predicted that national net- works will duplicate the Detroit plan and give the whole nation a graphic lesson in world problems and responsibilities. Herbert Ponting, a director of the Detroit News, owner of the sta- tion, and Harry Bannister, station’s general manager, explained to the guests how listeners seeking official certification from the television teachings may pay $2 enrollment fee and receive printed material developing the televised leetid*es. Bannister said 40f) already have enrolled for a video course in pho- tography which will begin Jan. 7. Continued from page 19 for a new local identity and i retail biz. WNEW Still No. 1 Indie WNEW: Still out in fron Number 1 indie, with tilted pj from local aiid national spot ac tisers. WMGM: Rated as Number J die, Loew’s-owned outlet repc a healthy increase in gross for ending Aug. 31. Heavy sports and MGM Radio Attractions 1 scribers helped recent good s) ing. WMCA and WINS are repo neck-and-neck. WMCA, under hardselling Norman Boggs Oj tion, touts increases of 23% after paring its rate card. Added sports coverage also helped. WINS has shown some faltering, tipped by some open adjacenies to its athletic events, However, TV dealers’ coin has kept the Crosley outlet in the race. WQXR: N. Y. Times outlet esti- mates a 10.7% hike in annual take, based on its specialization as the city’s longhair music box. WOV: Specialization has paid off with heavily-sold Italian language concentration.: English shows also are specialized — Irish, hillbilly, jazz, etc. Indie recently added three English hours daily to accommo- date new national spot biz. WHOM:.Reported as just holding its own. However, shift from Jersey City to N. Y.: (just approved by the FCC) and acquisition of WMCA-FM are expected to step up its stride. WLIB; Being outpaced but its new management is looking for a new pattern appealing to the city’s Ne- gro and Jewish-American audi- ences. WEVD: Jogging along steadily with dominance in the Jewish, field. WBNXi Not a mudder. WWRL: Diversification of for- eign languages, new pitch to Negro audiences, greater kilowattage helping the Woodside dark horse. WAAT, Newark, is a good subur- ban bet. WPAT, Paterson, showed some flash under pacing of the late Herman Bess. WNJR and WVNJ—both in Jer- sey-^show signs of weakness in the •stretch. WHLI, Hempstead, with the population of Nassau county zooming, has been pulling up. WNYC: Municipal outlet hasn’t had a commercial in 25 years. But its sponsor, City of New York, is expected to vote it a budgetary in- crease. L Damrosch Continued from page v'} have to tell you of the miracle that radio has worked in this country. The results have been awe-inspiring. Beethoven and Bach as well as Wagner and Verdi have brought their magic into the hum- blest and remotest dwellings.” The son of Leopold Damrosch, who turned from medicine to mu- sic and conducted the Metropoli- tan . Opera, Damrosch began to study harmony at the age of nine. When the elder Damrosch died in 1885, the son was appointed as- sistant director and conductor at the Metopera, remaining with it for seven years. For 41 years Damrosch led the N. Y. Symphony Orchestra (later merged with the Philharmonic So- ciety), retiring as conductor in 1926 and later serving as associate conductor. He helped form the Mu- sicians Emergency Fund Aid in 1931, for which he conducted a series of concerts in Madison Square Garden. Among his compositions in many forms are four operas, "The Scar- let Letter,” "Cyrano de Bergerac,” “The Dove of Peace” and "The] Opera Cloak.” From 1936-41 he served as president of the Na- tional Institute of Arts and Letters. He is survived by four daughters; a sister, Mrs. Henry T. Seymour; nine grandchildren* and a great- grandchild. ‘Option Blues’ Continued from page 21 Situation points to possible diffi- culties which will confront non-web stations if and when the channel freeze is removed and Chicago has its full complement of seven out- lets. Already cancelled is "Request Performances,” half-hour vaudeo show emceed by columnist Irv Kup- cinet and bankrolled in the Sunday night 6 to 6:30 spot on WGN-TV by Win. A. Lewis stores. Also Herb Laufman’s "Your J*roblem Panel,” 45-minute show using an average of six thespers weekly, has been dropped by Charles A. Stevens stores from its Monday night pe- riod on same station. Bowing put' Monday (25) was Ernie Simon’s "Simply Simon” va- riety stanza on WENR-TV, spon- sored by TV Forecast iriag. Wind- up of the football season hit a couple of shows with seasonal can- cellations. WBKB’s "Bear’s Quar- terback Club,” aired at 9:30 to 10 Tuesday nights, ended its run for Standard Oil last week. Likewise for the "Sid Luckman Football Show,” sponsored Monday nights on WGN-TV by Karrolls’ Men Stores, Still going strong, however, is Jim Moran’s hour-long "Cpurtesy Hour” variety show Friday 10-11 p. m. Car dealer, laying out be- tween $1,700 to $2,000 weekly for talent, says he has no intention of cancelling unless local TVA rates make it impossible for him to put on an acceptable show within the $2,000 figure. Seattle—Harry Helm now part- time announcer at KXA, local in- die Dick Crombie, formerly KBRO, Bremerton, now on sales staff at KXA, and Chuck Engcll, formerly at KMO, is a new engineer on the station, replacing Earl Thoms who is now at KJR. Thoms replaced Walt Stewart, now at KNBC, San Francisco. ” • fi MOUTT* -AMTII” j ”At’ Currently TOWN CASINO BUFFALO DirMtl«n: MUSIC CORf. OF AMERICA WANTED Commercial TV writor for largo mid- west agency. Prefer experienced vis- ual ad-writer with at least one year ogency work in TV. Write BOX G, 915, VARIETY 154 West 46th St., New York 19 Comtdy Writing Wanted •. Radio and TV • • • tkiti, monologt, iltuotlont outlined, [okas, etc. VYhat would YOU like? Box V-1222. Variety, 154 W. 46th St., New York 19, N. Y. I I