Variety (July 1953)

RADIO-TELKVISIOX Radio Reviews wx&m si Wednesday, July 13, 1933 Continued from page 26 tliornt* seems to do fairly well in this groove, although this chatty t.\ pc stuff with sortie good musical interludes might do better in a very late slot. . Its restf illness may. . go over better at that time. . Hawthorne, ; on his preeiri show ■i llv,' apparently sought to impress •by talking aboil t mundane subjects .aiid making some A timing Smalltalk on various :. injects, one of y h i eh was streetcars., Maestro Uohert: Armbruster chimes in with tlfe gal) as. does Barbara Logan, guest vocalist; Later ipcidentalr ,]y . slvow'cd an uneven qualify at times, but it may have been due to premiere jitters. Arm-' hi uster,. of course, is a batoneer \v it h some literate arrangements and he provides a good deal of color to the show.. The Hawthorne brand of humor K appealing to high>JQ groups. Although he didn’t show any flashes of ".low-pressure.-' ...brilliance On . his proem,' he’s likely, to hit a. stride that will make this a, highly lisle nabl.e stanza.. Hawthorne explained the title “Hau thorne-TBA” (To : Be Anil <\u need) as one. which seemed to lie the most popular.. in radio log livings. : ' This kind of prograrii, starts .o(T.. w ith one ad van t. a g e ,. 1 t\s the ki lid ol . show one can’t hate, so it’s got. to go in only one direction^— lip. Hawthorne has to gain a bit of altitude. . Jose. LITERARY GREATS With John W. Paccy, guests Producer:Bill Bcrns . Director: Richard Ritter Writer; MJchael -Sklar 15 Mins,., Tues;, 8:45. p.m. Sustaining .ABC* from N.Y. .' What’s basically an appealing program idea, having modern-day ..writers read their works, goes slightly, awry in this 15-minute segment. Those potentialities that would ."provide' interesting listening—.the origins and inspirations of certain works, for example, or even a chat with the writer— are ignored, and . in their place is a heavy-handed lecture on the writers’ works. Mie.haet Sklar’s scripts are written well enough within the llm SPECtAL OPTICAL EFFECTS AND TITLES On FIRESIDE THEATRE Television Show ' ■ by ' PAY MERCER & COMPANY 4241 Normal Ave., H'wood 29, Cal. Sand for Fra a Optical Effects Chart: itatiofis of their framework, but the program has the form of a college lecture, an evaluation of techniques and prominence of the writer. This leaves little incentive for dialers to tune in oh to stay tuned. ' . ' . -. Solemnity of the treatment was especially obvious on show caught, since Ogdon Nash was the guest writer. . It seemed a little paradoxical, the solemn/ comment of moderator . John W. Pacey .on the one hand, and the irreverent verse of Nash on the other: Pacey, Who is director of Public Affairs for the net, handled his. lecture .notes nicely, and Nash delivered his ditties in okay fashion, especially the. spoof on Christmas and radio commercials. . But: the entire tenor of the show is far too reverently scholastic to entice many listeners. Chan. ■■ ; DEADLINE With Bob Readick, Larry Haines, Alice Frost, Peter Fernandez, Mason Adams, Dwight Weist, • Danny Ocho Director: Jerry McGill 30 Mins.; Wed., .8. p.m. Participating MILS, from N Y. • Presented by the Mutual Broadcasting System in cooperation with the editors of Look mag, ♦“Deadline” registers as a stock meller entry ^ Initial yarn Wednesday (8), missed on some counts of plausibility. Program was also overburdened . with commercials. Besides an opening plug, another after the annotuiceriient of yarn’s title and a closing rpitch, there were two breaks during the run of the story. : Opening yarn dealt with a reporter’s belief in the Innocence of a truck driver convicted of murder arid his unearthing of the true facts of. the ease in time to save the man from the electric chair. Airer • lacked in suspense and provided little excitement. Character delineations : by Bob Readick as the reporter, Larry Haines as the truck . driver, Alice Frost and Peter Fernandez, as his’ wife and ... brother-in-law, respectively, Mason Adams as a young hood, Dwight Weist as a prison priest and Danny Ocho as a patrolman were all along pat lilies. : •’ / '• f ■ JCSS. MISSION MIDNIGHT With Walter Phillips 5 V a Hours; Mon.-Sat,, 11:30 p.m. Participating WLW, Cincinnati Listeners ' to .Walter Philipps’ zany riighlowl platter opry have a chance to get in on Ine act 'via, his. newest gimmick-— playbacks of’ their telephone talks with him. In addition to a flood Of mail and wires, he receives 25 or more longdistance ■calls a show, The Crosley dear-channel station carries to the 43 states, Canada and Cuba. After three years on other Cincy stations,. Phillips switched to WLW niirifc months ago and has built up an international following, with a distinctive line of ad libs. He never fails to plug singers and orchestras and most, often also the ; writers of tunes played, ..; The Phillips long suit is a mixture of sound effects and .--recorded voices whicli finally set off the time fuse for a corinmercial— either canned or live. Crosley has him concentrating this routine : in Crazy Quilt for 15 minutes, Monday through Friday at 7:45 a. hi., to put together eight commercials. The particular Phillips pattern of product plugging has been picked up by some other dee jays, who also may be expected to follow his conversation playback gimmick, which lie uses Several times a night on humorous conversations and with permission of the callers. “Mission Midnight” selections are all requests of pops and standards. On Saturdays from 1 1 : 30 p.m. to 1 a m. , the Phillips hit parade offers numbers, that were asked for the most during the week. . . Roll : From the Production Centres Continued from page 26 ■ Nichols has joined the WEDO announcing staff. He was a lieutenant in Korea In charge of two Armed Forces radio stations . , . Herman Schmidt KQV engineer who does the “Characters” program and 1 i • wife celebrated their 11th wedding anni , , .. Jimmy Gismondi, savrt'l director of WMB$ in Uniontown, has been elevated to the ’station managership, arid will continue doing sports as well. Gismondi w i? also elected president of the Uniontown Exchange Club . . . Lionel Poulton, KDKA producer, and his wife drove to Miami Beach ABC Seeks Place — — — Continued from page 27 on the vair that way. ABC-TV would face no competition in the 9 a. fri. time, since both NBC-TV and CBS; TV are . local, and . DuMont pro-: vi (1 es no network service u ntil th e afternoon. Web would also build new morning properties to follow the simulcast, bahkirig on the show’s drawing power to capture audience in the adjacent slots. As of the moment, the project h i hges on a vailabii] t y of bankroll-.-ers Tor the show. But if it doesn’t come oil for the fall, . web still considers “Breakfast Club” the foundalidn of its daytime programming, and has made it clear That when the simulcast starts, ''ABC-TV will be entering the daytime fold. One other factor figures in the projected simulcast— -fact that “Breakfast Club” draws a large part of its audience from rural areas, and once those areas develop set saturation, the web feels it will have, a readymade audience for the property. vacation . . Dave Scott, KQV announcer, and his family off fru. three weeks in California* IN SAN FRANCISCO ... Life (13) gave KCBS’ Red Blanchard a two-page spread ; / . KRO\vr Oakland, transplanted its transmitter to salt water flats in San Francisco Bay, should now. reach an estimated .150,000 more homes KYA ..will' -air 49er. football games next season Jack Clark rosUni-ci as KCBS announcer for Gotham.. Dick Wynne replaces him . cuv of Oakland presented plaques to Bay Area cerebral palsy emcees iialpiv Edwards, Marsha Hunt and Lee Giroux . . '* KROW boss JL G. “(iir Paltridge 6n eastern tour. And office mgr. Paulie .Lando'n. rc'turni d from a Michigan visit T; . . Edward H. Heinemann, desigherofDou gj ;iv “Skyrocket” plane, radio-TVisiting . .. . “Counter Attack1’ drhppvfi its KRQW airing ■'. • • Organist Korla Pandit inked (22) for local KGO'-TV show . . Paul Speegle^ formerly with Radio Free Asia, named new director of radio-TV education at S. F.: State : College.; IN MINNEAPOLIS . . . Group of 17 leading Minneapolis and St. Paul, citizens has aeievcl to serve as a temporary committee to investigate '.possibility, or obtaining an .educational TV station in Twin Cities. Recent state ,Te«i;s-; lature failed . to provide anyfunds for project. New group’s first steps will, be to determine public attitudes toward and support available 'and to induce FCC to extend time for Channel 2’s retention . John Ford back in harhess on WTCN after recovering frbm surgery . . . . . Randy Merriman, TV personality, due iri from New York, for a hometown vacation. . . Herbert Holm, comptroller and treasurer of radio station KSO, Des Moines, who died . last : week, formerly with WGN here; his home town, and was buried here . : , Peg Lynch, who writes “Ethel and. Albert,” NBC TV show, and plays femme title rolr, U.-J r* ‘ : l. ■ ' x* 1 ’.i.' • « . • ’ perinlertti;' and won plaudits. Band also has been engaged for concerts at Walker Art. Gallery center. . . . George Grim, KSTP star, who has been . devoting ..self, to TV since switching from WCCO, back on radio, with news . analysis program while still continuing with his numerous video shows. although NBC is hopeful, of developing separate TV shows, for the musieomed.y stars.' . NBC isn’t lipping the amount of coin involved in the attempt to. wrap up exclusive contracts, but its said to virtually hit a new high on talent deals. RCA Color prospect WLEV-TV Bethlehem • Allentown • Easton Pr e-plpn ned coverage ..reaches . the homes — the p e a p I e ^ i n t h i s ri c h m ark e f . Wr i t e . for info rmation . ., Continued from pa fce 25 use when there were only fl.OOO,000 sets in use. _ . It’s, likely that, .other changes will also be made from the old ■•'criteria :-'if:.the NTSC system is to he acceptable. Among these are convertibility and cost. The NTSC system is not considered to be convertible as a practical matler and cost of receivers to receive transmissions from NTSC color are estimated as considerably higher Ilian those for CBS color. The agency will also Want assurance that sets will be available in quantity before licensing a new system. Status of various tri-color tube developments are likely to be. fully explored. WFLA Cputimicd from page 27 Role of the assistant conductor in television is an unusually important one. He is the liaison man on the musical boat, running all over the set (-whiletheconductor must remain with the orchestra) so that the singers can see hirri for cues. Meanwhile, he must, al Ways be in. a position to see the conductor. . TV directors will be Kirk Browning (who directed “Amahl” as his second opera), and John Bloch. The operas, which cost an average of $25,000 to put on (With “Billy Budd” was . over that figure), will be presented once a month beginning .in the middle of October, with specific time and date yet to be set. As in the past, the NBC tele opera team probably also will produce next season about half a dozen fiveTninute operatic vignettes for the Kate Smith show. Hartford — Charles Parker upped from program promotion staffer at WDRC to account exec with the station. • KTVE-TV to Preem Longview, Tex,, July . 1 4. . A. James Henry, manager of KTVE-TV, has announced that target date for placing this TV outlet on the air has been set for Aug. 1. Work is rapidly being completed on the new $100,000 studio building for the . outlet. William M. Moi’row is. the commercial manager. Now (tarring on NBC's . ' ALL STAR REVUE Saturdays, 8-9 P.M., EDST Mgt.i William Morris Agency Circle 7-3900 or Circle 7-T348 S' ; y jic; Safer Ripreienfafiyo. • | / ^ (i • ' . New York • Chicago • loi Angstts • San Francisco : FRIDAY? . . . fish ! FILM PRODUCTION? george make enterprises, inc. 270 Park Ave., N. Y. C. PLaza 5-2340 Continued front page 24 to penalize /him for having served his community so well.” Poynter add his wife also publish the Congressional Quarterly News. Features, weekly digest of Congressional activities. Several' New York advertising, execs, including Hal .Janies of FTli hgton •& Co., Harry W, Bennett, Jr. of Sherman & Marquette, and John. S. Houseknecht of .William Esty, are directors of Tampa Bay. Also a director in Tampa Bay Co. is John Trevor Adams, Jr., New I York. ' ■; ■ . Only, local TV service in area is | now supplied by W SUN-TV; a . UHF outlet operated by City of St. Petersburg. 1 . Dollar for Dollar . . . ise . ... ji Merman & Martin Continued frQm page 1 which would go into the 9 to 10:30 -=>egm on ts=on=the^evei^fourt:li-w;eek= fhat “Show of Shows" lays off. If Ali.-s Martini. arid Miss lUerman also sign with, the web. they'd be the , mainstays of tlie super production, y You Figure It )dio Is a Better Buy Than Ever! i-ykjT 5°'000 WATTS CLEAR ^TjJ KEY STATION FOR CHANNEL THE NORTHWEST NETWORK MINNEAPOLIS * ST. PAUL HEPRESEKTED . ■Y COWARD RETRY inti COMPANY