Variety (December 1957)

Wednesday, December II, 1$57 EN’TEBNATIOXAL TV 7 ■ BABIO S9 (Week Ending Nov. 24) Sunday Night at the London Palladium ;... O.S.Sv .........'_. Film Show—‘Meet the Navy-',. ..... Take Your Pick................ . .... Chelsea at Nine..... . .... . . Tell the Truth...... . .. /.. .......... Television Playhouse—“The Gathering Dusk”. (ATV) Jubilee Show.... •.........;.... Armchair Theatre—“The Human Touch” Jack Hylton Presents—“The Lady Ratlings on Parade” v.. .1....; Martin Kane.. .. ........ j ...... Figures reveal the audience in the London, Northern, Midland and Scottish television homes capable of receiving both BBC and ITV programs. M • u* London, Dec. 10. The BBC's top . teenage enter¬ tainment program, “Six-Fiye Spe¬ cial,” is to be made as a feature film and is an indication, that Brit¬ ish film producers recognize the necessity for appealing to teenage audiences through the impact of top pop disk personalities. Smash success of “The- Tommy Steele Story’.’ gave the greenlight. and the rock ’n’ roll Success Boy was speedily rushed into a follow up pic, “The Duke Wore Jeans.” Vocalists Dickie Valentine and Russ Hamilton will Star in “Six-: Five Special,” together with “Skiffle King” Lonnie Donegan. Though Valentine will only sing in this film it is regarded as a limber- up before he tackles a straight film role: Terry Dene, another youngster who has rocketed to the top in a few months, has also just been given his film baptism, starring in a pic aptly named “The Golden Disk.” Ruby Murray and Dennis Lotis have each made one film and are earmarked for more, while Frankie Vaughan, ^following his impact as a straight actor as well as vocalist in “These Dangerous Years,” has just embarked, on his second starrer, “Wonderful Things.” David Whitfield, Michael Holli- * day, Alma Cogan, Eve Boswell, Ronnie Hilton and the Beverly Sisters are others who are being wooed for the screen when the. rights vehicles crop up. British producers’ tendency to eye the disk market for potential new tal¬ ent may eventually lead to more musical films, a category of which U. K, producers.; have been notoriously shy Since the war. Granada-TV To London, Dec. 10- Sir Gerald Barry has been ap¬ pointed by Grahada-TV, weekday commercial tv programmers for the North, to take executive charge of the company’s plants for educa¬ tional tv and all related matters. The appointment, which takes efi feet in ; the New Year, will mean that Sir Gerald will handle, among other things, the establishment of a research scholarship, a series of lectures on the social, aesthetic and creative aspects of tv, and the foundation of a university chair of television. The programmers stated earlier this year that they intend to foster the academic study of the medium. Jack Webster Quits Scot TV for Canada Glasgow, Dec. 10. Jack Webster, newscaster with Scot indie tv since its opening Aug. 31, has quit, and sails for Canada Dec. 17. He will-join Cana¬ dian Broadcasting Corp. A Scot himself, Webster recent¬ ly returned to U. K. after experi¬ ence in radio in Vancouver. He has retained his Canadian radio and tv links while her^ i ^—■———^- -- . - . .. ■ Aussie ‘Zither Girl’ Mulls ‘Omnibus’ Offer London, Dec. 10. Shirley Abicair, the Australian Zither Girl, is mulling over an of¬ fer to take her tv act; to New York for ..the. Alastair Cooke “Omnibus” ’ show. Her BBC-TV series, which follows pantomime at. Dudley Hip¬ podrome, will prevent her consid¬ ering this until early 1958. , Since she has not been i n native Australia for five years she is hop¬ ing, if the N. Y. deal jells, to fol- ; low on for a tour of the Antipodes;. Premiere Frost -No TV Beer, Wine Toronto, Dec. 10. Ontario Premier Leslie Frost has branded as “absolutely and com¬ pletely Unfounded” the Ottawa re¬ port that Ontario, the largest population concentration in Can¬ ada, planned to allow television (or radio) advertising of beer; wine or spirits. According to Ottawa re¬ ports, Frost was believed to have made a deal with Canadian brew¬ ers. permitting sponsorship, provid¬ ing the brewers stopped their Com¬ mercials on Buffalo stations. Private stations in Ontario have long been seething, since Toronto brewers sidestepped the State-op- -er a t ed Canadian Broadcasting Corp. regulations (forbidding beer; and liquor advertising, on the ether waves) by buying time on Buffalo! tv stations to which, according to a recent survey- by (he. .Canadian In¬ stitute of Public Opinion (the Canadian outlet for the Gallup Poll), three iy viewers to one in (Continued on page 48) Italian TV Blackout Threatened by Strike; Claim Pact Violations Rome, Dec. 10: An unexpected strike in the Milan RAI-TV studios almost re¬ sulted in a video blackout in Italy, the first of its kind since television started its regular telecasts here, some years back. Strike, called for four hours dur¬ ing the 8-12 p.m. time slot, was due to employees’ claims that RAI- TV had repeatedly broken several contract clauses in recent months, even after it had been warned that such violations would cause pos¬ sible shutdowns.. Regular newsreel show went on regularly at 8:30 p.m., emanating from Rome, but listeners tuning in. at 9 p.m. for the. usual live drama¬ tic show (“Gaslight,” directed by Claudio Fine starring Sarah Fer¬ rari, one 6f Italy’s top actresses) (Continued on page 48) MUCH AT STAKE FOR G0IUI1 SETUP By HAROLD MYERS London, Dec. 10. In. anticipation of a Spring elec¬ tion. and the possible return to power of a' Labor Government. in Britain, commercial tv program¬ ming companies are giving serious thought to the introduction of more serious entertainment at. peak hour periods. Important changes in pro¬ gram schedules are expected to take effect /from early in the. New Year. Among the commercial tv top- persJhere^iS,' in any event, a grow¬ ing recognition of the need to in¬ troduce a great balance in program content and high level planning has been in progress for some weeks. Now the question has greater urgency in view of the pos¬ sible change in the political execu¬ tive. The. Laborites have made nq, se¬ cret of their hostility towards com¬ mercial tv and opposed the legisla¬ tion, at every stage through Parlia¬ ment. Now that it’s on the statute book. it’s not seriously suggested that they will attempt to repeal the measure, but they would, if ;in power, become increasingly mind¬ ful of the neted to improve arid maintain ^standards. By getting in first, the commercial we^s would be . in a position to escape some of the criticism that would, otherwise come their way. If returned. to power,. Labor would almost certainly introduce other, measures which could seri¬ ously affect the.fprtunes of televi¬ sion,as well as the press, generally. In-private-meetings ini the House of Commons the party has let it be known that it is thinking seriously of clamping on a tax on advertis¬ ing.. They introduced a similar measure wheri. in power some years before, but withdrew it under pres¬ sure from industry. This time, it. is suggested, the Socialists will stand firm. Under existing legislation, all advertising expenditures are al¬ lowed as a tax free charge against earnings, and that’s encouraged big corporations to spend large sums in publicizing their products on tv and the press. With income tax running at 97V£%, the cost-has vir¬ tually been borne by the Treasury; The Laborite plan is to slap on a tax on the amount allocated for ad¬ vertising. budgets, which would mean that the corporations them¬ selves would have to bear a far larger share of the cost. Meantiriie, the Government is (Continued on page 481; Britain’s TV Awards . London, Dec. IQ. British television person- ality'of the year is Robin Day, an Independent Television News commentator. He was voted to this position by the . •Guild of Television Producers bind Directors at their annual ball, in London. Dairie Edith Evans presented the awards, all of which went to men. The production award for light entertainment went to Brian Tesler, who directs As¬ sociated Television’s “Sunday Night at the London Palladi¬ um,”. and Tony Hancock was Voted top comedian. Rudolph Cartier, the BBC-TV director, got the “Best Drama Producer Award” and another BBC-TV man, Donald Baverstock, was named the best documentary producer. Michael Hordern, who has appeared in several BBC-TV arid, commercial tv plays dur¬ ing the year, was picked as the actor of the year.. No actress received an award this-year. Best script arid design awards went to another two BBC-TV men. They were Colin Morris and Stephen Tay¬ lor. An extra award was given to the production team of As¬ sociated Television’s “Emer- gencyrWard 10.” ItaloTV Expands Jan. 1; Program Revamp Set; Daytime for Moppets ‘trade’ Wind Honolulu, Dec. 10. Hawaii’s first hurricane iri recent years temporarily knocked KONA-TV off the air, just one minute before the station was to unreel weekly “Goodyear Theatre” draina. Disrupted episode was titled— “Hurricane.” Run Run Shaw’s m London, Dec. 10, Commercial tv is expected . to operi up in Singapore towards the end of next year. Run Run Shaw, Who, with his brother Runme, con¬ trols a chain of show biz enter-; prises in the City, ranging from theatres to distribution, produc¬ tion,' night clubs, etc., was in Lon¬ don on a 48-hour stopover last Week, for a preliminary study, of the technicalities of the medium.. As a result of his talks with ex¬ perts iri Britain; he now feels con¬ fident that, subject to the approval of the Government authorities, he will be able to go ahead immediate-j iy arid get a commercial operation | on the air by this time next. year. | Although Singapore only has a. population of about. 1,500,000, Shaw I recognizes; that a large percentage- of the homes would not be able to : afford the. cost of iristailing a tv. receiver.. However, he feels, that; economically their operation could! get off, the hook with 12,000 sets in ] use, on the assumption, of course, ] that the number would grow stead- ] ily but constantly. There are no facilities in Singapore for the pro¬ duction, of transmission equipjnent' or of domestic receivers and these would all need to be imported. During his London quickie Shaw also, opened negotiations for a Brit¬ ish release for his latest produc¬ tion, ‘-Long House>” filined in Borneo- in Eastmancolor. His two main .studio outfits in Singapore and Hong Kong, turn out around 50 pix a year. Rome, Dec. 10. RAI-TV,. the Italian television net, will add “at least” three hours to its daily telecasting time on Jan, 1. Official announcement by ItAI topper Sergio Pugliese indi¬ cates that the local video outlet has postponed plans it had previ¬ ously considered of starting daily telecasts at 1 p.m. and continu¬ ing through midnight. It’s felt here that this would, have entailed over high expense at this stage of local television development, mak¬ ing the preliminary move more logical. -Telecasts, according to the RAI- TV announcement, will now. start at 5 p.m. and continue without in¬ terruption through midnight. Pre¬ viously, programs were suspended for two-three hours in the after¬ noon, resuming again at 8:30 p.m. Afternoon hours will now be ex¬ clusively dedicated to the moppet sector in the various age slots. The rest of the added program time will be taken up by cultural programs slanted for various, audi¬ ence sectors, thus leaving the eve¬ ning hours entirely Tree for enter¬ tainment. Previously, technical programs and cultural reports of naturally limited interest, telecast during evening hours, had brought many complaints from bored lis¬ teners. Pugliese also announced several drastic changes in programming on the local telenet. “Laspia o Radop- pia,” the popular quiz stanza, will remain the Thursday night attrac¬ tion, ..though some switches are contemplated in its regulations (based on the “$64,000 Question”); for orte, contestants will be al¬ lowed to try for the top money questions on the initial evening, if they wish. “Telematch,” the other top quiz show, will be moved back to Saturday night from its current Sunday slot, while another contest program, an ; elaboration of “Name the Tune;” is soon also to be seen, and heard on Saturday night For the moment, plans to pro¬ duce equivalents of “$64,000 Chal¬ lenge” and “Twenty-One” have been postponed, but other light¬ weight musical shows.- using pop ° (Continued'on Page 48) Israels B casting Alan Young's 16-Week ;! Click on Granada TV; Dickering Deal in U.S. London, Dec. 10. Alan Young will be staying over Christmas in Britain to complete his starring role in ’Tom Thumb” at Elstree. He arrived here last. May for a brief holiday, stayed to do six “Alan Young Programs” for i Grariada-TV which extended to 16. After a irionth.back in Hollywood Young proposes to return to U. K. to . work. “British artists don*t know how lucky they are. They can do a six-week tv series and then turn! to other work. But in j Ui S. it has to be minimuiri of 39 i weeks. Then if it clicks it goes on arid on. In the end you have to be re-iritroduced to your own family.”. Nevertheless, when Young re¬ turns to U. S. he will he huddling With Mark Stevens over a tv deal. It will be filmed. BBC’s ‘Cindy-EUa’ London, Dec. 10. Lucille Mapp will head an all- colored cast in a BBC radio adap¬ tation of the famous British pan¬ tomime, “Cinderella,” retitled “Ciridy-Ella,” on Dec. 23. The Ver¬ sion has been specially written for . the BBC by Caryl Brahms; the novelist, and Ned Sherrin, with music clef fed-by Peter Knight. Tel Aviv, Dec. 10. Satisfaction with the work achieved by. Israel’s State Broad¬ casting Service “Kol Israel” (Voice of. Israel) was expressed by Harry Zinder,. chief of the service, at a press meeting here, even consid¬ ering, that riot every listener gets what he wants. Comparing this station, serving the Country’s 2,- 000,000 inhabitants, with networks in other countries, he stated that the Swedish with the “Radio- stangst” same broadcasting time per day . had a staff of almost 700 while Jerusalem’s “Kol Israel” had a mere 160, Jerusalem broadcasts in a : great number of languages, for the vari¬ ous sections of the population, but it is the aim of the service to abol¬ ish this practice in order to make everyone in the country learn He¬ brew* the language of Israel. On the other hand, Zinder deplored that he could not yet introduce an additional number of programs in Arabic, both for the Israeli Arabs and the listeners in surrounding countries. Israel’s radio station—one of three, the others being the Army Broadcasting Unit “Galei Zahal” and the “Kol Zion laGolah” Over¬ seas Service—is a non-commercial, governmental agency, with listen¬ ers- paying a yearly license-fee of eight Israeli pounds ($4.50). The introduction of commercial pro¬ grams announced and postponed several: times this year, has not materialized, with no . reasons given; ~ -*'*