Variety (February 1958)

29 Wednesday, February 5, ,1958 PQaSBSft ' nABIO-TEUBVISION __ >: mmm Total 1957 billings for the three television networks climbed to $516,201,566, an increase of 5.6% over 1956 and the first time net¬ work billings have exceeded the half-billion-dpllar mark, according to figures released this week by Publishers Information Bureau. Leading the pack, with a 7.19^ increase oyer .last year and a 46.3% share of the three-network total, is CBS-TV, which passed the quarter-billion mark for the first time with total 12-month bill¬ ings of $239,284,899. In terms of the dollar increase, that’s $15,- 764,517 over la$t year, highest dollar gain of the three webs though not the highest percentage gain, Next Was NBC, which fell short of the $200,000,000 mark, billings of $193,845,383, representing a 2,9% or $5,924,266 increase over 1956. NBC hiked its share of the three-web billings to 38:5%; ABC pulled down the largest percentage gain over last year with an increase Of 8.3%, equivalent to $6,345;i55, to pull its overall '57 billings to the $83,071,284 mark, accounting for 15.7% of . the three.network total. Breakdown follows:. Chi’s WBBM Bucks Canned-Music Chicago, Feb. 4. The . trend bas been going the other way for several years, but WBBM here continues to . stand by “old style" radio, concentrating on live programming and favoring quarter-hour sales to straight spot participations... This, was a calcu¬ lated risk in 1951 when most of j the stations in the country were] paring their budgets with, recorded y music, but WBBM stayed live and itfs paid off. Last year was the CBS AM outlet’s biggest twelvemonth , to date,' and according to Pulse it now ranks » second in most time periods among Chicago stations. (Ironically, the top-rated is the jukeboxer, WIND.) From the profits standpoint, WBBM claims to he "second, if not first, in the entire country and unquestionably the biggest money- . maker among owned-and-operated ‘ stations,” to use the words of a sta¬ tion exec.. Bucking the canned music trend has not been inexpensive. WBBM’s operating nut, with most of its local programming live, is about 40% higher than that of the aver¬ age station, and- this 'has necessi¬ tated a rate card averaging 20% higher than that of the ordinary big station. Where spot partici¬ pations have become the lifeblood of most AM operations, WBBM still relies greatly on the sale of quartef*hours to individual spon¬ sors, from the firm belief that a 15-minute show With a personal pitch on a 15-minufe show is stronger than an unintegrated transcription. Thinking behind this adherence to "old style” radio is (1) that ex¬ tensive live programming can win the audiences rejecting jukebox radio, (2) that it tends to get adult nudiences, (3) and that it'tends, to inspire active listening as opposed to merely providing background music. Every other station in Chi¬ cago, save WLS, is mostly record¬ ed, and WLS’ live shows are slant- (Continued on page 50) • y Ameche on Brit TV London, Feb. 4. Don AmeChe is skedded to arrive in Britain tomorrow (Wed,) for a two-week stay during which, time he’ll make a couple of commercial tv appearances. His first tv stint will be as the bill topper on Associated Tele¬ vision’s, "Sunday Night At the London Palladium,’’ next Sunday (9>. The second show will he the ABC-TV second anniversary , pro¬ gram, entitled "Many Happy Re¬ turns,” which will be. networkedj*] over the commercial grid on Feb. ,15. ABC-TV to Hie Chicago. Feb. 4, Needham, Louis .& Brorby ad agency* having gained eight new accounts in i>ast year, racked up record billings in 1957 of $32,- 902,050, biggest total in the Chi agency’s 33-year history. Net -prof¬ its for the year we^fe reported at~l $196,326. NL&B is an employee, owned corporation, with around 60% of the staff holding shares. .Eight new accounts added in past year are American Smelting and Refining Co.,'Canadian Indus¬ tries Ltd., Indian Head Mills, In¬ ternational Minerals and Chemical Corp. (Ac’cent), Lever Bros. (Swan SoapL Thomas J. Lipton Ltd., Massey-Harris-Ferguspn Inc. and Renault Inc. ABC-TV is going to hike its time rates next fall. Network said that the. overall rate card increase will be due to the fact that seven or eight ABC affiliates will be getting - more for their time from network bankroliers. Web disclosed that the resulting hike will amount to about a Wo advance on present. gross time charges: Currently, for example,, a network charge for a shortterm deal on half-hour of ABC-TV air¬ times runs between $30,000. and $'32,000. The hike 'Will add about $300 to the sponsor’s time tab. Web will be giving a six-month; protection on the hike to its bank- rollers, which will, in effect, put the increase into action for the fall season. The only stations get¬ ting the hike, according to the net¬ work, are those which are "grossly underpriced at present.” Hikes were granted at the' in¬ sistence of the stations: involved, it was reported, some of which are among the network's strong mid¬ west affiliates. ABC-TV wanted to hold rates at their current levels, however, because via the Qecember monthlong Nielsens, the network moved for the first time in its history into undisputed cost-per- 1 000 supremecy. Until then, CBS could boast both the highest aud¬ ience circulation for its programs and the highest cost-per-returo. ABC, whose shows have been get¬ ting a greater hupk of the audiefice since last fall, is still not No. 1 by any means in overall circulation but when it’s time charges (being lower than CBS’ and NBC’) are coupled with audience increases it makes for the new selling point. Whether the hikes will affect this status was not determined, especi¬ ally since the web has not decided yet how to reshape its discount rate. The renaissance of live televi¬ sion appears to be underway al¬ ready,, largely as a consequence, of the darkening economic picture at the networks and among sponsors. But <far from being greeted with delight- by the "live” proponents, the rebirth is causing sohie degree of alarm. For it. is bringing in its for a rash of ty "game” shows: Two deals set for. prime time on CBS-TV this week are examples. Brown : .& .. Williamson^ bought ‘Lucky Dollar,” an EPI package based on the old word , game "Ghost,” in as the Saturday at 8:30 replacement for “Dick , & the Duchess.” And Toni purchased Jan Murray’s new package. “Win-Go,”; a quizzer variant of Bingo, and set It on CBS-TV Tuesdays at . 8:30 as the successor to EVe Arden’s filmed series. Nor does the story stop there. "Lucky Dollar” was originally, a daytime project, and across the street at NBC, several daytimers have already made their way into the evening structure, all of them quizz, audience-participation' or game entries.'To name a few, ‘- The Price Is .Right,” “Treasure Hunt,” "Tic Tae Dough,” “Truth or Con¬ sequences.” And judging by their rating successes, hext season can reasonably be expected to produce more of the same. Reason for the trend is simple enough—shows are getting a good- sized audience (and a "family’ 1 audience rather than one particu¬ lar sex or age group) at half the price of most of the filmed entries. And with the new wrinkle of at- home audience-participation, via r write-in contests a la "Price Is Right,” “Treasure Hunt,” “Lucky Dollar,” “Dotto,” fet al., each spon¬ sor buying one of the game entries is hopeful he’s got a runaway on his hands—and his chances are good at that. In a time of tighten¬ ing budgets, a low-cost (and there r fore low-risk) buy which has a chance of taking off. makes a great deal Of sense. But this is little comfort to. the ad ; vocates Of live television, who gen¬ erally mean live dramatics. As of the mojneht, there’s only two. new live hour dramatic entries on the drawing hoards at any of the. webs, and one of them is planned as a Coast origination (CBS’ “Pursuit” series of detective stories, which Charles Russell is prepping in Hollywood). Moreover, there’s the strong possibility that the live dra¬ matic shows currently on will fade by season’s end, ‘‘Suspicion,”; for example, which is half live and half film. I What gives the live forces cause Ifoirworry is that once all the game 'shows start to wear thin, the pend-: ulum, instead of swinging to an¬ other live programming form, dra¬ matics, will once again gravitate to films, with the prestige items in the live catalog going by the hoards for some years to come. 200G CBS Radio Biz CBS Radio racked up $200,000 in gross sales tins week, all of it- in its nighttime-weekend “impact” segment plan. Biggest chunk came from General Mills, which signed for four impact segs a week for 10 weeks, to he followed, in May with six a week for 13 weeks. Groye Labs bought a total of 60 “impacts” starting in March. Dodge bought four a week for four weeks: Of Good Drama, Sez Walter Kerr Tom Duggan Show In Negro Boycott Hassle Hollywood, Feb: 4. After a “violent disagreement” with KCOP’s Tom Duggan, Pamela Mason, wife of actor James Mason, has exited Duggan’s nightly show. The disagreement-was over an is¬ sue involving alleged . discrimina¬ tion by Negroes against Ann- heuser-Busch here for not hiring Negro employees-r-an issue which Duggan has been airing for sev¬ eral weeks, and saying in so doing Negroes are guilty * of practicing discrimination.^ Mrs. Mason said "Tom and I’had a violent disagreement. It became intolerable for me. to work on the show.” It’s reported Mrs. Mason objected vociferously to what; she considered a campaign against Negroes by Duggan. “We had a flareup on the show and he- told me to get off the show;” ‘ ’ to —Or One by Land And Two by Sea CBS-TV is cadgbt right in the middle of a continuing dispute on the jurisdiction of the network’s remote lighting assignments. And while the International Brother¬ hood of Electrical Workers and the International Alliance of Theatrical & Stage Employees fight it out in center ring, CBS has been forced to cancel two tv shows. % On Sunday (2), CBS-TV assigned IBEWV the remote lighting for "Let’s** Take a Trip,” the public affairs stanza which is shortly to be cancelled anyhow. Show was to be done on the S.S. United States, but the. : IA objected, then went after and got International Long¬ shoremen’s AssU. support and forced the steamship lines to back out. This, is a direct turnabout Of events of last spring. WCBS-TV, CBS New York flag, set a .spon¬ sored stanza for a'Waldorf-Astoria remote and assigned IATSE men to handle the lighting. IBEW ob¬ jected that time and the program was. cancelled. Subsequently CBS sued IBEW and filed a charge with NLRB and neither part of the mess is cleared up yet, although NLRB did rule (and IBEW is Con¬ testing the determination) that CBS had the right, in effect, to choose whomeyer.it pleased: to do remote lighting. - After “Trip” was cancelled, the network inserted the kinescope of a show on. a trip to the New York police academy. Web said it is mull¬ ing whether to take action versus. IA the; way it did against IB. . CBS, in explaining why it as¬ signed the Waldorf bust to IA and the S.S., U. S. bust to IB, said the Waldrof show was clearly a matter for-the stagehands to handle, since the intended program bad "acts” and also there was literally a stage involved in the presentation. Htbwever, the ‘Trip” to the ship was, in CBS’ opinion, nothing more than a question of "simple remote lighting,” the kind the web felt might be done for a studio tv show. Web said it even went so far, in planning the "no act” program, as to avoid going inside the ship’s auditorium. This, the web errone¬ ously felt, would avoid .friction with IA. By BOB CHANDLER Television is having an increas¬ ing beneficial effect on the legiti¬ mate theatre, in the opinion of Walter Kerr, New York Herald- ■" Tribune drama critic, who also writes and directs in the theatre and doubles into tv as drama con¬ sultant for "Omnibus.” And net only does television help legit, says Kerr, but does so usually at its own expense. Its primary aid to legit, stays Kerr, is video’s role as a training- ground for writers; directors and actors, who either double or grad¬ uate 'onto Broadway. In the case of authors, television has furnished new blood for the theatre, and if in their first or second attempts, the television authors tend toward “smallness” in their approach,-*, ““they can’t be blamed for that” since there’s some adjustment in technique necessary in the transi¬ tion from the small screen and limited time of the television drama. More important is the fact that these writers have been able'to be¬ come writers, "to earn their living while they learned their craft/’ in television, and eventually have grown to the point.where they can make a contribution to legit. Sad part of it, Kerr observes, is once they’ve hit in legit, they never go back to television; it’s a'matter of prestige and economics. He doesn’t hold with the opinion that the television writers’ con¬ tribution to legit has been cast out of one mold, the often-attacked morbid “slice of life” style. Or at least he points out that much of Broadway’s current drama and some of its top dramatists—Ten¬ nessee Williams, for example— also specialize in that. Kerr doesn’t see television «s bringing any new dramatic techniques to the theatre which haven’t already been tried there, but "after all, the talent is the really important thing, and television is bringing that into the theatre.” Same thinking holds for direc¬ tors and actors. In the case of the latter, tv. serves a double function, by giving gifted young actors the chance to perform in Classic roles which couldn't, for economic rea¬ sons* be done oh Broadway, and by furnishing most actors with tbe opportunity to “grow” simply by virtue of doing so many different roles instead of repeating a rela¬ tive few. As an. instance of the first point, Kerr points to Christo¬ pher Plummer’s. performance in “Oedipus Rex” on "Omnibus” a couple of seasons ago, "Oedipus” simply couldn’t have been done on Broadway, but it was done on tv and Plummer was given an pppor- (Continued on page 46) Frank Cooper-Reviving A Couple of Oldies Frank. Cooper office has ac¬ quired rights to two radio and tv oldies and is packaging them for fall sale.. Properties are' 7 "20 Questions” and "Double or Noth¬ ing,” with rights acquired for the former from originator - emcee Fred Van Devanter and the latter from Bill Dolph. Cooper office has tentative deal on “20 Questions” with CBS- TV, under which the web has agreed to do some audio -run- throughs on the show and if these prove satisfactory, tp do an audi¬ tion kihnie. NBC Screen Gems* Ha. Sheriff Series Screen Gems has set its sixth co¬ production project for next season, its first with NBC-TV via an agree¬ ment to turn out a pilot for an hourlong series locationed in Florida and based on the files of thafe state’s Sheriffs Assn. Series is still untitled, bpt it’s ail actioner with authentic backgrounds utiliz¬ ing case histories. Customary co- production arrangements prevail, with the. web financing the pilot in return for a shortterm option. The Columbia Pictures subsidi¬ ary plans to use two lead characters plus guestars in lead roles, reason being, that it’s otherwise , impossible to'film 39 hour shows on schedule Using the same lead character. Filming will be dqne throughout Florida, in Miami, Dade County, the Everglades, Palm Beach, the citrus belt, etc,. Screen Gems has already set jrtwo similar -coproduction arrange¬ ments at ABC and three at CBS. ABC entries are “Frankenstein” and ‘The Donna Reed Show,” while the CBS properties are “Stagecoach,” "Dennis the Menace” and ‘Too Young to Go Steady.”