Variety (March 1959)

56 BAMO-TELEVISIO]¥ Wednesday, March 11, 195*1 NAB Convention —^ Continued from - page 1 — tel in Chicago with an anticipated attendance of around 1,700. Turn¬ out is considered unexpectedly good in view of the purposely diminished scope of NAB in 1959. Outnumbering other issues by far on the official agenda are those pertaining to government and fed¬ eral regulatory agencies. Heaped on some hangover irritants of past years, such as the pending imposi¬ tion of certain Barrow Report rec¬ ommendations and upcoming FCC hearings, are new or revived prob¬ lems of federal probing and control. There is the business of allocations, the recent development that thej U. S. Justice Dept, is pressuring the FCC to kill option time as il¬ legal, and the spectrum studies pointing to the growing possibility that the military might actually take over the VHF channels. Latter issue gets ah airing on Monday afternoon in a discussion between Leo Arthur Hoegh, direc¬ tor of the Office of Civil & Defense Mobilization—who has been push¬ ing for a study of spectrum use by a Presidential commission — and Rep. William G: Bray (R-Ind.), whose stand has been that the mil¬ itary is asking too much. It may arise again in an engineering dis¬ cussion led by Dr. George Town. In-Depth D. C. Kickaround Because the atmosphere will be fraught with Government issues, NAB has scheduled a special ses¬ sion to cover the broad subject, “What’s Going On In Washington?” Other items on the agenda figur¬ ing to bear on the Washington pressures are the FCC panel dis¬ cussion on Wednesday; the Tues¬ day luncheon speech by John C. Doerfer, chairman of the FCC; and the talk “The New Congress—and Television” given by Vincent T. Wasilewski, NAB manager of Gov¬ ernment relations. Another may be the Wednesday luncheon speech of Lt. Gen. Arthur G. Trudeau, U. S. Army Chief of Research and De¬ velopment. By the convention’s end, NAB is expected to throw its support fully behind Rep. Oren Harris’ lat¬ est bill of reforms for the federal regulatory agencies and to reaffirm Its position re Section 315 (a) of the Communications Act, to wit, that the section in present form is “unworkable, impractical and un¬ realistic.” The subject of pay tv may come up again, possibly in connection with the Harris Bill. There will be a movement at this year’* conclave of delegates who will want a stronger organiza¬ tion to do a more forceful lobby¬ ing job in Washington, This will be promoted by members who feel NAB has too long been playing a defensive game on Capitol Hill and leaving the big fight solely to the networks. Methods by which to curb infla¬ tion that is causing broadcasting’s cost per thousand to go up will come.up in a labor clinic chair¬ maned by Ward L. Quaal (v.p. of WGN Inc., Chicago), in the Wed¬ nesday afternoon session on auto¬ mation, and in a later panel on “The Future of Television Sales and Television Costs,” on which will sit George Storer Jr., v.p. of Storer Broadcasting Corp.; John W. Davis, v.p. of Blair Television; Maxwell Ule, senior veepee of Kenyon & Eckhardt; and Hugh M. Beville, veep of planning and re¬ search for NBC. Vidpixers on Sidelines The *59 conclave will be notice¬ ably without the telefilmers’ hand¬ standing of past years, although top echelon execs of the film compa¬ nies will take suites at the Hilton “just to be friendly.” Outraged but not daunted by their third- class citizenship at NAB this year, the vidpixers will be “working” the convention mainly from the side¬ lines. While certain brass will put up at the Hilton for a handshaking show, others will man hospitality suites at other hotels, where the partying and pitching will go on. NAB members are being solicited ! by mail to stop in at the other ho¬ tels, and one telefilm topper is staging open house for top man¬ agement people at his Chicago penthouse apartment. ; Sore as they are at being virtual¬ ly ignored by NAB, the vidpixers are consoling themselves with a "they’ll be sorry” rationale. Says one of the nabobs. “They’ll find out this year. Without programming what have they got? Real estate, a bunch, of tubes, and a license to operate. We used to make them feel like showmen at the past con-, ventions.” The attendance of the film men this year was more conceded than encouraged by NAB. They ware all but ignored on the agenda, their canty exhibits have been outlawed, and their billeting dispersed at the Hilton in the interest of making the 1959 gathering “a mature one.” As curtain-raisers for the conven¬ tion the three affiliates’ meetings figure to be lively with a bullish “end of recession” tone, although the two tv networks holding gen¬ eral conferences—ABC and CBS— unquestionably will face up to the. serious problem of survival in a three network economy. Of special interest this year wilt be the happenings at the Mutual Affiliates meeting, which, at dead¬ line, had a new set of prospective owners. New ownership might have a bearing on the projects being set forth far consideration towards ex¬ panding the radio web’s program¬ ming concept. Mutual meeting will be held at the Hilton on Sunday (15) with exec veepee Blair A. Wal- liser and station viceprez Charles Godwin heading the delegation. The CBS-TV meet shapes as a hot one, and it’s heard that the ad¬ dress by CBS Inc. prez, Dr. Frank Stanton, will be at corker at the first day’s session (14). Others slated to address the affils are C. Howard Lane, viceprez and managing di¬ rector of KOIN-TV, Portland). Ore., and chairman of CBS-TV Affiliates Assn.; Louis G. Cowan, prez of CBS-TV; Hubbell Robinson Jr., exec veep in charge of network programs; William H. Hylan, v.p., sales administration; and Sig Midc- elson, CBS veep-general manager. Highlight of the ABC-TV con¬ vention will he a special presenta¬ tion of the web’s growth and prog¬ ress, covering the network’s audi- DISPLAY ‘.‘ARCH 15-18 N. A. B. CONVENTION enee* increase* this season, the philosophy and strategy behind fu¬ ture planning, and the selling theme for the new season. Climax of the presentation will be the unveiling of new programs for the 1959-69 season, shown to the affils. on Sunday (15) and to Chi adver¬ tisers and press the following day. Canada Producers Return to Work Montreal, March 10.* The strike by 74 producers oi the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. against the French radio and tele¬ vision network which started Dec. 29 officially came to an end Sat. (7). Both the producers and the unions which supported the strik- ! ers by refusing to cross the pickets lines returned to work Monday morning when normal services were resumed. The strike, first of its kind In CBC history, came about when the producers formed an association to give them the right of collective bargaining and some sort of se¬ curity (all producer contracts were negotiated on an individual basis, seldom ran more than a year and the producers had no pension or other securities available to other CBC workers who were unionized). The CBC revised to recognize the association saying it was part of management and under a ’52 Labor Relations Board agreement, could not form a union or association. The strike stopped aH live tele¬ vision on the French network and a skeleton staff of! supervisors kept the channel open with films. At the beginning Soane 2,000 members of CBC unions refused to cross the pickets lines which in the first weeks were orderly and quiet. When negotiations between the CBC and the producers failed time after time, the union-members were ordered back to work; they were threatened with dismissal but very few crossed the picket lines. This unique strike has caused bitterness between the French and English factions in Canada. The arrest of 29 sympathizers by the police outside the CBCTs main Montreal building shortly before the strike’s end brought this situa¬ tion into focus. Although both sides have expressed a desire to a "friendly” return to work and to let bygones be bygones only the developments of ensuing weeks will prove or disprove these de¬ sires. Caia&i’s 25 % Ceffiag Oi Oi. TV Performers; Too Many Too Cosily’ Ottawa, March 10. From now on, no more than 25% of guest performers on Ca¬ nadian tv shows can be from the U.S., a Canadian Broadcasting Corp. directive decrees. Canadian tv has been a happy hunting ground for U.S. acts, but CBC feels (a) its shows should have a higher Canadian content (b) too many guest stars are too costly. Most of the seven shows fre¬ quently using U.S. guests are sponsored, hut CBC shares the production cost, and cutting down on them would pare it. Shows most affected are “Cross-Canada Hit Parade/’ “Front-Page ' Chal¬ lenge,” “One of a Kind” (emceed by U.S.-bom Alex Barris), “Sat¬ urday Date,” “Showtime,” “Coun¬ try Hoedown” and “Here’s Duffy.” Some agencies and sponsors have protested that the move will rifminfgh interest in Canadian : tv in cities like Toronto, Montreal | and Vancouver, which easily get U.S. tv, but the directive stands. liertrude Berg’s Steel Seg Gertrude Berg, appearing in the Broadway production of “A Major¬ ity of One,” has.been signed for a CBS-TV “U. S. Steel Hour” assign¬ ment Betty Von Furstenberg also will be in the cast Show will be telecast April 8— taped, of course, due to Miss Berg’s legit commitment. It’s a script slugged “Trouble.-In-Law" by Danny Simon and based on a story idea by Simon mid Sheldon Keller. Merle Jones Continued from page 33 — most* foreign territories through individual distribution agencies. In Latin America, CBS Films has a two-year deal with Gore Mestre’s TISA, an organization composed of some key Latin Amer¬ ican station owners, to handle all CBS Films properties. Contrary to reports that the deal has blown up, Jones says the TISA deal re¬ mains firm. Jones characterized the cancellation report as wishful thinking of competitive syndicators, unable to get such a favorable deal. Michael Burke heads CBS i Europe, formed in Zurich, Switz¬ erland, and CBS,. Ltd., in London. The London office is the active one : for CBS Films sales, acquisition of properties and co-productions. In Canada, CBS Films is repre¬ sented by Caldwell, Ltd., in Italy, Fremantle, etc. Foreign route of a number of other major syndicators is to build an international organization, staf¬ fing.it in key spots with company personneL Rayburn Continued from page 29 to cancel out. He has turned down countless invitations to face cam¬ eras or the microphone since. In fact, such producers as Law¬ rence Spivak, Ted Ayers and Miss Roundtree have described him as the toughest of all Washington, of¬ ficials to land as a guest. Second place on this list has gone to Sen¬ ate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson, another Texan, who has yet to be on such a show. There are other holdouts in the Govern¬ ment hierarchy, such as Vice Pres¬ ident Richard M. Nixon (who hasn’t made an appearance since he was a Senator), Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Carl Hayden, almost all chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff through the years and ex-Secretary of Defense Char¬ les E. Wilson, to name a few. Interviewing Rayburn were Lyle Wilson, Washington United Press International bureau chief, and Barney Livingstone of Associated Press’ Congressional staff. Pix Shortage Cntinetf from page 33 > is more than doable all other L. A. telestations, with the exception of KCOP, which hits near 36 hours weekly for some 24 features, KTTV follows with approximately 17 pic¬ tures and 33 hours. Smallest user of cinema product among L. A.’s indie, channels is KTLA, which screens about 18 a week for 32 hours. Three network outlets here ac- [ count for less theatrical pic pro- igram time. KNXT leads the web i stations with an estimated 20 for 28 hours, followed by KRCA, with 14 for 20 hours. KABC-TV devotes least L. A. program time to fea¬ tures, allotting only some 17 hours : a week for an average of 16 pix. While most stations are currently “hoarding” backlogs, most execs will admit, in view of the situation, to be looking forward with trepida¬ tion to the point when post-48 pix scarcity will cause a serious short¬ age of supply for the relentless de- : mand of viewers for new theatrical product. Atlanta—WGST, Georgia Insti¬ tute of Technology station and af¬ filiate of ABC radio network, has acquired a new news mobile unit and Jim Nelson will be its jockey. Mex Censorship Crackdown on TV Mexico City, March 10. The Department of Communica¬ tions has served notice on all radio and television stations of a new tough censorship policy. Aim is to elevate moral and quality standards of broadcast and telecast pro¬ grams, a Communications spokes¬ man said. Stations and program producers have run riot in past 12 months or so, with little official hindrance. There have been a flood of pro¬ grams which “abstain from comply¬ ing with federal dispositions gov¬ erning the two mediums,” the spokesman said. In general there has been a strong accent on raw jokes, scantily clad dancers and singers, routines that are not for family audiences, heavy reliance on off color farce. And in so called “legitimate” drama crime, vice and other sordid themes are featured. Even com¬ mercials do not escape the force of double-entendre and general bad taste in plugs for products. Now there will be a general clean up, the Department of Communica¬ tions said. And all who violate regulations will face stiff fines and possible suspensions. The Depart¬ ment said it is the duty of broad¬ casting and telecasting stations, as Avell as advertising agencies pre¬ paring programs to cooperate in the morality drive which will go into effect immediately. KRON Bid to Telecast Ab Execution Rejected San Francisco, March 10. Gov. Edmund G. (Pat) Brown has turned down a request by KRON-TV here to do a live tele¬ cast of an execution. He said a telecast “would be carrying things too far” in the current campaign against capital punishment in Cal¬ ifornia. Station's request followed a suggestion by State Sen. Fred S. Farr, author of a bill to abolish the death penalty. Barr, who re¬ cently watched an execution, said that “if an execution were tele¬ vised, you’d soon have an end to the death penalty.” KRON-TV general manager Harold P. See thereupon telegraphed Gov. Brown and Richard A. McGee, state director of corrections. McGee said it was a matter for the legislature to decide. Station has taken an editorial stand fav¬ oring abolition of the death pen¬ alty. ft vy. Dynamic new dimension in TV programming PROFESSIONAL CORPORATION PRODUCTS OIVISION ~TM AHPEX CORP. REDWOOD CITY. CALIFORNIA