This week in TV Guide: February 8, 1969

For media analysts, the 1968 Democratic Convention is the gift that keeps on giving. I know a lot of you are probably tired of me writing about it as often as I do, but I don't generally go looking for it; it comes to me. And TV Guide has written about it at least as often as everyone else. It is, in fact, a seminal event when it comes to looking at how the news media presented events, how it became a participant in those events, and the public's perception of those events.

In this first of a four-part series, Neil Hickey looks at the decisive questions raised by last year's convention: "How well did the networks discharge their responsibilities? Was coverage slanted? Were viewers fully and fairly informed? Did many of them deliberately refuse to believe their eyes?" The issue, Hickey says, "appears destined neither to die nor fade away, but to linger in some morose corner of the public mind for generations to come."  The answer will influence the future course of television news coverage."  

What is truly remarkable about this preamble to the series is how these questions about the media are not only still being asked today but also appear to arise with greater frequency, greater intensity, and greater scope. If news coverage of the convention raised eyebrows back then—if viewers truly were shocked by what had hitherto been, in Hickey's words, a "20-year romance which television has enjoyed with American families" that had achieved iconic status with the coverage of President Kennedy's assassination—then today, many of these accusations are simply assumed as a given by most viewers, who would claim that the media doesn't even make a token effort to hide their bias. 

Coverage of the convention—it's estimated that almost 90 percent of American households were tuned in to the events, and 92 percent of all television homes in the free world—makes this kind of discussion inevitable, one supposes. In an era when you still had to make an effort to write a letter—unlike today's social media instant-reaction environment—the three networks and the Federal Communications Commission were flooded with "tens of thousands of letters" complaining about the media's coverage. Among those complaints were that coverage was biased against President Johnson and Vice President Humphrey; that news footage focused on violent acts by the police against the protestorss "but never the provocation which led up to it"; that reports and anchors "engaged in too much editorializing (at the expense of straight news) without labeling it as such"; and that newsmen "were too generous and affectionate in their coverage of the hippies, Yippies and radical leftists who had come to Chicago with the announced purpose of disrupting the convention and creating havoc in the streets." One of the specific allegations was that the media inflated the number of protestors; in the weeks leading up to the convention, the news floated estimates of between 100,000 and one million, but "the best estimates now indicate that the demonstrators’ recruitment was an almost total flop, and that no more than 5000 of them came to the city from points outside Illinois."

And look at some of these comments: Columnist Jenkin Lloyd Jones wrote: "It should now be obvious that television, as it is now used, is the enemy, not the servant, of the political convention. It has become so, not out of malice, but because TV is a medium that prefers drama to uplift, and where both are present it will go for drama every time." Sen. Everett Dirksen (R-lll.), called it "an outrage against the democratic process" and "a clear and outrageous attempt at editorializing and bias." You can read variations of this quote pretty much any time you want today. 

In an extraordinary series of reports by Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson, the columnists claimed that a House Commerce Committe study confirmed that "some of the networks deliberately went out to slant the news; that TV directors purposefully photographed Vice President Humphrey and Mayor Daley in unflattering poses, even resorting to distorting the TV color; that speeches favorable to the Johnson regime were forsaken repeatedly by the cameras to focus on some dissident eager for publicity," and that the networks, "perhaps in their eagerness to generate high ratings for TV sponsors, encouraged dissidents to make inflammatory statements and helped to stir up controversies." This was far from a universal opinion, mind you; even some of the papers that ran the columns by Pearson and Anderson felt compelled to offer disclaimers about the content; the New York Post wrote that "The notion that the labors of conscientious TV men under fire were exploited in a network plot to discredit the Democrats is absurd." 

Since there are three other installments in the series, I haven't done an in-depth presentation of everything involved in Hickey's investigation; instead, I've pulled some quotes that point to the disturbing similarities between the era I'm writing about and that in which we live today. Perhaps someday I'll write about the entire series. But for now, I just want to look at this as, if you will, one of those "canary in the coal mine" moments, that also proves how the more things change, the more they stay the same. With only a little tweaking, most of what we see here could have been written today.

What I find interesting is that you'll often read comments, mostly by people lamenting the state of today's news coverage, pointing to the "classic" era of television news, the days of Cronkite, Huntley and Brinkley, and others, when the news was "fair and objective," as opposed to today's slanted opinions and outright bias. In fact, the argument we're having today is nothing new. It may have intensified, it may be more available to more people, making them more aware of the controversy. But to suggest that everything was fine and dandy back in "the good old days" is simply not true, and the borderline-obsessive coverage of Chicago proves that.

This all happened nearly sixty years ago; most Americans of today weren't born then, and many of those who were alive don't have a clear memory of it anymore. I do remember it well; I remember what a terrible time it was for everyone. If we look back on these as the "good old days," how much worse does that mean things are in our modern age? One of the most disturbing quotes I found in this article comes from columnist Max Lerner, who talked of "a kind of 'social dynamite' in the spreading suspicion among both liberals and conservatives that the wells of communication in the U.S. are poisoned." Can there be any better description of the state of America today? 

l  l  l
During the 60s, the Ed Sullivan Show and The Hollywood Palace were the premier variety shows on television. Whenever they appear in TV Guide together, we'll match them up and see who has the best lineup.

Sullivan: Tentatively scheduled guests: Leslie Uggams; comic Bill Dana; singer Roslyn Kind, Barbra Streisand’s half-sister; Joan Rivers; Barbara Eden of I Dream of Jeannie; Peter Gennaro; and the acrobatic Schaller Brothers. (If there were any changes, they're not reflected in the episode guide.)

Palace: Robert Goulet’s guests: the Mills Brothers; Kay Thompson; singer Dusty Springfield; comics Hendra and Ullett, and Jack Wakefield; and Nina Logatsheva, low-wire ballerina from the Moscow State Circus.

You want singers? Sullivan has Leslie Uggams and Roslyn Kind; the Palace is hosted by a singer, Robert Goulet, and has the Mills Brothers, Kay Thompson, and Dusty Springfield. You want comics? Sullivan has Bill Dana and Joan Rivers, the Palace has Hendra and Ullet and Jack Wakefield. Sullivan has acrobats, the Palace has a low-wire ballerina. So what does all this prove? Well, the Mills Brothers are unbeatable, Dusty Springfield (singing "Son of a Preacher Man") is undeniable, and Mr. G himself is as smooth as they come. This week, Palace wins with a song in its heart.

l  l  l

From 1963 to 1976, TV Guide's weekly reviews were written by the witty and acerbic Cleveland Amory. Whenever they appear, we'll look at Cleve's latest take on the shows of the era.

Back in the day, you often heard it said that "there outta be a law." And Cleveland Amory has an idea for a perfect law: television should be prohibited from "laying its blood-stained hands on the classics—particularly on children’s classics." That includes NBC's new series, The New Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. "And make no mistake —which you already have if you've sat through an episode—this particular series is not content to murder just one classic." 

I think it's pretty clear where we're going from here, but it's our good fortune that our Cleve is leading the way, for the more he piles it on, the more entertaining he gets. Borrowing from Johnny Mercer's lyrics to Moon River, "Your Huckleberry friend who is waiting round the bend is only the take-off point here. Each program moves on from there to fire at will on "Don Quixote," "The Arabian Nights," "Gulliver's Travels," etc., etc.—until you end with a full-scale massacre. Watch it and we guarantee that your Huckleberry friend won’t have to wait at all. You too will be around the bend." (I don't normally quote at such length, but, unlike the series itself, this was simply too good to pass up.) You see, one of the conceits of this series is that episodes often involve Mark Twain's favorite characters in fanciful adventures that take place between the covers of other classics: "Huck of La Mancha," for example, in which Huck, Tom, and Becky find themselves rescuing Don Quixote and Sancho from Don Jose D'Indio, who is none other than—of course—Injun Joe. You might think that, well, at least this episode has good source material to work with; however, "it was really shocking to find that there was, in the concept and rendition of the character of Don Quixote, not one single whit of pathos, understanding or even point." Another episode takes our trio to the stories of the Arabian Knights: Ali Baba, Scheherazade, Sinbad. It takes them, and does nothing to them. In other words, the show is so much a product of today's values—"the self-centered, self-serving world the modern child today faces"—that it makes no attempt to present the values and morals that were integral parts of the original stories.

If you've never seen the show before (consider yourself fortunate), it blends live action and animation, not unlike Song of the South, although to much worse effect. In fact, Amory says, the animated characters are generally better actors. Of them, the best is Ted Cassidy, who voices Injun Joe. He appears in the prologue as a live character, then morphs into the animated villain of the story. Smart thinking, Lurch. Amory concludes at the beginning, with a look at that prologue. Speaking of Injun Joe, Huck says, "I had a funny feeling that we'd see him again." Says Cleve, "We had a feeling too—but it wasn’t funny."

l  l  l

It is hard to imagine that there was a time, as late as 1969, when people had not heard of Stella Stevens. I say this not just as a normal, red-blooded American male with an appreciation for such things, but as a student of pop culture. She appeared with Elvis in Girls, Girls, Girls. She appeared with Jerry Lewis in The Nutty Professor. She appeared with Dean Martin in The Silencers. She appeared with Rosalind Russell in Where Angels Go, Trouble Follows. She appeared with a smile and nothing else as the January 1960 centerfold in Playboy. I rest my case.

And yet, as Joe McGinniss* writes this week, that's exactly where we are. "Stella Stevens has not really failed. It’s just that she has not succeeded," McGinniss writes. "She has worked hard at her career since moving West from Memphis in 1958. She has made lots and lots of movies. She has done some very good television work. Yet nobody knows who she is." You'll forgive me if I have trouble believing this, and yet, there it is. She is, by all accounts, "warm and sincere," besides which, as we've mentioned, she's a knockout. But she's "too versatile," the knock is, moving from comedy to drama, from the big screen to television, never quite landing the part that would make her a star. 

*The same Joe McGinniss who would later write non-fiction books such as The Selling of the President and Fatal Vision. 

She's overcome a lot to make it this far, including a marriage at age 15, a son (Andrew Stevens, who would go on to become an actor in his own right) at 16, a divorce at 17. And her career is far from being what one would consider a failure. She has, McGinniss says, "adjusted to worse things. She will be able to proceed quite nicely through her 30's without being on the covers of magazines." And she believes the best is still to come. "I feel like my career is just beginning,” she says. "I've put in my apprenticeship. Now people are finally beginning to realize that I’m serious and I'm good." A lot of people say that she's very good, "a genuine comedienne who can handle straight roles, too." 

You can only remember so many names, though, and there are a lot of them out there. They're getting younger all the time, too (Stella is all of 29, virtually over the hill), and her chances of hitting the jackpot diminish. And yet, all these years later, the name "Stella Stevens" has yet to be forgotten. She appeared on television almost constantly, appeared as a regular in Flamingo Road and Santa Barbara, and remained active up to 2010. As a 2012 article noted, she was, in the 1960s, "one of the most photographed women in the world." Apparently, some people had heard of her. Of her layouts in Playboy (three in all), she said, "If you've got ten million people seeing you in a layout like that ... and half of them remember the name 'Stella Stevens', they'll buy tickets for your movies."

Joe McGinniss was a very good writer, but maybe he didn't know everything. Otherwise, all I can say is that it's a sad commentary on American manhood.

l  l  l

Here's a movie that definitely should have made it to Mystery Science Theater 3000: Billy the Kid vs. Dracula (Saturday, 9:00 a.m. PT, KTVU). I suppose it had something to do with rights, but listen to the description: "Billy discovers that his fiancee's uncle is a vampire." And it features John Carradine! What more can anyone ask for?

Sunday's highlight is the special Man and His Universe (7:00 p.m., ABC), a look at space exploration, specifically last December's flight of Apollo 8. "As earth's unrolled stunning blue-and-white carpet is_ across the screen, viewers hear from Apollo 8 heroes Frank Borman and James A. Lovell Jr.; Col. Edwin Aldrin Jr., named to this summer’s scheduled Apollo 11 moon-landing team; and Dr. Harrison H. (Jack) Schmitt, who plans to make geological studies on the moon." George C. Scott narrates the hour, which I really would like to have seen. I think the Paley Center has a copy of it; it might as well be on the moon. That's one of three specials that make Sunday night special, including a presentation of A Midsummer Night's Dream (9:00 p.m., CBS) by the Royal Shakespeare Company, with a cast including David Warner, Diana Rigg, Helen Mirren, Judi Dench, Ian Holm, and Ian Richardson. And NBC presents a rerun of last year's Fred Astaire special (10:00 p.m.), with Barrie Chase, Simon and Garfunkel, Sergio Mendes and Brasil '66, the Young-Holt Trio, Neal Hefti's orchestra and the Gordian Knot.

Twenty-four years before Schindler's List, Monday's installment of the ABC Evening News with Frank Reynolds (5:30 or 6:00 p.m. depending on the market) features a special report on Oskar Schindler: "Although he was a Nazi, Schindler saved 1300 Jews by having them transferred from death camps to his factory, and later gave them weapons so they could overcome Gestapo guards and escape to freedom." You don't often see a special report on the evening news that's featured in TV Guide, but as I recall, this is something that ABC did from time to time to try and boost their news by giving it a different feel. In primetime, Ella Fitzgerald is joined by Duke Ellington for an hour of music (7:30 p.m., KOVR), Davy Jones guests on a Valentine's celebration on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (8:00 p.m., NBC), and Carol Burnett is joined by a stellar lineup including Lucille Ball, Eddie Albert, and Nancy Wilson (10:00 p.m., CBS)

Speaking of guest stars, Jimmy Stewart makes a cameo appearance on Julia (Tuesday, 8:30 p.m., NBC), while James Earl Jones (currently starring in the Broadway production of "The Great White Hope") stars on N.Y.P.D. (9:30 p.m., ABC), a really fine half-hour police drama. And on The Tonight Show (11:30 p.m., NBC), Johnny's scheduled guests are Jack Benny, choreographer George Ballanchine (perhaps the premier classical choreographer of the time), ballet dancers Suzanne Farrell and Arthur Mitchell, and author and Discovery host Frank Buxton.

Wednesday is Lincoln's Birthday, which used to be a fairly big deal, at least back when I was in school, and Aaron Copland conducts the National Symphony in a Lincoln Day concert (8:30 p.m., NET), including one of Copland's most famous works, "Lincoln Portrait," narrated by Coretta Scott King, MLK's widow. Meantime, NBC repeats last year's highly acclaimed special with Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass (9:00 p.m.). The most interesting item on Tuesday, though, is what we didn't see: the never-aired second episode of ABC's infamous disaster Turn-On (scheduled for 8:30 p.m.), which would have featured as hosts Robert Culp and his wife, France Nuyen. 

As a sign of the times, I'm intrigued by this episode of I Dream of Jeannie (Thursday, 7:00 p.m., KHSL), in which Jeannie, in an attempt to free Tony from house fix-up projects, redoes the house into a mansion sold for $60,000 to a NASA VIP. Now, the idea of a $60,000 "mansion" intrigued me; I'm not sure you can buy a mobile home for $60,000 anymore, so I decided to see what that $60,000 house would be worth today. The answer? Approximately $558,831.03, an increase of 831.39 percent. Does that qualify as a mansion under today's home prices? Given that the median U.S. home price hovers around $400,000–$450,000, and that "luxury" homes start at about $1.3 million, Zillow estimates that a mansion would run around $1.4 million; in Miami, the price would be closer to $2 million. For $560,000, you would get a home classified as "nice" or upper-middle-class in many places; to call it a "mansion" would probably be treated with skepticism. (In case you're wondering, in 1969 a mansion would have run over $100,000.) Thus endeth our economics lesson for today.

Davy Jones, who was on Laugh-In on Monday night, is one of the guest stars on This is Tom Jones (Friday, 7:30 p.m., ABC), along with Nancy Wilson, who was on The Carol Burnett Show on Monday night, Rich Litte, Mireille Mathieu, and Herman's Hermits, who weren't on anything else this week. On The Name of the Game (8:30 p.m., NBC), Robert Goulet and his then-wife Carol Lawrence star as Tony Franciosa's investigative reporter looks into the case of a famous doctor (Goulet) who's "an absolute whiz at hospital fund-raising—but totally incompetent as a surgeon." In the late-night movie slot, check out The Outrage (11:30 p.m., KOVR), an Old West version of Rashomon starring Paul Newman as a bandit executed for murder, even though nobody knows for certain what the facts were. Claire Bloom, Laurence Harvey, Edward G. Robinson, and Howard Da Silva fill out a tremendous supporting cast, as well as William Shatner as a preacher—made to order for the Shat's overacting. 

l  l  l

Finally, as a dedicated MST3K fan, I can't ignore Robert de Roos's feature story on Peter Graves, who appeared on Beginning of the End, It Conquered the World, and Parts: The Clonus Horror, as well as the Rifftrax feature Killers from Space. Graves is now starring in Mission: Impossible, but according to de Roos, he still can't escape the shadow of big brother James Arness. 

"I don’t know why Peter wants to be a star so badly," says George Santoro, a producer at Universal. "He's already recognized by more people than most stars."  Graves insists that this doesn't bother him, although he does admit that he wishes he came across as a star whose fans hold him in awe, rather than those who come up to him and treat him like a long-lost friend. Some think it has to do with the squeaky wheel getting the attention; producer Norman Macdonnell says, "You never hear much about Pete." Others, including Graves, say that his television work has effectively kept him from making the movies that could elevate his profile. 

This could be changing, though. CBS vice president Perry Lafferty says of Graves that "The quiet strength of this man has contributed to the smash hit of Mission: Impossible." It could have been awkward stepping into the lead that had originally been held by Steven Hill, but "there was never a hint

of trouble. I can think of a half dozen other leading men who would have been bitterly resented by the cast. I just wish I had 15 more like him." (This jibes with other descriptions from costars and crew who speak highly of Graves' professionalism and quiet sense of humor.) Graves himself says, "Some bloom early, and some take a little longer. I have a deep sense that I am ready for the big push." Indeed, Peter Graves becomes the face of M:I, notwithstanding the show's gradual decline in the years after Barbara Bain and Martin Landau left the show. Perhaps his greatest hit comes in his deadpan role as Captain Oveur in Airplane. Like Stella Stevens, maybe it just took a little patience. TV

If you enjoy the content here and want to support my broader creative work, please consider buying me a Diet Coke at my Ko-fi page. Thank you!

Around the dial

A really thoughtful piece from David at Comfort TV leads off the week. It's called "Defending the Traditional," and while it's primarily about traditional television shows, it has a great deal to say about tradition in general, and what it means (or doesn't) today.

At Forbes, Marc Berman notes that it's the 50th anniversary of Rich Man, Poor Man, the series that changed television history. It wasn't the first miniseries, but it was the most influential, and it paved the way for Roots and a succession of others. Ah, what a glorious time!

The "Tony Wright Season" continues at Cult TV Blog, and this week John looks at the 1970 Play for Today episode "The Lie," an English adaptation of an Ingmar Bergman play. There's a fascinating history to go along with this dark story about a loveless marriage.

At The View from the Junkyard, Roger looks at the latest episode of The A-Team, "Fire," in which our heroes are called on to prevent a rival fire department (don't ask) from taking over a town. Just enjoy Hannibal and the team outwitting yet another colonel out to get them.

Terence offers remembrances of two more television stars this week, as we mourn the deaths of the great Catherine O'Hara, and the wonderful Demond Wilson, both of whom died in the past week. The roll call of classic stars is getting long, and we're only in February.

At Classic Film and TV Corner, it's a look at an underappreciated Agatha Christie series, Partners in Crime, which aired in 1983, and do not mistake this version for any other later adaptations you might see; this is the one to stick with.

Finally, given that I offer an MST3K alert (when I can ) in each week's TV Guide review, you'd have to know that I'd be all over Variety's news that the series is coming back for a four-episode run, courtesy of the crew at Rifftrax, which includes the original actors who made the last few seasons of the original series so enjoyable. This promises to be an improvement on the previous three-season revival, and it's such good news that I think I'll have to write at further length about it on Wednesday. TV

If you enjoy the content here and want to support my broader creative work, please consider making a donation at my Ko-fi page. Any amount you contribute helps me continue writing, researching, and sharing these articles and projects. Thank you!

TV Jibe: Smarter than the average bear?

TV

If you enjoy the content here and want to support my broader creative work, please consider making a donation at my Ko-fi page. Any amount you contribute helps me continue writing, researching, and sharing these articles and projects. Thank you!

What's on TV? Sunday, January 31, 1960

I mentioned last week ago how WGBH, the educational channel in Boston, acted almost as a secondary NBC affiliate, broadcasting The Huntley-Brinkley Report because WBZ had a grudge against the network. Well, this week, we see that WGBH is taking on some programming from CBS as well, including Camera Three and CBS Television Workshop, the last five minutes of which include Harry Reasoner's news update. Then, they turn back to NBC at the end of the afternoon for Meet the Press and Chet Huntley Reporting. I suppose WBZ figured nobody would recognize Huntley on their channel! As you can tell, this is the Eastern New England edition.

This week in TV Guide: January 30, 1960

Ahat are we to make of this week's cover story, "Can Ratings Be Fixed?" Does it imply that the ratings system is broken, that networks and advertisers pay far too much attention to them, sacrificing admirable but low-rated programs at the altar of profitability and popularity? Or do we understand "fixed" to have the same meaning as "rigged," that the integrity of the ratings system has intentionally been breached so the  figures reflect something other than the truth, all to profit an unknown someone in position to tamper with the numbers? Oh, the uncertainty of it all.

As it turns out, according to Bob Stahl, it's a little bit of everything. In addition to those choices above, the overriding question, one on everyone's mind, is: "How can electronic gadgets in only 1050 homes measure accurately what 112,000 viewers are watching?" A Senate investigating committee is looking into it (yes, they don't have anything better to do than that), for as Oklahoma Senator Mike Monroney says, "[t]he struggle for rating supremacy led to rigging of TV quiz programs." Put that way, compared to the constant threat of nuclear war, I guess it is an important question.

The fact is, as is the case with alcohol, guns, technology, and, well, television, the ratings are neither good nor bad, but neutral. "They serve a useful and necessary purpose in the business," Stahl points out. "The fault lies in the way ratings are constantly misused." Max Banzhaf, advertising director of the Armstrong Cork Co. (sponsors of Armstrong Circle Theater), says that ratings are "designed to serve only as a guide in making program judgments," but that "too often [they're] used as a substitute for judgment. ABC President Oliver Treyz says ratings are "only one factor in any program decision." Answering critics who claim networks are too eager to jump on the bandwagon and copycat successful shows, NBC Vice President Hugh M. Beville Jr. replies, "Is it wrong to give the people what they say they want?"

Counters historian Arthur Schlessinger, "The television industry must see its job, not as that of catering to the worst or even the average taste of its audiences, but in part as that of elevating taste." And Marion B. Harper Jr., president of the imposing McCann-Erickson ad agency, says that networks "must telecast more shows of quality than the ratings indicate the public wants to see." (We touched on this question of who decides what quality is in an earlier edition.)

Garry Moore, who's been on TV long enough to know a thing or two about ratings, raises this question: "Is a comedian any funnier when he gets a 30 [rating] than when he gets a 20?" As an example, "[s]uppose the comedian gets a 20 when he has a really good show. His audience will talk up the show to friends; more people will tune in the following week. So he may get a 30 rating that second week and not have as good a show. Wouldn't that mean he was funnier with a 20 rating than with a 30?" Yes, the ratings are necessary, but they "don't show whether viewers buy the sponsor's product." As to the question of whether or not the ratings are rigged, Sen. Monroney says they aren't. "[W]e concluded that rating samples are inadequate, that ratings receive far too much emphasis in the industry, [but] we never charged that ratings were rigged." It's possible that television could see something akin to the payola scandals that rocked the radio world, but unlikely.

Unsurprisingly, reports Stahl, "There is no clear-cut answer to all of this." Broadcasters and advertisers need to be taught how to use the ratings correctly, and, says Beville, since the press aren't experts enough to write about them, "ratings should have no place in the press." Dr. Frank Stanton, president of CBS, offers the final word: beyond ratings, the networks need to know something more: what people want to look at. "We need constantly to know what the audience things we ought to be doing." To that end, they're conducting their own public-opinion polls, but I'm not sure that's necessary, because we all know what the audience thinks the networks should be doing: putting on better shows.

l  l  l

If you think we're done with Garry Moore because of that little quote above, you've got another think coming. He's looking pretty satisfied on the cover, and for good reason: his Tuesday night variety show has more than held its own against NBC's heavily promoted Startime specials despite the latter's massive budget advantage ($250,000 per show, as opposed to Moore's $100,000), and I've Got a Secret, the panel show he's emceed all these years, is doing "quite all right" against NBC's Perry Como Show. (You'll notice ABC's not even in the discussion, which is par for the course in these days.)

"You can't run scared," Moore says of the doomsayers predicting disaster for both of his prime-time shows at the hands of well-funded competitors. Of his Tuesday night show, he says that "we expected very rough competition and we were prepared for it." It's true that Startime got off to a good start, but Moore credited the loyalty of his viewers for his show's success. "People were familiar with our show from last year and I guess a lot of them liked it." It doesn't hurt either that the supporting cast includes Durward Kirby, Allen Funt and his Candid Camera, and Carol Burnett. "I guess the most important thing is to have faith in what you've all learned over the years and not start running around scared when the ratings slip a point or two."

Regarding that $100,000 per show budget, Moore provides an example of how that money doesn't really go very far. "Nine years ago if we wanted a smoke effect for some kind of a skit, somebody would borrow a bucket from the janitor and get 40 cents' worth of dry ice from the drugstore. Today you've got to have three special-effects men and a hand-forged bucket and the tab is $40. That's the way it goes." Multiply that by thousands, and now we know why simple things cost so much nowadays.

Moore closes with a great take on the quiz show scandals. Asked if they were embarrassed, he says, "Of course we were embarrassed. Embarrassed because no one bothered to investigate us." Apparently giving away $80 per show doesn't attract much attention. But Moore wouldn't have it any other way. "I turned down a job as host on a big-money quiz show because I figured that, on it, I wouldn't be a host at all. I'd be a croupier."

Of course, if you'd like to hear more about the great Garry Moore, I'd point you in the direction of the video I did with Dan Schneider last week.

l  l  l

Invariably, one of the programming victims of the ratings game is the cultural/educational genre. These shows haven't disappeared from TV completely, but with few exceptions they've been relegated to the Sunday cultural ghetto. This week is a good example, beginning with CBS's famed trio of Sunday morning religious and cultural shows. At 10:00 a.m. ET, Lamp Unto My Feet presents "For God and Country," a documentary on the role of religion and the Scriptures in American politics during the Revolutionary War. At 10:30 a.m., it's Look Up and Live, with "The Betrayal," the final episode in the five-part series "Images of the Bible." Finally, at 11:00 a.m., Camera Three has scenes from Colette's novelette The Vagabond, interpreted in dramatic and dance sequences. 

Speaking of, the culture continues at 3:15 p.m. on NBC (following the NBA game of the week between Detroit and Boston), with NBC Opera Theatre's live, color special of Mascagni's one-act opera Cavalleria Rusticana. The title might not be familiar to you, but this might be: the Intermezzo, one of the lovliest and most famous orchestral pieces in opera, used in all kinds of movies, including Raging Bull.

Following the opera, it's back to CBS at 4:30 p.m., with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic, on Ford's Sunday Musical Showcase (you can see the entire program here). In this program, "The Creative Performer," guest Igor Stravinsky conducts the Philharmonic, with pianist Glenn Gould (making his United States television debut) and Met soprano Eileen Farrell. And after that, it's NBC, with G-E College Bowl at 5:30 p.m. (Case Western Reserve University of Cleveland vs. Purdue; the Boilermakers win, 260-15).

Bernstein is just fortunate that in Ford, he has a big sponsor supporting his show. Hallmark is another big sponsor, which is why Hallmark Hall of Fame airs in color on NBC Wednesday night at 7:30 p.m. It's not one of those saccharine pieces of drivel you see on the Hallmark Channel, either; it's Shakespeare's The Tempest, starring Maurice Evans, Richard Burton, Lee Remick, Roddy McDowall, and Tom Poston. (Watch it here.) Don't worry; I promise I'm not going to go off on one of my celebrated rants about the quality of Hallmark programming. It's just too easy nowadays, like catching fish in a barrel.

The point is none of these shows—none—would be on television today, save some niche streaming service that I'm not aware of. In fact, the best you can do is to seek them out on YouTube, which is not a bad alternative. After all, did you notice how many of these shows are there?

  

l  l  l

What else? Well, there is sports on Saturday, though not at the volume we have today. Hockey takes center stage with the NHL game of the week, featuring the Detroit Red Wings vs. the Bruins at Boston Garden (2:00 p.m., CBS), while the NBA counters with a matchup between the Philadelphia Warriors (before they moved to San Francisco) and New York Knicks from Madison Square Garden. (2:15 p.m., NBC)

Sunday night, CBS presents a two-hour retrospective on "The Fabulous Fifties," hosted by Henry Fonda, with an all-star cast including Jackie Gleason, Rex Harrison and Julie Andrews, Mike Nichols and Elaine May, Betty Comdon and Adolph Green, and news highlights with Arthur Godfrey, Roger Bannister (the first sub-four-minute mile), Navy Captain William Anderson (who sailed his submarine, the Nautilus, under the polar ice cap), and Edmund Hillary (conqueror of Mount Everest). Eric Sevareid provides commentary. (YouTube has it here.)

We didn't have a "Sullivan vs. Allen" face-off this week, as Ed was preempted by that "Fabulous Fifties" special; anyway, Steverion has moved to Monday nights, and this week his guest is singer Steve Lawrence (10:00 p.m., NBC). Later on, The Du Pont Show with June Allyson (got to get the full name in, right?) features June starring in "So Dim the Light," playing a movie star who discovers she will be totally blind due to injuries from an auto accident. Robert Taylor plays himself in a brief cameo appearance. (10:30 p.m., CBS)

On Tuesday, the aforementioned Startime presents Ed Wynn, Bert Lahr, and Nancy Olson in "The Greatest Man Alive" (8:30 p.m., NBC), a comedy about a man who, deeming his life to have been a failure, prepares to hang himself, when fate intervenes. Garry Moore, who more than holds his own against Startime, welcomes Andy Griffith and Carol Lawrence as his guests (10:00 p.m., CBS). And in the late night movie slot, a feature destined to become a thriller classic: The Night of the Hunter (11:15 p.m., Channel 4), the only movie directed by Charles Laughton, starring Robert Mitchum as a serial killer looking to murder a widow (Shelley Winters) for her money. The movie was deemed a failure in its time; Laughton never directed another film. Today, it's considered one of the greatest movies ever made. I'm always curious as to what leads to these kinds of reassessments. What was it the critics of the time didn't see?

Wednesday, Armstrong Circle Theatre presents "Ghost Bomber: The Lady Be Good" (10:00 p.m., CBS), a docudrama on one of the most enduring mysteries of World War II: the disappearance, without a trace, of an American bomber on a mission to Italy. Last May, the wreckage of the plane was discovered in the Libyan Desert, with no trace of the crew. You may remember a Twilight Zone episode from around this same time, "King Nine Will Not Return," starring Bob Cummings as the pilot of the mystery plane. Among the stars is a very young George Segal. The program is hosted by CBS newman Douglas Edwards

On Thursday night, the great French star Maurice Chevalier stars in a one-man show on CBS (10:00 p.m.), performing all his favorites, including "Thank Heaven for Little Girls," which he sings to some special members of the audience, including the daughters of Joan Crawford and Jack Paar. And in the late movie slot, Fredric March and Betty Field are in for a shock when they find out the German boy they adopted was raised as a Nazi in the 1944 movie Tomorrow the World! (11:15 p.m., Channel 13).

Friday, it's a one-man performance of another kind, as Art Carney stars in three one-act plays: Sean O'Casey's "A Pound on Demand," "Where the Cross is Made" by Eugene O'Neill, and "Red Peppers" by Noel Coward. (8:00 p.m., NBC, and in color, of course.) Elaine Stritch guest stars in "Red Peppers," doing a couple of song-and-dance numbers with Carney. Carney's singled out for praise in one of our Letters to the Editor as well, for his recent performance in "Cal Me Back." Anyone who thinks he's just Ed Norton has another think coming. Also on Friday, Robert Conrad makes a brief cross-over appearance as Hawaiian Eye's Tom Lopaka in "Who Killed Cock Robin?" on 77 Sunset Strip (9:00 p.m., ABC). Warner Bros. is always good that way.

l  l  l

Interesting note in Burt Boyer's column about how Robert Young wants this to be the last year for Father Knows Best. When you figure that Young started out on the show in 1949 when it was on radio (he was the only member of the cast to make the transition to television), he's already been Jim Anderson for 11 years. Not only does Young want to do something different, his TV daughter, Elinor Donahue, is getting other offers herself. It's said that Young is looking for $11 million to sell a network the show's inventory of close to 250 episodes. As it turns out, this is Young's final season, and while I don't know how much he wound up getting, Father Knows Best ran for another three years in prime time; two seasons on NBC, and a final season on ABC. Think about that: three years of reruns in prime time, and additional years as part of ABC's daytime schedule.* The only similar example I can think of is Marshal Dillon, the name for the half-hour episodes that CBS ran on Tuesdays from 1961 to 1964 (while Gunsmoke was still in first-run), and then in syndication.

*It was an episode of Father Knows Best that was running on ABC affiliates in the Mountain and Pacific time zones at 1:30 p.m. ET on November 22, 1963, when President Kennedy was assassinated. The ABC footage on YouTube shows a follow-up voiceover bulletin interrupting the next to last scene of the episode, "Man About Town," before returning for some commercials and the wrap-up. Knowing what we do now about what the post-JFK years are like, it's actually kind of poignant. I do wonder what happened with Bud and the illusionist, though. 

Then, there's Dwight Whitney's note on Edd Byrnes, one of the stars of 77 Sunset Strip. Byrnes has joined the impressive ranks of Warner Bros. talent, past and present, who've been engaged in contract disputes with the studio, and consequently he's on suspension. In the meantime, he's taken a job as a greeter at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. He's making $400 a week, which equals what he made playing Kookie. (No wonder he's upset with his contract!) Says Byrnes of his temporary career change, "The bills were piling up. I need the money."

l  l  l

"Introducing Pat Crowley" in
the role of the Kookie.

Finally, this week's starlet is Pat Crowley, who, aside from her good looks, is known as someone who doesn't pine for her own TV series. She likes being a free-lancer, she explains; comparing it to a gym, she says it allows her to "work out on a different kind of bar bell every week." She's already been a success on the Great White Way, selected as "one of Broadway's most promising new personalities," and after a brief stint with movies ("The timing wasn't good," she explains. "Kookies weren't fashionable.*), she tried her hand at the small screen, and with appearances on Wanted—Dead or Alive, 77 Sunset Strip, and Maverick, she hasn't looked back.

*Except, as we've seen, on Sunset Strip.

She can afford to be choosy, since she's married to a Los Angeles attorney named Gregory Hookstratten. He's better known as Ed "The Hook" Hookstratten, and as one of the biggest legal names in Hollywood, he boasted of clients including Johnny Carson, Elvis Presley, Vin Scully, Joey Bishop, Bryant Gumbel, Tom Snyder, and Dick Enberg. He was general counsel for the Los Angeles Rams, fixed a DUI for Fred Silverman without it getting in the papers, and negotiated contracts for many a celebrity. All that, and Pat Crowley too (even though they wound up getting divorced). Quite an adventure, wouldn't you say? TV

If you enjoy the content here and want to support my broader creative work, please consider making a donation at my Ko-fi page. Any amount you contribute helps me continue writing, researching, and sharing these articles and projects. Thank you!