Network drop stars for election returns
OWI to radio results overseas
By Si Steinhauser
Now that you have listened to national Democratic candidates take up 34 hours and five minutes and Republicans 29 hours and 10 minutes of your network listening time, big league commercials go bye-bye tonight to make way for election returns and hourly “commentaries” by “experts,” along with alibis for out-of-bounds predictions.
The 63 hours and 15 minutes of talk does not include spot announcements, five-minute recordings, in-person appeals, or state or county broadcasts.
If there is a decision tonight in the election, you may hear the victor and loser interviewed by network mikemen or the announcement “he has retired for the night,” a pre-radio version of “he has taken a trip up Salt River.” The younger generation may have that explained by their elders.
The Blue Network cancels all programs from 7 o’clock on. NBC, CBS and MBS begin their nationwide pickups at 8 o’clock.
Interpretative commentaries will be made by chairmen of national political committees, also by various aides and publicity directors. There will also be an election dramatization – as if the election isn’t drama enough – and man in the street interviews with “What do you think of the winner?” the $64 question. Servicemen will also he felt out as to “what do you care about it?”
The Office of War Information will begin overseas broadcasts of returns at 7 o’clock. These will continue until the globe is circled and time differences have been compensated and every military outpost has had the returns and the identity of the winner made available. Ten-minute return summaries will reach across the seas.
The Office of Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs will also broadcast returns in Spanish and Portuguese for Latin-American ears.
Wartime emergency transmitters will be used for tonight’s special broadcasts but returns will not be permitted to interfere with the regular transmission of military orders.
All of which is just a semifinal, to the nation’s return to normalcy, soap operas, blue jokes, promises of cheap television sets and warning to do your shopping early for Christmas is coming. And we’ll get more and bigger reports from the victory fronts in Europe and the Pacific. Of course, we’ll have to listen to the “I told you so” guys until next Sunday night. by which time all excuses and boasts will have been completed.
Next election you will see the candidates as they speak if what happened on a tiny scale in New York means anything. Senator Robert F. Wagner was seen by owners of television sets as he asked his native state to return him to the Senate. He was televised by Station WABD and was the first candidate ever televised in a campaign speech.
Now back to the old routine:
Larry Stevens, the “unknown discovery” of Mary Livingstone who made his singing debut on Jack Benny’s broadcast Sunday night was brought to the Benny home last July and signed as Dennis Day’s successor. That, according to Jack Benny, who ought to know, since his manager, Leonard Lyon’s, and Larry’s manager did the signing in Jack’s presence, following an audition.
Judith Wood, who plays a Japanese spy on the Counterspy series, is the wife of a member of the British Consular Service, Christopher Wren, whose father wrote Beau Geste. Judith makes a specialty of portraying Oriental women on the air.
We don’t admire Shirley Mitchell for going on the Fibber McGee Show last Tuesday just after she learned that her father had died. The “show must go on stuff” gets no favor here.
Donald Loughlin has joined the Woman of America cast as Logan Matthews.
Pittsburgh’s Earl Hines will play a boogie-woogie version of the “St. Louis Blues” on tomorrow’s (KQV 3:15 p.m.) Hollywood Show Time.
Len Doyle, who plays Harrington of Mr. District Attorney broadcasts, is Chief Special Investigator for the Admiral in the new Broadway play, The Streets Are Guarded.
Murray Kane, who sang with Fred Waring’s gang, is overseas in uniform and turning his experiences into money. Pfc. Kane picked up the G.I. query “Got Any Gum, Chum?” and made it into a song. Fred will introduce it Thursday night.