The phone rang … suddenly … shrilly. P.S. stretched out his hand and hesitated – was this a trap? What fiendish question was he now to be asked ? He overcame his fear and picked up the phone, hand trembling slightly. ‘Hello, production office’ he said. No one answered, but he could hear heavy breathing through his earpiece. He glanced at his colleague T.H. and his eyes indicated the extension, which T.H. slowly lifted to his ear.

‘Hello’ said P.S. again. The muscles of his jaw twitched and his steel-blue eyes narrowed through the thick cigar smoke that filled the office. Both men were still, tense. The phone had not rung for at least two minutes and now – this. The tension became unbearable and beads of perspiration trickled slowly down his temples, dropping from his chin and staining the blotter on his desk. He could still hear the breathing of his adversary and faintly in the distance, revolver shots – one! two!! Immediately a voice at the other end – metallic, authoritative – called: ‘Hold it there – don’t move’. P.S. tensed. It was not the first time this situation had arisen. Twice before this very day he had heard those shots, and the cold command to stay still. He glanced quickly at T.H. on his left. T.H. sat still, relaxed, but ready to move instantly to back up his colleague in any emergency. The pencil drummed lightly on the ash tray before him. Both men were experienced operators and had passed through these crises many times before. There had been that time with the lions and panthers when only feet had separated them from a terrible mauling – and they were still in action: and again, when all seemed lost, and they had fought their way through the Russian mob and beaten the crime – and punishment. But this – this, was different. P.S. glanced swiftly at the schedule hanging by his side. Nothing sinister – all should have been quiet. But it was always in these moments of apparent calm that the greatest danger came. Although it seemed like hours, in fact only a few seconds had elapsed since that first terrifying ring.

Suddenly the door was flung open and D.N. stood framed in the opening. His sharp eye took in the situation at a glance. ‘What now?’ he gritted and took one sharp, nervous pace into the room. P.S. held up his free hand in a gesture of silence. D.N. stood stock still, his eyes never leaving the telephone in P.S.’s hand.

In an instant the tension broke as a sharp, incisive voice said ‘Is that the production office? Oh! Studio 5 here – will it be all right if we go to lunch five minutes early?’ The air whistled through P.S.’s lips in a surge of relief. ‘O.K.’ he said. Slowly he replaced the receiver, slumped back in his chair and lit a cigarette. Another crisis over. He smiled: ‘How about a quick jug in the club before lunch?’ There was a quick flurry, the slam of a door and – silence.

I must confess that the above is a slight exaggeration, but sometimes this is how it appears to us on extension 207 in the production office at Wembley. It is not a large office, but every day from early morn until half an hour after the last studio closes, these is always a duty manager on hand to answer queries on studio technical requirements, dressing room allocation, special effects, staff problems, hygiene, safety first, and 100 other subjects of a production, whether it be of a personal or domestic nature.

On average, about 15 productions are transmitted, telerecorded or videotaped every week at Wembley, and four or five at Television House.

Those of you who read articles on ‘Hippodrome’ and ‘The Informer’ in Fusion will have realised the enormous problems facing members of the production teams, and these are but TWO series. Apart from these two there are also other series such as ‘The Rat Catchers’, ‘No Hiding Place’, ‘Orlando’ plus drama, science, schools, features, light entertainment, children’s and religious programmes, all of which have their own (and equally important) administrative problems and, in all of which, somewhere along the line, the production office is involved.

For example, while ‘Hippodrome’ was in production, the production office team were responsible for the housing, feeding (and bedding) of 12 elephants, 12 lions, six tigers, two pumas, and five leopards, plus assorted dogs and trainers – not to mention the acts – Mexican, French, Spanish, and German – who required facilities for cars, caravans and cages and the laying on of electricity, water and heating.

During ‘Ready, Steady, Go!’ every week cloakrooms are set up to take care of the coats and handbags of up to 150 teenagers and while ‘Five o’Clock Club’ is transmitting and recording parents must be accommodated and facilities for them to view the programmes laid on – somewhere. We have in our time, dealt with a fire in dressing room 26, flood in Studio 2, a ‘punch-up’ in Studio 5 and a robbery (and arrest) in dressing room 513.

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‘The yellow submarine is like an information-cum-lost-persons-cum-marriage-cum-personnel office.’ So says Mrs Peggy Davidson, manager of production in Ray Dicks’ section about her yellow-painted office on a corner of the fourth floor – like a submarine, it has no view.

Peggy Davidson’s job is to assign teams of directors, PAs and stage managers to programmes and allocate the rehearsal rooms. It sounds simple but working with creative people sometimes presents problems and in particular the problem of personalities.

‘Some people don’t like working with others, some people work better on a certain kind of programme and some haven’t the ability to do what they want,’ says Peggy Davidson. ‘All this has to be taken into account when considering a team for a programme. When I started this job, I was very worried about matching people up, and found that all my best ideas seemed to come in the middle of the night. The answer was to keep a pencil and notepad by my bed, and when I woke up shouting “Of course – put her with him” I would jot it down immediately. I’ve still got a notebook by my bed, but it’s only used in moments of great stress.’

The manager of production’s job has changed a lot over the past four years. In 1965, Peggy Davidson had 40 staff directors and brought in perhaps a dozen freelancers for specific assignments over a year. Now there are 22 staff directors and the rest, over half, are contracted. This involves much work as there are agents to be contacted, contracts to be negotiated and fees to be arranged and the whole to be passed by the controller of production, Ray Dicks. The position of PAs has also changed during this time. All PAs are on the staff and must be kept working all the time. ‘The days of a durable partnership between a director and a PA are going to become rare,’ says Peggy Davidson.

To keep them busy PAs must now be moved from one director to another. This means matching them with a book showing what a director is doing at any time and when he will be free or available for a programme. There are also minor problems like making sure that the contract directors have offices, that PAs have stop watches and that programmes have rehearsal rooms. The number of rehearsal rooms at Television House are dwindling as they are converted into offices. Part of Peggy Davidson’s job is to find new rooms outside, which means more negotiations. This can sometimes produce unexpected complications like: ‘You can have the room all week except Thursday afternoon when we have our jumble sale’.

Theoretically, once the members of the unit are selected Peggy Davidson’s responsibility towards that programme ceases. In fact it doesn’t, because her office (known to the inmates as the Yellow Submarine and to outsiders as Ray’s Aviary) is a clearing house of information concerning the whereabouts of people, the availability of freelancers and general problems.

‘The job has developed a great deal over the past four years,’ continues Peggy Davidson. ‘I think one of the biggest changes has been the advent of producers. When I started, there were really only two – one for “No Hiding Place” and one for “This Week”. Now there seems to be one for almost every programme. It makes the job more complicated, because there is one extra channel to go through. Setting up a show used to involve the head of a section and his manager, but now there is a third person to cater for – the producer. All three have their own ideas, their own preferences and their own dislikes. Matched up with the creative ability of directors, plus the opinions of the PAs and SMs, one has an awful lot of combinations to play with.’

The job of being a director, a PA or an SM are among the most sought-after in television. Peggy Davidson sees on average three would-be SMs and a PA each week. ‘They go onto a waiting list or my files,’ she says. ‘I also see directors and arrange for Ray Dicks to interview them too. SMs are usually trained when they come, as are directors, but PAs are more often trained with Rediffusion. ‘We have a board of PAs to help select the girls – but vacancies are few and far between. They are in all three jobs.’ Peggy Davidson is an ex-PA herself. She joined Rediffusion in 1955 and after two years went to Canada. She returned in 1959, worked on ‘Hippodrome’ and the following year went into advertising. At Stella Ashley’s request she returned, for the second time, in 1962 and worked on ‘The Somerset Maugham Hour’ series. Then she took over from James Butler who had been manager of production for three months on a temporary basis. ‘It’s the longest I have ever been in one job,’ she says. ‘I love dealing with people and this job involves a great deal of it.

‘Our humorous and tragic moments come and go,’ concludes Peggy Davidson. ‘Usually they are of the moment, and are neither funny nor important by the following week. The one that does stand out in my memory though was a director announcing he would interview all the SMs before deciding which one he wanted to work with. He so floored me that I let him see four and choose his own. It’s never been done before or since.’

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The year 1966 started with political praise being heaped on the head of ‘This Week’ when the programme celebrated its 10th anniversary on January 6. A publication to mark the event carried messages of goodwill from the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition and the Leader of the Liberals. Later that night a programme title ventured into the realm of the astrologer with what at that time seemed an amazingly rash prediction… The World Cup – England to Win?’ Then on January 31 the first of a new series called ‘The Rat Catchers’ started to win predictably high ratings.

In between, however, had come the death of a member of the board of directors – Sir Bracewell Smith, a former Lord Mayor of London, chairman of Wembley Stadium and an honorary vice-president of the Football Association. February brought yet another award to the company when ‘Children of Revolution’, the Intertel production on young people growing up in Czechoslovakia, won a Silver Dove from the International Catholic Organisation for Radio and Television (UNDA) at the sixth Monte Carlo International Television Festival. Another award came the next month when Hughie Green and Michael Miles received a joint special award from the Variety Club of Great Britain at the Show Business lunch on March 8 for the continuing popularity of their programmes.

March 31 once again saw Studio 9 as the hub of the ITV network when everybody went into action to cover the General Election.

Mr Wilson was given ‘A View from the Bridge’ shortly after on April 4 with the transmission of Arthur Miller’s play. Meanwhile the ITA announced that its present three-year contracts with the programme companies would be extended until the end of July, 1968, as no decision had been taken on whether to extend the ITV service.

A flurry which was to extend for quite a few weeks hit the Wembley studios when the first of the colour ‘Hippodrome’ series went on the floor on April 19.

In the business world, company chairman John Spencer Wills became the chairman of The British Electric Traction Co. Ltd, on April 21, following the death of Harley Drayton.

On May 9 the first of the ‘Seven Deadly Sins’ series was transmitted. Pride, gluttony, sloth, avarice, lust, envy and wrath subsequently achieved the distinction of all getting into TAM’s Top Ten.

Three days later the first of the adult education series ‘Royalist and Roundhead’ was screened. While not hitting the Top Ten, it rose high in the opinion of educationalists.

May also saw the drama section of the club take over Studio 9 to stage ‘Ring Round the Moon’ and achieve high audience ratings. Meanwhile Fusion made its own dent in the award stakes by receiving a certificate of merit in the British Association of Industrial Editors’ contest, a top award of excellence in the International Council of Industrial Editors’ competition and the Block and Anderson Cup from the British Direct Mail and Advertising Association.

The International Television Federation – Intertel – reached the fifth anniversary of its foundation on June 14. Behind it were 34 programmes and a coveted 1965 Peabody Award for making ‘the first continuing contribution towards international understanding through television.’

Also in June came an award for ‘Stage One Contest – Caroline’. This children’s programme won the Munich Prix Jeunesse.

The Mountbatten series also made news in June when it was announced that this exclusive story of the life and times of Lord Mount-batten would be made in colour.

July started with the news that the first episode of the ‘Hippodrome’ series on July 5 had gone straight to the top of Neilsen coast-to-coast ratings when screened by CBS in colour.

This was the month of the World Cup which England won on July 30 and which stretched the joint resources of BBC and ITV in providing coverage for the world. Rediffusion contributed its share of equipment and executives.

The day after the final at Wembley historians gathered at Television House for a conference with ‘History on TV’ as its theme.

August 1 brought the first programme in ‘The Informer’ series which regularly knocked on the doors of the Top Ten during its run.

The month was shadowed by the death of Bernard Rickatson-Hatt on August 7. He had been on the board of the company since July, 1958. A former Guards officer, he had been editor-in-chief of Reuters, adviser to the governor of the Bank of England and to the Bank of London and South America on public relations.

In September came two club events. On the 10th there was the annual sunlit sports day for the children of club members at Shepperton and on the 17th the football team took part in the TV Cup knock-out competition. For the second year running the Rediffusion XI lost to Scottish, the eventual winners.

On September 21 it was announced that Sir Richard Thompson was joining the board. A former M.P., he has held various government appointments.

A conference for educationalists was held at Wembley on September 22 at which, for the first time, teachers were allowed to produce their own programmes in a television studio. September 26 saw the start of the new autumn schedules with 15 new programme presentations, the sequel being six out of TAM’s Top Ten for the week. As part of this schedule the first production of the new Rediffusion Films Ltd was transmitted on September 28 – ‘Dare I Weep, Dare I Mourn’ with James Mason and Jill Bennett. The Frost Programme’ series also started later that night.

Appointments in features came in October. First there was the announcement of the appointment of Barry Westwood as producer of the networked Thursday edition of ‘This Week’. Then, on October 27, it was announced that James Butler had been appointed head of features from November 1.

During October and November, three joint Rediffusion/Talent Association productions under David Susskind passed through Wembley to be recorded in black-and-white and colour for America.

On November 8, it was announced that the present series of ‘Ready, Steady, Go!’ would end on December 23.

On November 11, the announcement came that managing director Paul Adorian had been appointed managing director of Rediffusion Ltd. John Spencer Wills, chairman of both companies, relinquished his managing directorship following his appointment as chairman of The British Electric Traction Co. Ltd upon the death of Harley Drayton.

The annual general meeting of the company was held at Wembley on November 28 and at it, the winners of the 1965-66 Golden Stars were presented with their awards. Independent Television presented ‘A Royal Gala’ before the Duke of Edinburgh at the Palladium on November 29 in aid of the CTBF and the Bowles Rocks Trust.

From December 7-16, an exhibition of the work of graphic designers was held at the Upper Grosvenor Galleries.

Finally – and still to come – is ‘The Royal Palaces of Britain’, the joint Independent Television and BBC production on December 25.

The post Tele marks of 1966 appeared first on THIS IS REDIFFUSION from Transdiffusion.

THAT was a decade that was. That was a decade that was…

Oh, put the emphasis where you like. The fact remains that all of us who were there on the night when Rediffusion and ITV first flickered on to the screen are now 10 – no, 11 – years older.

I’ve changed. How about you?

Rediffusion has certainly altered. For a start it is no longer ‘Associated’.

Incidentally, dear editor, it would be interesting to find out just how many people at present on the pay-roll were with the company on Night One (still known to some as the night they invented champagne).

The answer is 252 – Editor.

From my own memory book I recall Sally Sutherland, Red Lyle, Dennis Atherton, Richard Hawkins, and the late Hugh Finlay – all part of the Press Office over the years.

Where the nostalgia really hit me was at the ITA’s white-tie Guildhall banquet when 10 glorious years and all that were celebrated.

It might have been the wine and brandy but sitting there under the stony stare of Gog and Magog I suddenly realised that 10 years (and part of a hair line) had vanished since I was in almost the same seat for ITV’s curtain-up.

The instant reaction was to check for ‘old familiar faces’ along the tables around me. Of 40 or so TV ‘professionals’ within range only four, perhaps five, had been there back in ’55.

Now I know how Greybeard felt. If my memory is right was Lord Hill, now ITA chairman, at that September 22, 1955, dinner as Postmaster-General?

And at that time didn’t ABC TV consist of just Howard Thomas and a secretary?

Before quitting that particular celebration I wonder if the champagne would have flowed so freely had it been known that within one year Rediffusion would be over £3 million down?

By the way, hasn’t that been perhaps the most important change of all – turning those colossal losses of the early years into a profit?

As a privileged spectator seeing much of the game from close quarters it seems to me that Rediffusion’s development has been in three stages.

The first, naturally, was that somewhat daffy unreal period when the newly recruited army worked excitedly to get the company on the air and keep it there.

Forgive me if there is an overlap for so many shows have been crammed into the decade, but those were the days of Gordon Harker and ‘Sixpenny Corner’. Of Ralph Reader’s ‘Chance Of A Lifetime’.

The weekly sports magazine. The Granville Melodramas. And of Sgt ‘I Only Want The Facts, Mam’ Webb and ‘Dragnet’.

Wasn’t there a freakish series called ‘You’ve Never Seen This’? Book reviews in the morning. Sheila Matthews as Friday’s Girl. Wasn’t this, too, the Jack Hylton variety era… the names which occur being Arthur Askey, Tony Hancock (he once did a one-man show in an emergency), Rosalina Neri, Bryan Michie, Ivor Emmanuel, the Crazy Gang and the Water Rats?

Roland Gillett was the programme controller, Lloyd Williams was on the production staff, and the whole period was like the froth on top of a pint.

The second stage was marked by the appointment of Paul Adorian as managing director and John McMillan as programme controller.

Now the workaday face and output of the company was being established. On went the old originals in ‘Take Your Pick’ and ‘Double Your Money’.

But morning TV disappeared. Much of the early pioneering excitement went with it. And the staff settled down to a more orderly existence.

Schools programmes started – remember Enid Love? Was it in this spell or even earlier that we had those Michael Ingrams’ series? How about those Goonish shows like ‘A Show Called Fred’, ‘Son of Fred’, and ‘Idiots’ Weekly’? Not only Sellers, but Milligan, too.

The work of putting in the foundations went on continuously.

‘Cool For Cats’ caught popular fancy and brought Joan Kemp-Welch’s name to the forefront. ‘This Week’ was going strong. Somewhere around this point Cyril Bennett and Elkan Allan began contributing to the company’s fortunes.

Peter Cotes is one more name I associate with this sector of Rediffusion’s fortune. And was I alone in liking America’s ‘Johnny Staccato’ jazz-thriller series?

I went down the Thames on one Rediffusion birthday party – and across to Paris for another. That was the day that George Sanders, then working on a special programme called ‘Women In Love’, helped to play host. Although only a voyage down the Seine, Captain Tom Brownrigg was also on hand.

So we had ‘No Hiding Place’ and ‘Intertel’, ‘Wagon Train’ and ‘Rawhide’. But where was Tig Roe? Whither Alan Morris? Goodbye Kingsway Corner.

Out went advertising magazines. Out went ‘Jim’s Inn’ – after setting the standard for all shows of this type. But in came the many successful Pinter plays.

The most successful, of course, being ‘The Lover’, with Alan Badel and Vivien Merchant. It must have won almost every award possible… actor, actress, author and director. Surely Rediffusion’s most successful production in all those 11 years?

Just as the TV scene was growing contentedly sedate on came ‘Ready, Steady, Go!’ to give half the nation convulsions and the other half blood pressure.

Visiting the ‘RSG’ studio at TV House brought back all the din of 1955 and that drilling year when Adastral House was being converted.

By now Rediffusion was part of life. Dan Farson, always prominent in company affairs on the screen (his ‘Time Gentlemen, Please’ show was not only entered at Montreux but must have been responsible for the introduction of ‘Stars and Garters’), was a notable departure.

But phase two was drawing to a close too. On went John McMillan to general manager and in came Cyril Bennett as the new programme controller.

This is now part of the latest story… come in David Frost, Stella Richman, Benny Green, ‘Three After Six’, ‘The Rat Catchers’, and David Jacobs.

Pausing only to nod a farewell to Buddy Bregman and a friendly greeting to Europe’s favourite TV ‘uncle’ Eric Maschwitz, it scarcely seems credible that Monica Rose was hardly walking when ‘Double Your Money’ was first televised.

Yes, you’ve changed all right. Some more memory jogs… Stuart Hood, that ‘Arabian Nights’ opening for Wembley Studios, ‘Hippodrome’ in colour, the American deal with David Susskind, ‘Dial M For Music’, ‘Alfred Marks Time’, Keith Fordyce, Groucho Marx, Dickie Henderson, and on, and on.

It’s been a long time. Perhaps after all it should be that was a decade that was? What’s more Gog and Magog are still waiting.

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