Love Lucy....At Your Own Risk.

From the book,  "How I Escaped From Gilligan's Island"    by William Froug:

"In 1949 I was hired by Lloyd Brownfield, head of CBS Press Information, Hollywood, as a senior publicist for $83.50 a week.  That was a living wage at the time.  My assignment was to write for the daily mailer, which was sent out to all the CBS Radio affiliates.  The mailer was intended to pique their interest in the network's programs and especially their stars.

One of CBS's newest stars was a tall, pretty, young, red-headed woman named Lucille Ball.  She had appeared in a number of B pictures and , according to the powers that be in New York, had a gift for comedy.  Now she was being given her own radio sitcom, My Favorite Husband.

Brownfield gave me my first assignment:  interview Ball and do a feature story on her for the mailer.  I walked across CBS's Columbia Square courtyard and entered our big audience Studio A.  The large auditorium was dark except for the lit stage where the cast was seated on folding chairs, studying scripts.  They were on a rehearsal break.  My good fortune, I thought, as I walked toward the stage where Ball was seated.

As I approached she glanced toward me, curiously.  "Miss Ball,"  I said, "I'm Bill Froug with CBS Publicity, and I'd appreciate it if I could have a couple of minutes of your time to do an interview."

She turned in her chair so she was facing me head on.  She fixed me with cold eyes and a knotted frown.  "Kid,"  she said, "go shit in your hat."

When I reported the incident to my boss, he broke out into loud guffaws of laughter.  "That's Lucy, all right,"  Brownie said.  "Dig up a studio bio of her, rewrite it, and send it out.  And, by the way,"  he added, "welcome to the real Hollywood."

Richard Denning with Ball

This Calls For A Celebration!!!

Exactly 100 years ago today Nestor Studios, the first motion picture studio in Hollywood CA, opened up it's doors for business!

Blondeau Tavern soon to be Nestor Studios

It opened at the former Blondeau Tavern (above).  Nestor didn't remain autonomous for long though.  Carl Laemmle, of  Independent Motion Pictures (IMP), absorbed the company along with several others in 1912.  Afterwhich, Nestor head David Horsley and former Nestor Director Al Christie made pictures under the new Laemmle banner of Universal Pictures.

Same site in 1913

After Uncle Carl Laemmle (who had a very large Faemmle) moved Universal to what is still it's location today - Universal City,  Christie split off from the Universal moniker and the lot was now "Christie Comedies".  Christie's company expanded the lot and flourished for the next two decades.

 

Christie lot 1926

As we all know, however, progress happens....

Demolition of Christie Studios, 1937

And, every once in a while, progress is not such a horrible thing.....

CBS Columbia Square

Columbia Square opening April 30, 1938

Columbia Square Lobby

View from the stage of the 1000 seat studio A

The Glenn Miller Orchestra, Studio A

Lucille Ball and Richard Denning  "My Favorite Husband"

Agnes Moorehead's legendary performance of "Sorry Wrong Number"

Columbia Square is something of a ghost town now* since local CBS affiliate KCBS and KNX radio left a few years back.  The property is in the hands of new owners who, of course, plan new and dense and tall construction -- once this wacky economy clears up.  They have promised though to preserve Columbia Square.  Meanwhile some of the space is being rented out to production companies, mostly of the reality TV variety.  But it seems as though only 30-40% of the over 100,000 square feet are being used.

So today, on this most special day, I snuck in!  I boldly walked into the lobby, prepared to go into a riff about my historical walking tour and the significance of the building and the necessity of my walking through it.  I was also prepared to get summarily thrown out on my can.  But, don't you know there was no one sitting at the sweater-draped chair behind the receptionist desk!  I was home free.  I knew once I was inside that if I was spotted, I would be assumed to be an employee of one of the tenants.  So in I slipped.  It was a bit disappointing.  Much of the grandeur and streamline of the place was done over (seemingly in the '70s).  But I walked up to the roof top and went to the deck that surrounds the penthouse office (vacant) to snap these pictures just for you of Hollywood on it's 100th birthday:

The roof looking North East. 

The roof looking along the Penthouse wall to North West.  You can barely make out the Hollywood Sign on top of the hill.

Many of the photos above come from the fabulous facebook page CBS Columbia Square Alumni.

*Ghost town indeed.  Scores of former employees from the building insist that, not only does the spirit of CBS founder and president William Paley inhabit the building, but so does that of former KNX morning DJ/television star Bob Crane (Hogan's Heroes).

Everybody Freeze - It's A Raid!!!

In 1947-48 CBS honcho Bill Paley performed a major talent raid in Hollywood at the NBC studios 2 blocks away.  In addition to Benny, the other defectors included Amos and Andy (proudly cited in the above ad)  The Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy Show, Red Skelton and The Burns and Allen Show!  This little maneuver would, for the first time, land CBS at the top of the ratings battle.

How'd he do it?  Does the phrase, "You'd sell your own name!" ring a bell?  CBS would buy the stars' names as a property, in exchange for a huge lump sum and a smaller salary.  Since the tax structure on capital gains (the name sale) was a much lower rate than on income (the smaller salary portion of the deal) the talent benefited by double. And there was no concern about NBC doing a reverse raid because now CBS owned these peoples' names! 

**The above image was supplied by my new pal Raul Moreno who has a fantastic page for CBS Columbia Square Alumni.

Ford Has A Judy Idea.

The 1950s was truly the Golden Age of anthology television.  In 1955, the Ford Motor group entered the fray, teaming with CBS to produce the Ford Star Jubilee.  The timing of September 1955 was an ideal time to promote the new line of 1956 Fords.

The Tiffany Network and Family Of Fine Cars produced top drawer monthly entertainment.  Running 90 minutes in length, each program was presented in color and boasted a constellation of stars that included:  Bing Crosby, Orson Welles, Betty Grable, Julie Andrews, Noel Coward, Lauren Bacall, Claudette Colbert and Jack Lemmon.  Over the course of it's run, it was nominated for 8 Emmy Awards and won 3.

For it's inauguration, the show cooked up The Judy Garland Show.  This was a sure-win tie in with Capitol records, who, the day after the broadcast was releasing the album "Miss Show Business".

For her part, Garland had never appeared on television to this point and was, understandably a nervous wreck, even developing laryngitis the day before the show.  I'm pretty certain that her nervous condition was partially assuaged by the $100,000 (826k in today's money) she was receiving for the show.  The salary figure was a closely kept statistic as all the networks were afraid that other top performers would start demanding the same.  Another safeguard was that husband Sid Luft was producing a concert formatted show that was basically a condensed rehash of her record breaking Palace engagement.  And let's face it, our girl could always put over a number while darning socks! 

She probably didn't even the wire of encouragement from Bogie and Betty but, my, wasn't it nice.  The result:  she delivered.  Big time.  So did the viewing audience.  The program broke existing ratings records for a televised special. 

Photos found here

The album didn't do so bad either, staying in the Billboard top 40 for seven weeks and peaking at #5.

Now, to prove my theory that Everything Goes Back To Judy, for it's 12th and final, episode the Ford Star Jubilee abandoned it's live format to instead air the "The Wizard Of Oz".  This was a couple of firsts:  The first time that picture was ever broadcast on television.  And the first time CBS had ever broadcast any feature motion picture.

Of course what resonates the most for me is that by airing the movie, CBS set the table for what became (for kids of my generation) an annual household event.