The People On Your Screen (4)
Press, Volume Cix, Issue 32228, 21 February 1970, Page 3
RUSS DALLEY joined the N.Z.B.C. in Dunedin in 1965, as a television cameraman, With radio announcing in mind. In 1966 he spent a year as a radio announcer in Timaru and later was transferred to Christchurch.
He began in commercial radio, with a special interest in pop music; and soon he will be leaving for Australia then Canada as a disc jockey.
He will be remembered principally for the “Sally Dalley" TV show, devised by an N.Z.B.C. producer, Bill Taylor. It was designed for children 10 to 12 years of age and had a variety of themes, such as a sport of the week, or a leader in some particular field. There were demonstrations of sport, for instance, in the studio and pamphlets were sent children who sought guidance on sporting matters, with the main points of the sport being covered in text and diagrams.
Sally was Sally Walker, who was on contract to do children's programmes. Double speed shooting so that people materialised on the screen was one of the most popular effects in the show. It was intended to run for 20 weeks, but lasted for 30.
Two years after the show ended, Russ Dailey is still being called “Sally Dailey” in the street. He says he likes the work and the service, but feels he has done what he wanted to do in New Zealand, and is thus moving to Australia.
He recalls, particularly, a song written by George Crowe ot the programme department—"Ode To Hawk Eye,” with the lyric by Dick Allard. It was used on the air before Canterbury’s Ranfurly Shield challenge against Hawke’s Bay. A 45 record was made of it and it sold quite well, and was, for about four weeks, in 3ZB’s Top Forty. The music was provided by “Dailey’s Expeditionary Pilgrims’ Band.”
He is married, and has one son—Justin, now 7 months old. “if 1 have any say, he will never sit down behind a mike,”says Dailey. Asked about his favourite television programme, he said he liked something not too deep, but something in which he could become absorbed, while sitting back and relaxing. “Ironside” was perhaps the best.
His most embarrassing moment? His first day on radio, at Timaru, when, for the first time, he was “let loose on the air waves of New Zealand.” He. managed to get a thumb stuck between the speed changer and the turntable in changing his first record, and had to wrestle his way free. It took only a few seconds, he said, but felt like hours.
His most enjoyable times were those in making the “Sally Dailey" show, when he and Sally Walker had to attempt the sport of the week. “We had to ham it up as comedy,” Dailey said. “I had to fall into the Avon from a row-boat, slide down a ski slope on all fours, fall out of a yacht in Charteris Bay, have my arms nearly pulled out of their sockets when being dragged, without water skis, behind a speedboat and indulge in many other similarly unrewarding activities. Before the series ended I was a mass of bruises and had scars everywhere.”
