From the New Zealand TV Weekly. January 30, I967
Barrie Perkin, NZBC TV Programme Purchasing Officer, talks to Hannah Templeton.
Barrie Parkin (32) has been the NZBC Television Programme Purchasing Officer for over four years. He is chairman of a committee of three which views programmes available to the NZBC, and he recommends which should be bought. The other members of the committee are Maurice Broome (30), and Mrs Elizabeth Connor. Before accepting his present position, Mr Parkin worked in London with the BBC, where he won a high reputation for his balanced and informed judgement in its buying and selling department. He is a New Zealander.
Television programming: the ability to assess a programme. Is it entertaining? Is it informative? Is it worthwhile? To consider whether it will appeal to audience tastes, where it could be placed and how it compares with similar, relative programmes-these are the questions uppermost in my mind when I look at a programme that has been offered to us for purchase to show on New Zealand television.
To look at a programme and say, yes, I think it has value, I think it will be popular, is the thing I find tremendously challenging. Unfortunately, you are never right 100 per cent of the time; that is impossible. In the final analysis it is a subjective decision, but the standards I use to judge a programme are objective. It is easy to recognise bad acting, or a bad script, or a bad plot. And, heaven knows, bad programmes are plentiful enough. We see about 130 programmes a month and as many as sixty per cent of these are rejected. Viewers may complain about some of our programmes but if they saw the worst that are offered to us they would realise that we do in fact care about high standards, that we do try to buy films of quality.
At the outset I would emphasise that the entire head office programming department must work as a team. There is strong liaison between the Programme Purchasing and Programme Planning sections. When a programme is being auditioned the Viewing Committee must bear in mind the time slot -in which it could be most satisfactorily placed and therefore there are important, vital discussions with the Programme Planning section headed by Mr J. B. A. MacFarliane. I wonder if I can explain some of the problems of programme purchasing and programme scheduling?
You see, it is not just a matter of really good top quality programmes (there are not enough of them anyway to fill out the schedules for each night of the week). Would people want to see Danger Man, or whatever their favourite programme might be, every night of the week? And in any case is it good for us to see our favourite programmes on every successive night of the week? Should we give a vociferous, reasonably large but important section of the audience what it wants to see, or what we consider it should see? These are just some of the considerations in our discussions.
One rule, however, is paramount: We should be the masters of the television medium-it should not be the master of us. Our aim is to win over the number of viewers who recognise, accept and welcome quality programmes, Already there are definite signs that New Zealand audiences discriminate.
The intelligent and worthwhile programmes are gaining ground at the expense of the efficiently made, glossy, magazine style, conveyor belt produced shows, so much the staple diet of many overseas channels bent on capturing a large and undemanding public.
To the best of my knowledge, some programmes which I consider worthwhile and major productions, for example Z Cars, The Plane Makers, The Avengers, Dr Finlay's Casebook, The Richard Boone Show and some Enigma shows, have received low ratings in Australia, yet here they have been widely acclaimed and very popular. But there has to be variety, comedies, documentaries, thrillers, dramas, cartoons, Westerns, adventure films. The demand for new and different programmes is insatiable.
Another point is that unless the appeal of a programme is based on a topical or particular cult or fashion, for instance, Hullabaloo or the recently made Monkees (which are based on the latest teenage crazes) there is no point in purchasing quickly. We have learnt from experience the folly of buying a programme quickly, only to find, a few weeks later, that a superior production is available.
The fitting together of our programme schedules is a formidable task. Both the Purchasing and Planning sections study the format on a daily, weekly, monthly and even yearly basis. Overseas features form roughly 80 per cent of our telecasting time throughout the year and they have to be carefully integrated with our own productions.
There are complications that many features are not suitable for showing early in the evening when they might be seen by children. Some New Zealanders might be critical of American family shows like Green Acres, The Donna Reed Show, or The Andy Grlfiith Show, but I do not know what we would do without them for the early evening hours.
If we started showing The Avengers or Z Cars round 6.30 p.m. those critics who say we have too much violence would be up in arms.
We keep buying additional episodes of some established programmes simply because better shows in their categories are not being made. For example Perry Mason is one series which over the years retains its essential appeal.
Another case in point is the Beverly Hillbillies-enough people can take it as a steady diet, and a few more who find it an occasional pleasure. What makes the show durable-and endurable-is a lack of pretension. Simplicity is the keynote. Its characters are deftly drawn-Granny is the "enfant-terrible," Jed is good, loyal and true, and Elly May fills her blue jeans to perfection. It's a smooth blend of appealing personalities and slick production.
The Power Game recently purchased, is a continuation of the theme of The Plane Makers, with Patrick Wymark. This is a model of neat, tight writing. Its success is due to the naked quality of the conflicts between Wilder and almost everyone else in the cast.
Coronation Street, has a wonderful sense of realism, its characters may be seen anywhere, and very often it has something quite significant to say about society. Above all, it is true to its own convention.
My own personal view is that television's powerful potential to entertain and inform people would be destroyed if all programmes are aimed at the lowest common denominator. Programmes like Your Life in Their Hands, Festival of Performing Arts and Spread of the Eagle have a significant place in our schedules.
Quality, variety, balance-these are the important considerations in programme purchasing. If several good crime series are already running or are in stock, there is not much point in spending more money to buy others. Then, again, you might find that some of the programmes needed for a balance are not quite up to standard. What happens then? Put in another heavyweight drama series and give the public dramatic indigestion? Or buy a musical because the scheduling is light on those, even if the quality is fairly ordinary?
Sometimes we find that programmes we would like are not available. There may be a copyright problem. Other programmes that have high ratings in the countries of origin are sometimes too parochial, or their topicality is so up to the minute that it is lost by the time they get to us. Among the top rated programmes in the States that have not been available to us were those starring Perry Como. They had a very short "playing-off" period, too short to be shown here.
Next week Barrie Parkin reveals how the NZBC-TV Viewing Committee reaches its decisions for programme purchase recommendation, and discusses the problems of maintaining a satisfactory programme balance.
Maintaining the Right Programme Balance
From the New Zealand TV Weekly. February 6, 1967
Part 2 of an interview with Barrie Purkin, us he spoke to Hannah Templeton.
In the first part of this article Barrie Parkin introduced the three members of the NZBC Viewing Committee who audition overseas programmes and recommend which ones the Corporation should buy. The actual procedure adopted by the Committee is now explained in detail.
What is our procedure? Well, some of the programmes are offered direct to the NZBC by the producers or their agents. In other cases we read about coming programmes overseas and ask to see sample episodes.
When the film arrives the Viewing Committee - myself, Maurice Broome, Elizabeth Connor look at it and each of us prepares a separate and independent report on it. Our recommendations go to the Controller of Television Programmes, Mr T. F. A. Shankland, the Director of Television, Mr N. R. Palmer, and eventually to the Director-General, Mr G. H. Stringer.
We try to recommend the most entertaining and informative programmes that are available. The qualification is really what is available. We know for example, that Westerns are popular but sometimes those that are offered do not always measure up to our standards. But in order to satisfy the other criteria of variety and balance in our programme schedules, it could be necessary to recommend the best of a bad lot. We get a feeling about a programme; it is an intuitive thing based on an accumulation of knowledge and experience.
Occasionally we see a pilot print which comes up to our standard, but in the end the full series may prove to be disappointing. So when We have doubts, we ask to see more episodes before making a recommendation. We hesitated a long time over The Man from U.N.C.L.E. partly because we had bought others of this particular type, and partly because the first episodes we saw were not quite up to standard I think most viewers in New Zealand will agree that U.N.C.L.E. does not come up to the standard of Danger Man or The Avengers. The comparison shows up the importance of the script. Without a top class script, an otherwise first- class series can fall apart. The scripts of Danger Man, The Avengers and Z Cars are consistently good. Sometimes outstanding acting can carry a show, but, more often than not, if the script is poor not even the best acting in the world can save it.
Some people criticise us for running too many documentaries and too many plays. But I think you will find that these are the programmes that we will talk about and remember longest, It may be that a series like Mr Novak, The Fugitive, Dr Kildare, The Munsters, Bonanza and Laramie attract the widest viewing public, but it is not easy to recall particular episodes.
Here you can see the clash between television as a medium simply to entertain and as a medium to inform. Some people use it just for entertainment. Others want it to tell them more about their own country and the world they live in.
No-one would dispute that television is at its best when it is reporting on immediate events happening here and overseas-things like Winston Churchi1l's funeral, or President Johnston's visit, or a sporting event. We are being criticised for showing too little-or too much-of the Vietnam War. We try to keep a balance, to be impartial. But again, the choice depends upon what is available. Sometimes, a topical documentary might be offered to us that we think may not be particularly satisfactory to a New Zealand audience. Should we buy it? There may be nothing else on the subject.
There are sbme subjects like mental illness, or the Pill which must be presented seriously and in the best possible taste and which require extra care and attention in previewing. Often experts from both inside and outside the Corporation are called in for their opinions. In the case of the Pill, no documentary has yet been shown here on the subject, quite frankly because a worthwhile one has yet to be produced. Two have already been auditioned but their effect was to confuse rather than enlighten.
The checking of documentary material is possibly the most exacting part of previewing. We look for correctness and authenticity, the up-to-dateness of facts given and evaluate any bias in selection and presentation of facts. A periodic check on up-to-dateness of documentary film material on circuit around the channels is also essential. It is interesting to look at what happens overseas. Those viewers who say we have too many programmes from the United States should remember that most of these same programmes are also on the screens in Australia and Britain and many other countries. And others who say we do not show enough American programmes should remember that over the past year nearly all the top rated American shows that were available to us were seen here. And in addition we had the most highly regarded features from Britain.
A most interesting article on the acceptance of the initial pilot episodes of American programmes recently appeared in a leading American magazine. If a programme does not make the Nielsen ratings it is soon killed. Nearly every top television producer has stillborn shows which he considers to be better than his successes. There is the story of Norman Felton who made Dr Kildare and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. Apparently he made another programme called Grand Slam about a sports writer. Recently just before he moved from M.G.M. to become one of NBC's top producers, he had a last look at Grand Slam in the projection room. Someone said to him, Forget it, Norman, you know a pilot does not have to be good. It only has to sell.
The story illustrates, I think, the point that the programmes we buy from the States are those that survive the peculiar hazards of the American television industry, the ratings and the ability to "sell", first to a sponsor and then to the public. The American television makers this last year gambled a record $30,000,000 on television pilot productions-over 100 new series for the season that began in October, of which only a score reached the screen. Already Milton Berle's comeback series, a crime series entitled Hawk and The Jean Arthur Show have been killed. It is interesting to note that both The Jean Arthur Show and Hawk had already been turned down by our Viewing Committee.
We here might be interested in programmes that do not survive but in fact we have only the choice of those which the sponsors consider appeal to the mass market.
It has been noticeable that the Westerns have become much less rugged. In the real "West" women were few and far between, but every television Western now has its "feminine" interest, so that the show will have "family" appeal-really to keep its place in the ratings.
Our search for quality programmes extends beyond Britain and the United States-We have corresponded with over 30 overseas film distributor companies and we read and study everything about television we can lay our hands on.
If there is one thing I have learnt in this job it is that you may please some of the people some of the time, but you cannot please all the people all of the time. The fact that television is viewed by people in all walks of life and environments emphasises that individual reactions must differ greatly. To meet all tastes all the time on one channel is, of course, an impossible task.
It is amazing how far a few people will go to show their dissatisfaction. One viewer indicated his displeasure by sending us a lavatory brush. A crank perhaps? Anyway, the tea lady took it home so everything finds its use. We do, however, try to take note of all the sensible criticisms and we appreciate the letters in which viewers express their preferences. As Dean Martin says keep all those letters comin' in.
Our Viewing Committee has worked particularly well, because each of us has brought a different viewpoint to the job. We often have varying opinions. Sometimes we reach the same decision, but for very different reasons.
It has been rewarding working with Maurice Broome and Elizabeth Connor, the long hours of viewing and discussion pose a mental strain but throughout we have had a feeling of harmony.
It is possible for an individual to make an error of judgement, but I think our Committee has narrowed the room for errors down to a fine limit. It would not be too much to say that the standard of programmes is reasonably good-some people whose judgement we value have even said they are excellent. I would like to see an even wider range of programmes to choose from-but we are in the hands of overseas suppliers.
Comments powered by CComment