From the New Zealand TV Weekly. January 2, 1967
Auckland
Like Cyril Fletcher, most TV personnel_ have a seasonal yen to be strictly anonymous
—and that's a tricky thing when one's face is a fixture in most households. Keith Bracey says, I'm going to take my car and get lost for about five weeks—-just go where the whim takes me.
Maybe a shave would do the trick, but an unbearded Bracey would be as odd as a bearded Barbara Magner... Bryan Easte is still irritated at realising too late that one Revue '66 included no fewer than four Command Performers. Bryan's holiday plan is simple- I'm staying home for a change. I've just about forgotten what the sun looks like.
What about New Year resolutions? I never make any because I always break them, Well, I could think of one—but you'd never print it!
... On the subject of the surprise decision to drop Revue '66
, Bryan says that there's plenty of talent available, but Revue's format is obviously not the answer. It is presumed the audition backlog will not be wasted and something new devised, but it is to be hoped that the decision-makers won't procrastinate until the year is half-way gone... Les Andrews is hopeful that lots of people decided to give records for Christmas. Click Goes the Cash Register.... Familiar Canadian voice of Mike Bellinger is currently calling the shots in Gisborne's summer carnival frolics. ... . Rumours that one of the old panel games may be revived.... Barry Crump seems to survive the barrage of anti-Crumpery like a good keen man, with a flurry of support in letters to local papers. But if he is to be kept as a specimen of New Zealand rough diamond, some less fatuous gimmicks are going to have to be worked out for him.
Wellington
As WNTV1's Town and Around show ground its way through December, it was obvious that the minds of everyone were on something else - producer Kevan Moore was thinking of his new shows, and the others of their holidays. Some of the editions could have qualified for the worst of the year series.
Unlike Kevan to go out not with a bang but with a whimper; so perhaps the final edition or two for the year could be spectacular.... but at the time of writing who can say? . . . . . Much speculation about whom will succeed Kevan Moore. Now that John Terris has announced his intention of leaving to study for the Anglican ministry, it looks as if Chris Bourn is shot's eye. Apparently NZBC's brass has turned thumbs down on another series of The Family Game next year, so Chris would be available. (Incidentally, with no Family Game, where does that leave Selwyn Toogood on the television scene?) ... Should Chris take over from Kevan, would he retain Peter Read as compere? Some say viewers would be upset if Peter were not retained. But he himself might like a change. He has been one of the outstanding figures of Wellington television through the year. . . . . One had the impression that pirate and private radio was taking up so much time of the NZBC bosses that television was not getting their high-powered attention as 1966 drew to a close. Who knows what 1967 will bring? Perhaps a second channel and a third?
CHRISTCHURCH
Christchurch actor, Jonathan Elsom, now working in England, has taken part in an episode of The Avengers with Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg. Everyone is great fun to work with in this zany comedy thriller,
he wrote in a letter to his parents. Episode was The See-Through Man,
the fifth in a new series being filmed for colour and black and white TV. It will probably be seen here later this year. Elsom has also appeared in two other TV films. He was guest actor in the last episode of The Troubleshooters, a popular BBC series about a large oil company, and he took a part in Intrigue, ia 50-minute play about industrial espionage for ABC-TV. . . . . If comments and letters to one local newspaper are any indication, Christchurch teenagers and others really dig C'mon! . . . . . Virginia Miles, Arch King and Norm Allen helped the Christchurch Lions Club raise about £200 for Birthright when they took part in an elephant race in Hagley Park on a recent Sunday. Virginia showed much better form than her mount and Arch emerged a comfortable winner.
DUNEDIN
Some vociferous protests firom Southern viewers about the goings-on on The Second Sex — Men as Lovers!
As one father of teenagers put it If it had been a movie, it would have (or should have) been restricted to Iaudievnces over eighteen.
His sensibilities weren't so shocked by the women themselves as by the possible harm their so-called mature attitudes could have on immature and searching young minds. . . . . Broadcasting's Christmas Party seems to have been a success inasmuch as no one will comment on it on the grounds that anything said might tend to incriminate. . . . . Automation is all very well, but not long ago a button was accidentally knocked on DNTV2's new automatic camera, and Peter Dallas appeared to read the news on an unexpected long shot, looking for all the world like someone seen through the wrong end of a telescope. . . . . No one as yet knows who will take over production of the local Town and Around when Chris Thomson departs the scene, but it seems fairly certain that presentation of the show will be increased from three to five nights a week. . . . . Special season's greetings from ex-DNTV2 announcer Colin Lehmann, now, making his mark at station GMV6, Shepparton. Colin includes all his friends in Dunedin, with special thoughts for Noel Robson and Neil Collins, and also John Blumsky, whom he hopes will read this up in Wanganui. Adds Colin, I still love New Zealand as a country, and we'll eventually settle black there.
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