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Channing Grigsby behind podium Tom Sherman cameraman |
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Photos & story courtesy Channing Grigsby. Click on photos to enlarge.
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Channing Grigsby behind podium Tom Sherman cameraman |
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CFN Sundays |
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by Channing Grigsby |
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The station staff got very ambitious and wanted to produce local programming and so came up with the idea of a half-hour anthology show for Sunday evenings. Some wrote script, some directed, some performed, often rotating as these photos indicate. The show being done here was a set of readings from the Bible, done strictly as readings. I don't clearly remember who did what, but I do remember that I was reading from Genesis about the creation of the universe, and in order to get an upward angle on me, we had to hang a blanket high in the background and I stood on a ladder since cameras were primitive by modern standards and had to remain on their tripods at a fixed height -- can't change camera, change location of performer. The wall against which most of these pictures were shot was the end wall of the studio farthest from the TV control room and just against the window of the second radio control room which was directly behind the back curtain. Behind that control room was the radio broadcast control room. Notice the size of the cameras. We really were improvising and making it up as we went along. Ron Harper adapted a Sarayon play (Skin of Our Teeth, I think) and I, if you can believe this, I wrote a script adapting The Red Badge of Courage for a 30 minute dramatic presentation -- can you believe it? Ah, the arrogance of the young. At one point a civilian who was important in stateside TV -- like a producer of major dramatic show of those days like Kraft Television Theater or something visited the station for a week to observe and critique. Unfortunately, I do not remember his name. He was generous with his time and his comments. I remember him saying the point of view of the camera that was on me during the Genesis Bible reading should have been reversed -- I should have been on the floor looking up and the camera pointing down on me. |
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| The Studio |
| The program was called "The Studio." CFN tried to do a full series, thirteen shows, but it is uncertain if they completed the full series. Everyone involved had full-time jobs and The Studio was being done in addition to the full-time jobs. It required the cast and crew to do a full setup for each show. They did everything -- scripting, lighting, rehearsal, direction, sound, costumes, sets, etc. Thirty minutes doesn't sound like much time, until you have to do as much for thirty minutes as for sixty. Channing clearly remembers four shows -- The Bible reading, the Saroyan play, the Red Badge, and another sci-fi -- He remembers that they had a hard time trying to get an image of stars and the universe to show up in black and white TV. The Studio was intense and exhausting and a wonderful experience, but hard to do on a weekly basis, especially without the benefit of tape. In that sense, it was like a rep theater company putting on a new play every week. |
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carbon copy 1st page of shooting script for The Red Badge of Courage |
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Text reads: Good evening. Welcome once again to the Studio. Tonight we open one of the greatest books of the Civil War, "The Red Badge of Courage", by Stephen Crane. The amazing thing about this book is that Stephen Cranbe never saw a battle until some years after he wrote it. It was immediately hailed as a masterpiece and has remained so to this day. Henry Fleming was a farm boy in New York who burned to enlist in the Union Army. Finally, he did enlist, against his mother's wishes, and after their training, his regiment went to the field and seemed to sit, and sit, and sit, waiting and waiting...
HENRY (voice over -- on tape): What happens if we go into battle? The way the veterans talk, there's no stoppin' those Johnnies. But they always talk like that. What would I do in a battle?... (looks up as two men enter).
JIM (to Wilson) That's all right. You can believe me or not, jes as you like. All you got to do is sit and wait as quietly as you |
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