More early colour TV show questions

[jmdocs]

Re: The Berle shows. The TV listings for New York, Washington, DC and Chicago note the show as being in color. The LA Times listings don't. What likely happened was it was colorcast live to the Eastern and Central timezones and kinescoped in black-and-white for the west coast. This happened all the time--and was the reason NBC started using the "lenticular color" kinescopes. They were used pretty frequently for a couple of years until color tape came in. (Every so often the LA Times TV critic complained about their poor quality.) I have no idea if that or any other of the lenticular kines survives. I do know that Film Technology in LA figured out how to transfer early Kodacolor lenticular film, which is basically the predecessor of these kinescopes, to video in full color. Theoretically, if anyone came across one of these lenticular kines and had the time and money, it ought to be a relatively similar process. I think.

[Joel Cairo]

There **are** lenticular prints for at least **some** of NBC's shows of that period. Jerry Lewis has some from his NBC series in his archive, and since almost all of Berle's kines were finally located by NBC, it's pretty certain there must be some there, as well. Judging from the existing kines I've seen, at least one of the Berle/Presley shows originated in color, but from the known timeline, it would appear that all of Presley's NBC appearances (on the Berle & Steve Allen programs) pre-dated the use of the lenticular color kinescope process, so that makes it more unlikely that color footage of those shows exist.

The other issue is that no one has ever transferred an entire program from lenticular film. I was told that a set of color bars from the head of a reel was done by a transfer house, just to show that it was possible; but the price given to transfer a full program using the custom hardware setup was so expensive that it was considered prohibitive.

Having said that, though, the Peacock Network did (on occasion) make standard color kinescopes of some of their programs... there are extant examples of an episode of "Coke Time with Eddie Fisher" and a clip of Sam Cooke on "The Arthur Murray Party" (10/6/58).

To answer the "1st rock & roller on color TV" question, my first guess would probably be Elvis on the "Milton Berle Show" in 1956, but it should be noted that Bill Haley & the Comets performed on "The Milton Berle's Show" in October of 1955, so if someone can check their TV Guide listings, **that** may actually be the correct answer.

-Kevin