14
Close-Up of Radio's Director of Variety
"L
ISTEN," they said, “you're always writing about this well, fellow John Watt --
who is he?"
Millions of listeners know the name: they've heard his voice on the air, they've read his name in the programmes. They probably know by now that he is the B.B.C.'s Director of Variety.
"Yet few people, I imagine, realise that it is John Watt who la responsible for the entertainment of more than twenty mil- Hon listeners,
1 said twenty milou listeners. There may be more even than that John Watt, appruled over the al for one thousand listeners to ker41 # record of their Estening-in until the end of 1937.
Forty-nine thousand replied. Statisticians regard this re- sponse as indicating that the appeal reached twenty million people.
OHN WATT, 36 years old, gets about £1,500 a
year
for his, Job-
12 hours a day, seven days a Week.
He has a large stat under him. It has grown so big that they no longer have 'meetings In lits own office. They use the council chamber over at Broad- casting House.
Broadcasting House, you see, is more often than not a con- venient term for newspapermen to use.
Actually, the Variety Depart- ment lives in St. George's Hall, In rooms above, around and 1 under the old Maskelyne and
Devant Theatre.
This department has a large staff because it puts 64 pro- grammes over the air overy week between 6 and 10.30 p.m.
"Varioty" means not only musical comedies, music-hali and revues, but organ music, dance music, gramophone re- citals.
There are more than a dozen producers, each more or less a specialist in one type of show. There are script writers and conductors.
E
VERY week about 98 scripts are submitted
to the Variety Depart- ment. Less than one per cent. of these ever finds its way into - a programme.
And oven such scripts as are ac- ceptable have to be re-written.
There are only a few outside writera whose work is ever broad- cast as they write it--among them James Dyrenforth, Henrik Ege, and Hons Priwin. They have learned by associating with pre- ducera.
Programmes are scheduled nine weeks ahead, Monday 15 the be-
THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, SATURDAY, JULY 16,
1988.
The Director of Varioty looks at some of the thousands of replies to his questionnaire on listeners' lastos.
Who's
WATT
?
by Spike Hughes
ginning of Week 9." On Tues- day there will be the weekly meeting of the Variety Depart- ment. It will discuss "Week 18."
O
tho
N Wednesday three bosses of the De- partment will meet the B.B.C. Programme Executives, John Watt, Harry Pepper and Charles Brewer will compare their "Weck 18" with the Progranume Execu- They have to Lives' Week 17." make sure that the Variety De- partment's programmes afford sufficient contrast to the general programmes, and that they are effectively distributed over dally time-tables.
AL
ten
the
o'clock on Thursday morning there is the dance-hand meeting, when bands will be fixed for
Week 18."
These are the high spots of John Wall's week.
His job, though, is not just one He expects him- of supervision.
self to have as many ideas as hals stat, to provide listeners with as much as possible for their money.
People have little iden of what broadcast costa.
For an hour's musical show, which is repeated. the author's copyright fees are usually between £75 and £100, Artists and chorus share on an average $300 between them,
Overhead expenses cannot be calculated 50 castly, but they Producers' salaries mount up. range from
0 to £10 a week,
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orchestral wages account for more than £300 a week. Then there are technicians. an- nouncers, cffects boys and their salaries.
The B.B.C. publiabes a balance- sheet, just as the Government an- nounces that so many millions have been spent on battleships. But whereas the public is told how much a battleship costs every time a new one is launched, the radia public is never told how its money is used for broadcasting.
It would be pretty safe to say. however, that in John Watt's de- partment alone something very near £3,000 goes into thin air every week,
T
all
HE man behind this 15 small, pale- faced, with a little moustache, n broad grin and a way of being appallingly rude to your face that is most endearing once you know him and/or con take it. (Or maybe that is only my own ex- perience?)
He sits at a desk measuring 9 fect by 4. He needs the space, for the B.B.C. is the memorandum- writer's den of heaven.
In one corner of his room there is a loudspeaker. Without leaving his seat he can listen to any brond- cast. any
any rehearsal from studio, by pressing a button under his desk.
Once a reporter in Fleet-street and on the staff of a news agency In Paris. John Watt is a good
mixer. He learns all he wants to know about public reaction to his programmes by talking to taxi-drivers and people in country pubs.
He is married, has two young children Christopher John. age 8. and Nigel John, age 2 a house in St. John's Wood,
a cottage in Essex, and says it was only three weeks ago that he learned to tie his tie properly.
He likes gardening, detests five particular letters he gets every week. These are from cranks who insist that everything broadcast is full of indecent double-meanings, and proceed to "prove" it by the most fantastic twisting of phrases and words.
John Watt's reaction to listeners' letters is interesting.
F
ORTY letters after a broadcast nowadays,
he considers, are worth
the 400 that used to arrive at Savoy Hill, in the days when radio was a novelty,
He likes to hear grouses, too.
wan Recently,
programme broadcast in which 1934 was re- ferred to instead of 1924.
Three hundred and fifty letters came in next day pointing out the mistake.
Good, says John Watt, they were pro- Interested enough in the gramme to notice.
+4
Does he like his job? Yes; he likes bumming around," talking Lo show people. That's one of the most important parts of his duties, But he misses a little not being able to write and produce as much Rs he used to.
The work he's putting in on the Tudio version of "Snow White and the Seven Dwaris" has been a great relief, he says, though it has meant working almost as a hobby. late at night,
Y
ES, John Watt likes his job-memoranda, administration,
Krouses and all.
But most of all he likes trying to please twenty million lateners.
Thousands wouldn't.
Music hath charms
Sunday Classical Concert
at Repulse Bay Hotel
Under leadership of
Goo. Pio-Ulski
Programme for Sunday, 17th July, 1938.
1 p.m. 2.30 p.m.
PROGRAMME
1,
Vienna Blood. Waltz
2. Serenata Brago
1.
Capriccio Itallen
Strauss. .Smith.
.Tschalkowsky.
4. Robert le Diable. Selection..Meyerbeer.
G. Belleve me If all those endearing young
charms.
6. Quand l'amour meurt .........Cremier.
Perdutamente
7.
}
For Reservations
phone 27775,
.Siciliani.
By Paul F
HOW IT BEGAN Berdanter
GOLD CHAIN EMBLEM OFİ AUTHORITY
THE CUSTOM OF PLACING" A GOLD CHAIN AROUND.I THE NECKS OF PERSONS INVESTED WITH AUTHORITY
IS OF GREAT ANTIQUITY. IT IS FIRST RECORDED IN GENESIS XLI, 42: "PHARAOH PUT A GOLD CHAIN ABOUT HIS (JOSEPH'S) NECK WHEN HE SET HIM OVER ALL THE LAND OF EGYPT"
ANTWERP
BERNIER
THE ANCIENT ARMS OF THIS BELGIAN CITY DEPICTS THE THROWING OF TWO HANDS INTO THE SCHELDT BY THE HERO BRABO. LEGEND SAYS. THE MOTTO HAND-WERPEN" (HAND-THROWING) SLURRED TO "ANTWERP" PROVIDED THE CITY'S NAME. MORE PROBABLE ORIGIN IS "AN T' WERF "(CITY ON THE WHARF)
By William
THIS CURIOUS WORLD Ferguson
CYPRESS TREÈS SEND UP ” KNEES” FROM THEIR ROOTS, AND THESE GROWTHS, PROTRUDING THROUGH THE SWAMP. WATERS, ARE THOUGHT
TO ASSIST THE
TREES IN BREATHING/
THE WALLS OF
GOPEESERY NEA BERVICE, ING
EACH BEE CELL HELP TO RORM THE WALLS
OF
NINE OTHER CELLS.
the
U.S.-CANADIAN
BORDER.
IS MADE UP OF 2,198 MILES OF WATER AND ONLY 4,788 MILES OF LAND/
2-17
THE comb cell of a honey bee is an engineering masterpiece: Each hexagonal chamber shares its parts. Its six enclosing sides and threefold base... with nine other cells, with which it is in contact.
ALLEY OOP
THE PROBLEM ||WE COULD DAM UP THIS) THOSE BAMBOO OF A WATER LITTLE STREAM, BUT SUPPLY FOR THEN THE WATERD, THEIR LITTLE ||COME DOWN ALL PET HAS PUT OVER TH' PLACE ALLEY OOP
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