Evening star., 1954-05-04
On n'the
On the Air
What's S New in Color Video?
A Gray and Black Picture
By Harry Macarthur

The National Broadcasting Co.
will move its color television
cameras into the Metropolitan
Museum of Art next Saturday
afternoon and come face to face
with an ironical state of affairs.
The star of this first telecast
from the Metropolitan is almost
certain to be a famed expatriate
painting temporarily repatriated
from the Louvre.
It is picture which has had a
fairly dramatic history. It has
even survived reproduction on
postage stamp with a bouquet
added to make florists happy.
It also, according to reports, was
in and out of several pawn shops
before the French government
bought it for approximately $500.
If the French government
wanted to sell it today-and If
it could find a buyer-it might
show a profit of $2,999, 200. And
if you want a copy of it any art
student could turn out-a credit
able one for less, without refer
ring again to the original.
The picture was painted in
1871 and looks the way it looks
today because the artist relented
after three days of work and
allowed his model to sit down.
Changed the whole composition,
of course. It was first shown in
America 10 years later at the
Philadelphia Academy of Fine
Arts.
At that time the price tag on
it was $500 or $1,000 (reports
vary) and there were no takers
at any price. It was another 10
years later before the French
recognized a bargain when they
saw one and bought the picture.
1t was purchased originally for
the Luxembourg Palace and
moved to the Louvre in 1925. 1t
is at the Metropolitan as part OF
a loan exhibit, Sargent, Whistler
and Mary Cassatt."
The painting is, of course,
James McNeill Whistler's ia
nous and familiar portrait OF
his mother. It is the picture the
artist titled arrangement in
Gray and Black" which, NBC
will have to admit. is a comically
ironic title for the central at
traction of a color television
show.
VORACIOUS Another tele-
vision program which has the
welcome mat out for writer's OF
original TV dramas is Kraft's
"Television Theater." The long
est-running program on tele-
vision has a birthday coming
up Thursday and, as usual. some
statistics have been passed along.
If any one of these indicates
a trend it is the count Of original
television plays produced on the
show. More of these were done
in the past year than were done
in all of the programs preceding
years. AS of May Z. 1853, "Tele-
vision Theater" had done 40
originals. A year later the total
is 81.
This puts TV writers second
only to Broadway playwrights as
sources of "Television Theater"
material. Adaptations of 1919
Broadway plays have been done
since the show started on May s.
l947. Other sources have been
plays from the London stage
600, plays written originally for
the stage but not produced (3O
and classics (22).
"Television Playhouse" has an
appetite for plays twice that OF
any other TV drama. It was
doubled last October is when the
Thursday evening hour on ABC
tWMAL-TV) was added to the
Wednesday evening hour on
NBC (WNBW). The show runs
through the summer, too. which
means it requires 104 scripts q
year.
The anniversary will be cele-
brated Thursday. incidentally,
by another of those "Comes-As-
You-Were-on-Kraft" costume
parties at New York's Waldorf
Astoria Hotel. There will be COZ
oIiactS af hoy,or plovore uho