The Busy Air

Amos 'n' Andy sold their program to CBS for $2,000,000. Then CBS sold radio's most durable comedians to Lever Bros. For serving as "technical advisers" on their own show, Amos 'n' Andy will get an additional annual fee from CBS. The plan behind this dizzying high finance: Amos 'n' Andy can now look the Collector of Internal Revenue squarely in the eye and declare that the $2,000,000 is subject to a capital gains tax (25%) instead of income tax (up to 80%).

Ella Mason, chatty hostess of a daytime food quiz show on Manhattan's WHN (which this week changes its name to WMGM--in honor of affiliated Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer), has solved the problem of how to prevent audiences from prompting quiz contestants. Her contestants will wear earmuffs of sequins, poppies and plumes.

Curtis Publishing Co. (Satevepost, Ladies' Home Journal) will take over the sponsorship (on Mutual) of the presidential election results. Nash-Kelvinator will pay for the same show over CBS. If no angels appear at NBC and ABC, these networks will perform "a public service."

Edgar Kobalc, president of Mutual Broadcasting system, made a fateful decision: Three for the Money, an MBS giveaway show (grand prize: up to $7,000 cash and a trip--for two--anywhere in the world), will be dropped from the network this week. Folksy Ed Kobak claimed that he had had misgivings when the show first went on the air 13 weeks ago. "We never did like the idea of a giveaway show," he explained, "but we're like sheep." He added: "Down in our hearts our conscience bothered us." He was further influenced by the new code of the National Association of Broadcasters which contains the mild stricture that "any broadcast designed to 'buy' the radio audience . . . should be avoided."

Kobak's decision was greeted with moderate applause in the trade. There was also some likelihood that his troubled heart and conscience may have been reinforced by the fact that Three for the Money--unlike giveaway shows on rival networks (e.g., Stop the Music, Truth or Consequences)--never attracted a sponsor.

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