Advice to Advertisers

Advice to Advertisers "It is very common in our society to dislike advertising." With this blunt observation, Chicago's Social Research, Inc. last week sent its admen subscribers a comprehensive survey of TV commercials which seemed to say that television was making no progress at all in changing the public attitude.

Social Research found that televiewers have come to regard commercials with "the stoical air appropriate to a necessary evil." Reactions differ considerably by class. The Upper Middles (12%), if they watch commercials at all, watch just to be critical. Middle Majority viewers (65%) are more sporting, will stay with commercials until they get bored. Lower Middle Class (23%) televiewers are apt to be most considerate. Because the advertiser pays for the program, they feel duty-bound to lend their eyes & ears to his sales message.

But all groups, says Social Research, have common denominators of both tolerance and revulsion. Viewers generally approve of commercials that are integrated into programs (Martin Kane, Private Eye; Fred Waring; The Goldbergs) because integration makes them "seem short." They are partial to salesmen who inspire confidence or amuse them (Arthur Godfrey, Sid Stone of Texaco Star Theater, Stop the Music's Dennis James). They will accept, more or less grudgingly, commercials that show them how something is done (Kraft TV Theater, Garroway-at-Large).

What viewers don't like about commercials makes a longer list. They are against

1) overcrowding, particularly at station breaks, when there are sometimes four consecutive commercials--one from the concluding show, two spot announcements, and the first plug of the next show, 2) jarring interruptions, when a song or action sequence is crudely broken into by a commercial, 3) noisy commercials, especially those that are sharply different in mood from the program, 4) overworked techniques, which have made viewers indifferent to stars whirling into focus to spell out a brand name; beer being poured into glasses; animated figures jumping on to and off of product labels; celebrities plugging hair tints and watches.

Social Research sees no chance of a millennium when viewers will grow to love commercials. Its only advice to advertisers: search earnestly for ways to "minimize the irritation."

The New Shows

It's Up to You (Sat. 5:30 p.m., CBS-TV), an effective collaboration between the network and the Red Cross, mixes film clips of typical disasters with demonstrations by Red Cross volunteers of what to do in an atomic emergency ("In case of shock, don't move the victim; keep him warm; raise his legs to increase the flow of blood"). Actress Joan Bennett was an able guest commentator who took the trouble to learn her lines for delivery without benefit of script. Future guests: Arlene Francis, Martha Scott, Basil Rathbone.

You Can't Take It With You (Sun. 6 p.m., NBC) is a radio serial based on the PulitzerPrizewinning (1936) comedy by George Kaufman and Moss Hart. The opening show clung tenaciously to the original playscript in putting the zany Sycamore family through its paces: Penny, writing plays in the parlor; Paul, detonating explosives in the basement; Grandpa, exhibiting snakes in the living room. Cinemactor Walter Brennan plays the philosophizing Grandpa Vanderhof, and is described with deadly accuracy as "a wonderful, scheming, lovable old pixie."

Time for Ernie (weekdays, 3:15 p.m., NBCTV) undertakes the strenuous job of parodying the antics of daytime TV. Wearing a pitch helmet and waving a cigar, Funnyman Ernie Kovacs does a take-off on a weather reporter, plugs a nonexistent beer called Lost (for the sake of the slogan: "Get Lost!"). More slapstick than satire, the show, unsponsored for obvious reasons, winds up sounding dangerously close to the real thing.

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