A New Kind of TNT

Theater Network Television is growing as fast as TV itself. Last year's Joe Louis-Lee Savold fight was carried by only nine U.S. theaters in seven cities. Last week 50 theaters in 31 cities packed in more than 125,000 people who paid close to $400,000 to see the closed-circuit telecast of Rocky Marciano's knockout of Joe Walcott. A drive-in theater in Rutherford, N.J., with a capacity of 1,300 cars, was sold out at $10 a car, and 7,000 chairs were set up for the overflow customers who had to park their cars outside the theater. One hard-luck theater, Manhattan's Academy of Music, made a $12,000 refund to its SRO audience when the TV picture failed. Some theaters reported a gross of $15,000--more than they usually take in during a week of showing movies.

Nathan L. Halpern, 37-year-old president and founder of Theater Network Television, is looking forward to $10 million sports gates when most of the nation's 18,000 movie houses and 4,000 drive-ins are equipped for TNT. A former basketball player at the University of Southern California and an ex-CBS executive, Halpern also has big plans for bringing Broadway to Main Street. "Most musicals cost about $300,000 to produce. With TNT you can make back your complete investment in one night. We'll be able to do complete plays because we won't have to worry about time segments or how much it's going to cost a sponsor." Halpern even offers hope to the cultural minorities who are often slighted by television: he plans to set up a network in the art movie houses and present full-length telecasts of operas and ballets.

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