What Can the Matter Be?

THE FAIR

From start to finish, the New York World's Fair was planned for profit. Remembering the ocean of red ink that engulfed New York's 1939-40 World of Tomorrow, the World's Fair of 1964-65 Corp. schemed and ballyhooed to make sure that the billion-dollar bazaar would not only repay every last penny it cost, but also would even show a $99 million surplus. New York City hotels, stores and restaurants also counted confidently on record profits from hordes of tourists attracted by the extravaganza in Flushing Meadow. By last week, well into the second half of its first season, it was clear that the fair, while no fizzle, was no bonanza either.

An ever-increasing number of unhappy exhibitors is singing a blues version of an English song:

Oh dear, what can the matter be? Johnny's not out at the Fair.

Though 22 million people to date have clicked through the turnstiles, attendance is more than 20% below the 28 million that fair officials counted on during the period. And, 49% of all fair visitors have come from the New York metropolitan area.

Slow Shows. Most fair-minded patrons allow that the trip on the whole is worthwhile--but many also find plenty to criticize. The grounds cover 646 acres, and it is a tiring trudge from exhibit to exhibit. Visitors who have their minds set on seeing the main attractions spend a good part of a day standing in queues. Transportation is expensive: it costs $3 just to board a Greyhound escorter--if you can find one. The hardest thing of all to track down is a cool soft drink, and even that entails waiting in line.

Understandably, the loudest complaints come from the handful of concessionaires who have been forced to close, mostly with heavy losses. The show business sector has been hardest hit. Mike Todd Jr.'s America Be Seated closed shortly after the fair opened. Another notable dropout was Wonder World, a glossy musical-extravaganza with a cast of 250 that at times was bigger than its audiences. The Texas pavilion's lavish To Broadway with Love and Dick Button's Ice-Travaganza also folded. The Teatro Espanol's guitarists and flamenco dancers would be a hit in Manhattan; at the fair, business is so slow that the Spanish pavilion has slashed admission from $3 to a ridiculously low $1.

Show business entrepreneurs complain bitterly that Fair Corp. President Robert Moses seems indifferent to their problems, as when he said recently: "The collapse of a few amusement ventures has been grossly exaggerated." Their backers, who lost some $7,000,000, were not so philosophical. Said one showman: "How does Moses gauge the success of the fair? Well, he's paying off the bondholders, but at our expense. They won't help us, and they won't let us help ourselves."

What They Go For. Actually, the fair's most conspicuous successes--and failufes--both clearly show that most people do not go out to Flushing Meadow for conventional entertainment. After all, they reason, they can go to a show in Manhattan. What does lure them to the fair is its impressive array of industrial and cultural pavilions--nearly all admission-free. More visitors (28%) comment on its "educational value" than any other aspect of the fair save its sheer "magnitude." Judging from the lines in front of the G.E., IBM, G.M. and Ford pavilions, the average fairgoer wants to goggle at scientific wonders, to inspect the future, or see a prehistoric spectacular such as Ford's battle of the dinosaurs (bodies by Disney).

Indeed, industry has gone all out, and often far out, to pull in the public with such delights as Coca-Cola's instant world tour (from a street in Hong Kong to a cruise ship off Rio) and Pepsi's unforgettable boat ride through a Disneyland of wildly singing, dancing dolls.

Of course, big corporations and some foreign governments that are anxious to impress Americans do not count their immediate profits in dollars and cents. "Where else could we get the undivided attention of a captive audience of 14 million people?" beams Steven Van Voorhis, manager of G.E.'s Progressland. On the other hand, their very success tends to aggravate the problems of smaller, less glamorous exhibitors who have trouble attracting visitors.

Help from Russia? The fair, naturally, claims many more successes than failures. The Spanish pavilion, for example, rates Numero Uno; its collection of great paintings in an exquisite building proved so popular that the pavilion had to start charging 250 admission just to control the crush inside. The elegant Japanese pavilion is another hit, with a beautifully balanced display of new products and ancient crafts, samurai dueling, judo wrestling and Kabuki dancing. With a few notable exceptions such as Illinois and its electronic Abe, a number of state and foreign pavilions are in trouble. The New England pavilion expects to end at least $250,000 in the red.

One of the fair's biggest headaches, however, is that, unlike the 1962 Seattle Fair, New York's was never sanctioned by the International Bureau of Expositions, which limits any member nation to one fair a decade. Thus big drawing cards such as Britain, France, West Germany, Italy, Brazil and Russia are not represented.

Fair officials concede that some changes will have to be made before the '65 season gets under way. Among other steps, they have made overtures to Russia to participate. Other pep-up programs are planned by individual exhibitors. While several good shows may simply not be able to return next year, much of the promising Hall of Science and the Belgian Village have yet to open. The prospect is that the fair will continue as something quite a bit better than a financial or esthetic wilderness, but less than Moses' promised land.

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