Consider Your Verdict. It was a Saturday in November 1963. I was getting myself breakfast at home in West Heidelberg, listening to the wireless, when the news came through that the President of America had been assassinated by a person or persons unknown... This was surely a very bad joke. This could not be right. Modern day Presidents, especially in the U.S.A. do not get assassinated. And especially not the most popular, charismatic John F.Kennedy, the vital life-force of American political and military power. The man who had faced down Nikita Khrushchev and the might of Russia over Cubas missiles. Besides, America was a country that had Father Knows Best, Ozzie and Harriet and Disneyland. People dont get shot in plain daylight. By the time I got to the Fitzroy Teletheatre, for Consider Your Verdict there were a number of people sitting in the empty audience seating. Writer/actor/producer Sonia Borg and director John Dixon were amongst some of the camera crew and a few of the cast. The mood was sombre, everyone was stunned. I cant remember much more about that morning. We all just seemed to go through the motions, and when we got to the end in mid afternoon, I think everyone simply drifted away, lost in their own shocked thoughts. Jack Kennedy was dead. What about Jackie? What about the next President? This Lyndon Johnson bloke? The Kennedy children? America? Who did it? Why? Of course Australia in the early sixties was a long way away from America, in distance and in time. Our communications were still Reuters and U.P. ticker-tape wire agencies and Movietone News reels. Perhaps long-distance phone calls were available, through Government/Military. During the hours and days to follow, the litany of history slowly unfolded: The suspect was cornered and arrested, taken into custody, moved through the basement of Police headquarters where a determined assailant was able to confront him and fire a gun, killing Lee Oswald. The gun was held by Jack Ruby who in turn died four years later of an illness reported as (galloping) cancer and also of a pulmonary embolism. (Depending on which source you choose.) Much was made of John F. Kennedys funeral. His wife, his children, his family did him and the people of America, proud. Little was made of the funerals of Oswald and Ruby. The first was confined to the same backwater of history as Lincolns killer John Booth. The second became a question mark, though not lauded for destroying the man that had destroyed a President; simply cast aside as maybe a puppet of The Mob or an avenger, or perhaps just a lunatic. The prisoner in the dock will rise. Gentlemen of the Jury. Have you reached your verdict? We have, Your Honour. And how say you? Guilty, Your Honour. Cut to a mid-close-up of the accuseds downcast face. Cut to the triumphant mid-shot of the prosecutor, hands clutching the borders of his black robe. (In this instance, the actor Wyn Roberts, whose hawkish appearance always challenged and threatened.) Cut to a mid-shot of the bewigged judge, his fingers white and strained against the dark timber of his high throne. Then it is my duty to deliver sentence upon you... Cut to mid-shot of the court reporter, (The actor Roly Barlee,) sitting at his old-fashioned prop type-writer. Brandon John Weekes was sentenced to seven years hard labour for the aggravated assault and subsequent deprivation of income to the plaintive. This is your Court Reporter saying Good Bye, until next we meet. (THIS IS NOT AN ACTUAL SCRIPT EXCERPT. JUST MY IMPRESSION.) I relax at the back of the crane camera and John Haddy, upfront de-elevates to floor level. Meanwhile the floor manager calls Cut! Thanks everybody. That should be alright. Just wait for clearance. Ill go and cap-up camera four, I say, heading around the back of the set and in, under the Judges bench to where four is sitting locked off on a fixed tripod. This is the camera that is used for the shots of prosecutor or defence council when they face the judge. Gee, the actor that plays the judge gets into the part. His knuckles went white and his face looked really grim. I say, steering the crane back into its run and hauling in the cable. Hes got an ear-piece under his wig and a transistor radio in his robes, says Joe Wharton, the ex-merchant navy short-order cook. Likes a punt on the horses. He adds laconically. (The ear-plug was not hidden by the wig but was stuck in his right ear away from the cameras view.) I worked on a few Considers. One memorable was when Lyle Hughes was up front on the crane. It had a position just in front of the Judges bench, shooting back into the court setting, at various witnesss and others in the gallery behind. Lyle began to elevate for a different angle and the back of his seat wedged beneath the ornate lip of the bench. As the crane rose, so did the bench by several inches, causing said judge to gather his robes, gird his loins, clutch at his hidden ear-piece and prepare to jump ship. Peace and calm were swiftly restored as Lyle de-elevated, freeing his chair. Consider Your Verdict, produced by Crawford Productions had many fine actors and actresses: Roland Strong, George Fairfax, Terry Norris, Wyn Roberts, Keith Eden and Kenric Hudson as well as the cast of Homicide in various roles. The Teletheatre saw many programmes come and go in the late fifties and early sixties. At one point Channel Seven had a variety show on every night of the week as it struggled to combat the rising rating menace of In Melbourne Tonight and the slow incandescence of Graham Kennedy, the kid from radio. Thanks to Chris Keating (Presenter/producer at 3INR Community Radio, likewise at 88.6 Plenty Valley FM) and his vast resource library, he reminds me that, Top of the Town, hosted by Jeffery Lenner, (Hello Hoomans!) and starring Buster Fiddess, Panda, Vikki Hammond, Len Lowe and Gaynor Bunning, ran 1961-1962. Hold Everything, and later Merry-Go-Round, 1961-1962, hosted first by Peter Colville and Vic Gordon, and later by Panda and Mike Williamson. And Club Seven, 1959-61, starring Jackie Clancy, Roy Lyons, Pilita; hosted at first by Terry Scanlon and later by Frank Wilson. And it should not be forgotten, even though not a part of the Teletheatre history, that a very early variety show was Bandwagon 1959-60. This show, produced in studio one at south Melbourne, was the fore-runner of all the seven variety shows. The directors were Anton Bowler (Who I just missed, even when he was directing Parliament of Youth.) Ian Jones and Bruce Ross-Smith. Other shows, curtesy of Chris Keating, were Make Mine Music with Ron Cadee, Letterbox hosted by Bill Acfield, and My Fair Lady hosted by June Finlayson and artist Charles Bush, and later by Madeleine Burke and then by Vikki Hammond. Next time we meet it will be The Price Is Right, Coles Three Thousand Pound/Six Thousand Dollar Question, and Video Village time.
Posted on: Fri, 15 Nov 2013 07:16:17 +0000