Banner Graphic, Volume 16, Number 140, Greencastle, Putnam County, 24 January 1986 — Page 13

Super Bowl a real TV event, too

c. 1986 N.Y. Times News Service NEW YORK Bob Costas calls it “a game, not a religious event.” Michael Weisman hopes to capture its “magnitude.” Merlin Olsen wants to “climb inside the players’ heads.” The Super Bowl is many things to many people, from a bore to a dream to a holiday, but to the folks at NBC Sports, it’s a big job. Having paid the National Football League sl7 million for the right to televise Super Bowl XX in New Orleans next Sunday, the network is busy putting together a game plan that is as extensive, and much more expensive, than those of the Bears and the Patriots. “More so than for any other event, the country is united for the Super Bowl,” said Weisman, who, as executive producer of NBC Sports, is where the buck stops. “I don’t want to get into the commentary of what that says about the country, but it’s a fact.” Year after year, the Super Bowl is one of America’s mostwatched television shows. Seven of the 10 top-rated shows of all time are Super Bowls, and the top 10 sports programs have all been Super Bowls. This year should be no exception an audience of about 115 million, or nearly half the country, is expected to watch all or part of the game, which begins at 5:15 p.m. Eastern Time. But the game is only part of the big show NBC is planning. The network will start with a pregame show at 3 p.m. and will also do a postgame show. The whole telecast will last about six hours. The size of the audience, the hype around the game and the long air time means extra work and pressure on Costas, who will the host of the pregame show, Olsen, one of three broadcasters for the game, and Ted Nathanson, the coordinating producer. But the biggest bur-

PROGRAM SCHEDULE

Time Monday-Friday 7 00 am Thundercats 7 30 am Gobots 0 00 am The Flmtstones 830 am __ Mighty Mouse 900 am _ Hying Nun 9 30 am My Favorite Martian 10 00 am The Monsters 10 30 am Theßtg\teHey 11 00 am 11 30 am Mr Ed 12 00 n I Love Lucy 12 30 pm DickNfen Dyke 1 00 pm Ironside 1 30 pm 2 00 pm Batman 2 30 pm Inspector Gadget ■ 300 pm ___ Gobots 3 30 pm HeMan A Masters of the Univ

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Dick Enberg (right) will join pro football analyst Merlin Olsen when NBC Sports presents exclusive coverage of the Super Bowl Sunday featuring the Chicago Bears

den falls on Weisman, who will oversee a production and technical crew of 135 people and sll million of electronics gear. While publicity has focused on some relatively small pieces of NBC’s plan a quiet minute during the pregame show and an interview with President Reagan instead of airing his postgame phone calls to the locker rooms Weisman and his colleagues are spending

Sunday Catholic Mass Jimmy Swaggart Amazing Grace Kids Inc Funtastic Sunday Star Trek Sunday Movie i Sunday Movie 2

Saturday US Farm Report Batman Ntoyagers Saturday Morning Wbrid of Ftiotography The Avengers B J & Lobo Saturday Movie i Saturday Movie 2

most of their time on other segments. They say they hope to avoid some of the predictable stories and pictures they believe have dominated television on previous Super Sundays. Although NBC hopes to be different, Weisman conceded that the pre-game show would contain the usual talk of team strategy and a feature on Buddy Ryan, architect of Chicago’s

Time Monday-Friday 4 00 pm She Ra 430 pm _ Transformers 500 pm _ Mork& Mindy 5 30 pm Bewitched 6 00 pm Star Trek 6 30 pm 7 00 pm Too Close for Comfort 7 30 pm Taxi 000 pm * WXINS9 0 30 pm 0 O Clock Movie 9 00 pm 9 30 pm 10 00 pm + Night Gallery Mon 10 30 pm Alfred Hitchcock Night Talk 11 00 pm _ Taxi 11 30 pm __ Bob Newhart 12 00 m ’ Benny Hill Pn Bob 12 30 am __ Comedy Tonight Movie i 00 am _ Phil Silvers ' 30 am In Search of Ail Night

and New England Patriots from the Superdome in New Orleans. Kickoff is set for 5:15 p.m., with pregame coverage 3-5 p.m. and game coverage 5-9 p.m. on NBC.

merciless defense. There will also be music and videos, including one that will have celebrities involved in a fundraising effort for America’s poor. Commercials, of course, will be sprinkled liberally throughout, and will last nearly an hour altogether. Indeed, the pregame show is so long for business reasons. The longer the show, the more commercial

Saturday Saturday Movie 3 Street Hawk Black Sheep Squadron Elvira Mistress of the Dark Movie Tales of the Dark Side Twilight Zone Benny Hill Show Saturday Late Movie Thriller All Night Movies

Sunday Sunday Movie 3 Sunday Movie 4 Star Games Specials The Saint Tales of the Dark Side Black Belt Theater

spots NBC can sell, at a cost of $550,000 for 30 seconds during the game. Once the game begins, Nathanson will be mostly responsible for picking which pictures appear on television screens across the country. Working in his 10th Super Bowl, Nathanson will have an army of 21 cameras NBC regularly uses for football. There will be extra equipment for instant replays, extra endzone cameras offering high and low views, two reverse-angle cameras, three cameras and three tape machines for isolation on players and a camera in the scoreboard above the playing field. And Bob Griese, added to the regular team of Olsen and Dick Enberg, will use a “telestrator” to superimpose diagrams on the picture. How exciting the game is will determine some of what Nathanson shows. Some footage he prepares may not be shown, depending on how close the game is. Meanwhile, the broadcasters will have prepared themselves by watching films of previous games and talking to the players and coaches. Olsen, for example, flew to Boston last week to visit the Patriots and then on to Chicago to see the Bears. “Seeing them gives me a chance to climb inside the players’ heads a bit,” Olsen said. “And I get a chance to find out their plans for some of the individual line matchups.” The coaches, he said, give him such information as what plays they are likely to call in certain situations so he can be prepared to tell viewers how the play worked, or didn’t. Once in New Orleans, Olsen, Enberg and Griese will meet with the camera crew and tell much of what they know about the teams. Of course, the part of the show NBC can’t rehearse is the best part.

8 O'CLOCK MOVIES JAN. 27 SALEM'S LOT I David Soul • James Mason JAN. 28 SALEM'S LOT D David Soul • James Mason JAN. 29 THE DIRTY DOZEN Lee Marvin • Ernest Borgnine JAN. 30 HANOVER STREET Harrison Ford JAN. 31 CLASS * Lesley-Anne Down Jacqueline Bisset • Rob Lowe i 1

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