Wikipedia

PM Magazine

PM/Evening Magazinewas a television series with a news and entertainment format. It wassyndicatedto stations throughout the United States.[1]In most areas,Evening/PM Magazinewas broadcast from the late 1970s into the late 1980s.

PM Magazine
Also known asEvening Magazine
(Group W–owned stations,KING-TVandWWOR)
GenreInfotainment
Presented byVarious
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
Production
Running time30 minutes
Production companyGroup W Productions
Original release
NetworkSyndication
ReleaseSeptember 1978(1978-09)–
August 30, 1991(1991-08-30)

Origins

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During the summer of1976,KPIXinSan Francisco, California,aCBSaffiliate then owned byWestinghouse (Group W) Broadcasting,premiered a local weeknight television news and entertainment series titledEvening: The MTWTF Show.The show was designed to add localism as suggested by the newly enacted "Prime Time Access Rule."At its inception, the rule was created by theFederal Communications Commission(FCC) to give back the half-hour preceding primetime (7:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. in theEasternandPacifictime zones; 6:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. in theCentralandMountaintime zones) to local network-affiliated stations in thetop fifty television markets,prohibiting them from accepting network-originated programming (and later on, syndicated reruns of network programs) in that time slot.

KPIX'sEvening Magazine

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KPIX'sEvening Magazinewas first hosted by San Francisco radio personalityJan Yanehiro,journalistSteve Foxand Detroit news anchor and reporter Erik Smith. According to the tenth-anniversary special, Smith lasted 13 weeks before heading back to Detroit and returning toWXYZ-TV,where he remained until 2010. It was the first of a new breed of television show shot totally on videotape, rather than the then-standard 16mm film, taking advantage of new minicam technology. The format called for the local hosts to have on-location wraparounds (in and around their local communities) and introduce short feature stories about ordinary and interesting people doing extraordinary and quite newsworthy things.

Expansion

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At the time, Westinghouse owned four other stations around the country, and with the success ofEvening Magazinein the San Francisco market, it was expanded to their other properties. Soon, Group W stations inBaltimore(WJZ-TV),Boston(WBZ-TV),Philadelphia(KYW-TV), andPittsburgh(KDKA-TV) were all doing their own local versions of theEveningformat. The show's format allowed the stations to share their feature stories[2]among each other. For example, a feature that aired in San Francisco could also be shown in Baltimore, and vice versa. The success of the format on the Group W stations gave the company management a bigger idea. Group W decided to expand and syndicate the format to other markets where they didn't own stations. The shows in non-Group W markets would generally use the name "PM Magazine."

At the end of the 1970s, withEveningandPMnow all over the country, Group W Productions created a large production office in San Francisco at 855 Battery Street. This was on the bottom floor of KPIX-TV. Dick Crew was the National Executive Producer, with the following production staff: Dick Newton, Sally Jewett, Andrew Schorr, Melanie Chilek, Bill Geddie, Diane Heditsian, John Norton, Larry Emsweller, Vanita Cillo, Jim Ziegler, David Baxter, Mellen O'Keefe, Gary Cooper and Joe Tobin. Their function was to watch all of the stories being produced by the new localPMandEvening Magazinestations and create a weekly "national reel" for stations to run in local markets. Depending on local station budgets they could produce as much or as little feature material as they wanted, but still have a local show starring local talent. The cooperative production model created byEvening/PMremains unique to this day.

Breeding ground for television on-air and production talent

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Evening/PMwas also a "breeding ground" for television on-air and production talent.Matt Lauer,Tom Bergeron,Nancy Glass,Leeza Gibbons,Henry Tenenbaum and Jerry Penacoli were among those who became well-known because of their work with thePM/Eveningprograms. In Pittsburgh, KDKA-TV's broadcast ofEvening Magazinefeatured a youngDennis Millerproviding a "humorous" closing piece, similar toAndy Rooney's commentary on60 Minutes.Over the course of its run,PM/Evening Magazinehad numerous co-host male/female pairs around the country, including a number of African-American female co-hosts. Among the male co-hosts, Calvin Sneed atWATE-TV,Knoxville,Tennesseewas the first African-American male co-host, a title he held for several years. In its more than a decade run, the show's local market producers traveled all over the country and the world, producing fun and memorable television.PM Magazinewas a launching point for the career of actor-meteorologistMike Randall,who co-hosted the Hartford version from 1982 to 1983, andMiami Dolphinswide receiverJimmy Cefalobegan his broadcasting career with the local edition on WTVJ.

Departments

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Two long features were augmented each day by a block of "departments", featuring special tips for daily living—generally, two or three departments were featured in each program, each with a different host. In the early 1980s, "Captain Carrot" (Cary Nosler)[3]presented the "Self" department, on healthier living; Judi Sheppard Missett presented "Jazzercise"in the" Exercise "department; Dr. James Wasco presented medical issues in the" Health "department;Chef Tellgave new "very simple, very easy" food ideas in the "Cooking" department; the "Animal" department featuredJoan Emberyand animals from theSan Diego Zoo;Fred McBurney hosted "Outdoor Leisure", featuring tips related to hunting & fishing; and in the "Travel" department, Linda Harris visited various parts of the globe.

Special editions

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Occasionally,PM Magazinewould feature a prime-time "Special Edition" special, focusing on a single subject for an entire hour. These specials were hosted not by local hosts, but by better-known personalities, such asBill Rafferty,who hosted a 1980 special edition on "Mating and Dating in the '80s"; and a 1982 "Star-Studded Super Special" hosted byRobert Guillaume.[citation needed]

Decline

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The number of stations carryingPM Magazinebegan to decline in the middle to late 1980s for a variety of reasons.[citation needed]

Some industry insiders have placed a great deal of the blame on Group W Television, which handled distribution of the franchise as well as national advertising sales for the local editions. The initial arrangements between Westinghouse and stations which subscribed to thePM Magazineformat were done so on a "barter" basis, where the local affiliate and the national distributor shared an even split of advertising time and revenue. But by the mid-1980s Group W increased the program's franchise fees, and also took more advertising time within the program, thereby reducing the local affiliates' ability to make money with local spots, some by as much as 20 percent. With fewer local commercial spots to sell, and increasing production costs on the affiliate end, thePM Magazineformat appeared less attractive.

By1990,when Group W decided to cancel the format,Evening/PMhad been edged out in many of its local time slots in favor of tabloid TV news–investigation programs, many with little or no local content. Shows such asA Current Affair,Hard Copy,andInside Edition,along with the lighter-edgedEntertainment Tonight,filled up the prime-time access available spots and endedEvening/PM's run, although KPIX would resurrect its own version ofEvening Magazineonce again, this time in the mid-1990s. During this run, one of the hosts wasMike Rowe.KPIX continued to air its version ofEvening Magazineweeknights before CBS's prime time programs up until2005,when the show's name was changed toEye on the Bay,and the program's hosts also changed after a short transition.

Stations that carriedEvening/PM Magazine

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Notes: This is an incomplete list. Information on local hosts of this program may be found within the individual stations' articles. Stations marked with an asterisk were owned by Group W.

See also

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References

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  1. ^Rahner, Mark (April 24, 2009)."Television | John Curley, 'Evening Magazine' host, signs off".The Seattle Times.RetrievedApril 7,2013.
  2. ^"Ghost Stories (1981)".Texas Archive of the Moving Image.
  3. ^"SacTV.com - Captain Carrot at Sac Music Fest".www.sactv.com.Retrieved2023-06-01.
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