Movie 4
Encyclopedia
Movie 4 was a television program that aired at various times, but predominantly weekday afternoons, on WNBC-TV
in New York City from 1956 to 1974. The program aired top-rank first-run movies and other future classics from Hollywood
, as well as foreign film
s. As with other movie shows of 90-minute length, films that ran longer were often divided into two parts.
Though it achieved a degree of success, for most of its run the show usually ran in the shadow of rival WCBS-TV
's The Early Show on weekdays and The Late Show on weekends. Despite its being a major player among the local movie shows for nearly 18 years, the program today is largely forgotten in relation to WABC-TV
's better-known The 4:30 Movie
.
The Movie 4 title was also used at varying times until the 1970s by NBC
's two other owned-and-operated station
s on channel 4, WRC-TV
in Washington, D.C. and (to a considerably lesser degree) KNBC
in Los Angeles. The network's Chicago outlet, WMAQ-TV
, used the title Movie 5 for its movie shows from the late 1950s up to the 1980s; and during NBC's ownership of Philadelphia station WRCV-TV (now KYW-TV
), their movie umbrella was known as Movie 3.
Johnny Andrews. Prior to its debut, WRCA-TV had been the least committed to airing old movies among the New York television stations. The show was started in large part as the station's attempt to compete with WCBS-TV's aforementioned movie shows and WOR-TV
's Million Dollar Movie, as well as capitalizing on the recent release of major pre- and post-1948 films from the top Hollywood studio
s for television. Only a month into the show's run, and to show that the station was in the game for keeps, WRCA-TV appointed whom they called a "film director" to oversee the purchase of first-run feature films, and to advise NBC's O&O's and affiliate
s. The program's title switched to Movie 4 on or about February 3, 1957.
, High Noon
, The Quiet Man
, The Men, and East of Eden. For the most part, top-line features were usually reserved for the Saturday and Sunday night airings, while more standard fare was run on weekdays and weekend afternoons.
Prestigious foreign films—mainly from England but also from other countries—also had their first showings on Movie 4 over the years. For example, in the autumn of 1960, New York viewers saw the 1955 Peter Sellers
–Alec Guinness
version of The Ladykillers
for the first time on television, as well as Fernandel
's The Sheep Has Five Legs
, the 1954 Rossano Brazzi
film Flesh and Desire, the 1957 French release Les Louves (Demoniac), the 1955 Spanish movie The Miracle of Marcelino, and the 1950 Italian
film Prima comunione (Father's Dilemma).
In the program's last years, several films became recurring staples of Movie 4s schedule, including North by Northwest
, Home from the Hill
, Soldier in the Rain
, Captain Newman, M.D.
, Father Goose
, The Time Machine
, and the respective pilots for Columbo (both Prescription: Murder and Ransom for a Dead Man) and Ironside
. Some of Elvis Presley
's films also saw play on Movie 4, among them Flaming Star
, Kissin' Cousins
and It Happened at the World's Fair
. The show was also among the first times New Yorkers saw the Doctor Who
character, via the theatrical releases Dr. Who and the Daleks
and Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. with Peter Cushing
as the title character
. The station also had its share of Japanese monster movie
s, including Ghidrah, the Three-Headed Monster
and Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster
, but such titles were minuscule compared with the number of such films that ran on rival WABC-TV's The 4:30 Movie.
Other films shown on Movie 4 were Visit to a Small Planet
, Crawlspace
(1972), Lover Come Back
(1961), Ten Little Indians
(1965), The Deadly Hunt, and I'd Rather Be Rich
, and such MGM
musical
s as Annie Get Your Gun
, The Band Wagon
, Singin' in the Rain
, High Society, Kiss Me Kate, and Les Girls
.
).
As the years went on, the frequency of Movie 4s airings began to be gradually reduced. In October 1960, the late Saturday afternoon editions were discontinued (they would appear on and off on the weekend afternoon schedule in later years, but such airings were never considered part of the series proper). The program's Sunday night airings ended on September 23, 1962, and was replaced the next week by rerun
s of Desilu Playhouse
. From December 1962 to April 1963, the weekday airings were temporarily cancelled by WNBC due to the 1962 New York City newspaper strike
, while special newscasts ran in their place; the strike ultimately led to the creation of a 30-minute newscast, The Pressman–Ryan Report, anchored by Gabe Pressman
and Bill Ryan. The Saturday night airings of Movie 4 came to an end on January 2, 1965; the following week, weekend reruns of The Tonight Show took their place. Thereafter, Movie 4 generally aired weekdays only. After WNBC-TV's early-evening local newscast was expanded from 30 minutes to an hour on May 10, 1965, Movie 4 moved to its final time slot of 4:30 to 6 pm, where it remained for the rest of its run.
and closing
title segments over the years. One such set, made in 1964 and used to about 1966, has shown up online. They were produced by an animation studio
that had done bumper
s for WNBC-TV at the time. The opening theme
, "Silhouette of a Dream," was composed by Stan Zabka, a former associate director
of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
, and the closing theme was an easy listening
version of "Petite Fleur (Little Flower)."
on WABC-TV
in January, followed by the cancellation of weekday airings of The Early Show on WCBS-TV and its replacement with The Mike Douglas Show
in March. While the series had some up-and-down moments afterwards, these moves eventually consigned Movie 4 to also-ran status, and the show's rating
s began to decline. To make matters worse, WNBC-TV's own ratings plunged to last place among the city's network O&O's in the early 1970s, dragging Movie 4 down with it. This was despite a series of promotional advertisements for Movie 4 published in TV Guide
and the Daily News with illustration
s by Robert Grossman
, and later caricature
s of individual films' star
s by Al Hirschfeld
, as run during 1972. In addition, in the show's final years WNBC's inventory of films was becoming alarmingly low, due to their loss of rights to movies that wound up on WCBS-TV
, WNEW-TV
, WOR-TV
and, ironically enough, WABC-TV.
The cancellation of Movie 4 was announced by WNBC-TV on December 12, 1973, as part of its plans for an expanded two-hour newscast that would debut on April 29, 1974 as NewsCenter4. The last Movie 4, a repeat of The Time Machine, was aired on April 26, 1974. The resulting half-hour void left by the cancellation of Movie 4 was filled by reruns of Room 222
, whose run on ABC
had ended only a few months earlier. Movie 4s demise left WABC-TV as the only network O&O to have an afternoon movie show (The 4:30 Movie, which ran until 1981). The end also preceded by nearly two years the introduction of home videocassette recorder
s, and by several more years the beginning of the growth of cable television
.
that wound up on rival WPIX
, which aired several of the titles (including Father Goose and the Columbo and Ironside pilots) as part of its own The Eight O'Clock Movie that ran from December 1974 until the premiere of The WB Television Network
in 1995.
As the years went on, the quality of films shown on WNBC-TV became increasingly inferior, with some coming almost exclusively from the public domain
. From 1977 or so, the station began using the all-purpose umbrella title Cinema 4 to replace various individual titles that had been in use since the mid-1960s. Cinema 4 ran with decreasing frequency, in its last years confined to occasional weekend airings and overnight weekend showings, until the late 1980s.
WNBC
WNBC, virtual channel 4 , is the flagship station of the NBC television network, located in New York City. WNBC's studios are co-located with NBC corporate headquarters at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in midtown Manhattan...
in New York City from 1956 to 1974. The program aired top-rank first-run movies and other future classics from Hollywood
Hollywood, Los Angeles, California
Hollywood is a famous district in Los Angeles, California, United States situated west-northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Due to its fame and cultural identity as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars, the word Hollywood is often used as a metonym of American cinema...
, as well as foreign film
World cinema
World cinema is a term used primarily in English language speaking countries to refer to the films and film industries of non-English speaking countries. It is therefore often used interchangeably with the term foreign film...
s. As with other movie shows of 90-minute length, films that ran longer were often divided into two parts.
Though it achieved a degree of success, for most of its run the show usually ran in the shadow of rival WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV, channel 2, is the flagship station of the CBS television network, located in New York City. The station's studios are located within the CBS Broadcast Center and its transmitter is atop the Empire State Building, both in Midtown Manhattan....
's The Early Show on weekdays and The Late Show on weekends. Despite its being a major player among the local movie shows for nearly 18 years, the program today is largely forgotten in relation to WABC-TV
WABC-TV
WABC-TV, channel 7, is the flagship station of the Disney-owned American Broadcasting Company located in New York City. The station's studios and offices are located on the Upper West Side section of Manhattan, adjacent to ABC's corporate headquarters, and its transmitter is atop the Empire State...
's better-known The 4:30 Movie
The 4:30 Movie
The 4:30 Movie was a television program that aired weekday afternoons on WABC-TV in New York from 1968 to 1981. The program was mainly known for individual theme weeks devoted to theatrical feature films or made-for-TV movies starring a certain actor or actress, or to a particular genre, or to...
.
The Movie 4 title was also used at varying times until the 1970s by NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
's two other owned-and-operated station
Owned-and-operated station
In the broadcasting industry , an owned-and-operated station usually refers to a television station or radio station that is owned by the network with which it is associated...
s on channel 4, WRC-TV
WRC-TV
WRC-TV, channel 4, is an owned and operated television station of the NBC television network, located in the American capital city of Washington, D.C...
in Washington, D.C. and (to a considerably lesser degree) KNBC
KNBC
KNBC, channel 4, is an owned-and-operated television station of the NBC Television Network, licensed to Los Angeles, California, USA. KNBC's studios and offices are located within the NBC Studios complex in Burbank, California, and its transmitter is located on Mount Wilson...
in Los Angeles. The network's Chicago outlet, WMAQ-TV
WMAQ-TV
WMAQ-TV, channel 5, is an owned-and-operated television station of the NBC Television Network, located in Chicago, Illinois. WMAQ-TV's main studios and offices are located within the NBC Tower in the Streeterville neighborhood, with an auxiliary street-level studio on the Magnificent Mile at 401...
, used the title Movie 5 for its movie shows from the late 1950s up to the 1980s; and during NBC's ownership of Philadelphia station WRCV-TV (now KYW-TV
KYW-TV
KYW-TV, virtual channel 3, is an owned and operated television station of the CBS Television Network, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. KYW-TV shares a studio facility with its sister station, CW flagship WPSG just north of Center City Philadelphia...
), their movie umbrella was known as Movie 3.
Early history
What became Movie 4 debuted on what was then WRCA-TV on June 4, 1956. In its first eight months on the air, the program was known as Evening Theatre, and was hosted by staff announcerAnnouncer
An announcer is a presenter who makes "announcements" in an audio medium or a physical location.-Television and other media:Some announcers work in television production , radio or filmmaking, usually providing narrations, news updates, station identification, or an introduction of a product in...
Johnny Andrews. Prior to its debut, WRCA-TV had been the least committed to airing old movies among the New York television stations. The show was started in large part as the station's attempt to compete with WCBS-TV's aforementioned movie shows and WOR-TV
WWOR-TV
WWOR-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the flagship station of the MyNetworkTV programming service, licensed to Secaucus, New Jersey and serving the Tri-State metropolitan area. WWOR is owned by Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation, and is a sister station to Fox network flagship...
's Million Dollar Movie, as well as capitalizing on the recent release of major pre- and post-1948 films from the top Hollywood studio
Movie studio
A movie studio is a term used to describe a major entertainment company or production company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to film movies...
s for television. Only a month into the show's run, and to show that the station was in the game for keeps, WRCA-TV appointed whom they called a "film director" to oversee the purchase of first-run feature films, and to advise NBC's O&O's and affiliate
Network affiliate
In the broadcasting industry , a network affiliate is a local broadcaster which carries some or all of the television program or radio program line-up of a television or radio network, but is owned by a company other than the owner of the network...
s. The program's title switched to Movie 4 on or about February 3, 1957.
Peak years
The heyday for Movie 4 was in the late 1950s and early 1960s. During this period, many films that became classics had their New York television premieres. Among these films were The Bells of St. Mary'sThe Bells of St. Mary's
The Bells of St. Mary's is a 1945 American film which tells the story of a priest and a nun at a school who set out, despite their good-natured rivalry, to save the school from being shut down. It stars Bing Crosby and Ingrid Bergman...
, High Noon
High Noon
High Noon is a 1952 American Western film directed by Fred Zinnemann and starring Gary Cooper and Grace Kelly. The film tells in real time the story of a town marshal forced to face a gang of killers by himself...
, The Quiet Man
The Quiet Man
The Quiet Man is a 1952 American Technicolor romantic comedy-drama film. It was directed by John Ford and starring John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara, Victor McLaglen and Barry Fitzgerald. It was based on a 1933 Saturday Evening Post short story by Maurice Walsh...
, The Men, and East of Eden. For the most part, top-line features were usually reserved for the Saturday and Sunday night airings, while more standard fare was run on weekdays and weekend afternoons.
Prestigious foreign films—mainly from England but also from other countries—also had their first showings on Movie 4 over the years. For example, in the autumn of 1960, New York viewers saw the 1955 Peter Sellers
Peter Sellers
Richard Henry Sellers, CBE , known as Peter Sellers, was a British comedian and actor. Perhaps best known as Chief Inspector Clouseau in The Pink Panther film series, he is also notable for playing three different characters in Dr...
–Alec Guinness
Alec Guinness
Sir Alec Guinness, CH, CBE was an English actor. He was featured in several of the Ealing Comedies, including Kind Hearts and Coronets in which he played eight different characters. He later won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as Colonel Nicholson in The Bridge on the River Kwai...
version of The Ladykillers
The Ladykillers
The Ladykillers is a 1955 British black comedy film made by Ealing Studios. Directed by Alexander Mackendrick, it stars Alec Guinness, Cecil Parker, Herbert Lom, Peter Sellers, Danny Green, Jack Warner and Katie Johnson...
for the first time on television, as well as Fernandel
Fernandel
Fernand Joseph Désiré Contandin , better known as Fernandel, was a French actor and singer. Born in Marseille, France, he was a comedy star who first gained popularity in French vaudeville, operettas, and music-hall revues...
's The Sheep Has Five Legs
The Sheep Has Five Legs
The Sheep Has Five Legs is a 1954 French film directed by Henri Verneuil. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Story.- Cast :*Fernandel as Édouard Saint-Forget / Les quintuplés : Alain, Bernard, Charles, Désiré...
, the 1954 Rossano Brazzi
Rossano Brazzi
-Biography:Brazzi was born in Bologna to Adelmo and Maria Brazzi. He attended San Marco University in Florence, Italy, where he was raised from the age of four...
film Flesh and Desire, the 1957 French release Les Louves (Demoniac), the 1955 Spanish movie The Miracle of Marcelino, and the 1950 Italian
Italian films of 1950
A list of films produced in Italy in 1950 :-A-B:-C-I:-L-P:-Q-Z:-External links:* at the Internet Movie Database...
film Prima comunione (Father's Dilemma).
In the program's last years, several films became recurring staples of Movie 4s schedule, including North by Northwest
North by Northwest
North by Northwest is a 1959 American thriller film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, starring Cary Grant, Eva Marie Saint and James Mason, and featuring Leo G. Carroll and Martin Landau...
, Home from the Hill
Home from the Hill (film)
Home from the Hill is a 1960 film directed by Vincente Minnelli and starring Robert Mitchum, Eleanor Parker, George Peppard, George Hamilton, Everett Sloane, and Luana Patten....
, Soldier in the Rain
Soldier in the Rain
Soldier in the Rain , starring Jackie Gleason and Steve McQueen, is a comedy-drama film about the friendship between an aging Army Master Sergeant and a young country bumpkin buck sergeant . Tuesday Weld also stars....
, Captain Newman, M.D.
Captain Newman, M.D.
Captain Newman, M.D. is a 1963 film starring Gregory Peck, Tony Curtis, Angie Dickinson, Robert Duvall, Eddie Albert and Bobby Darin. It was directed by David Miller and filmed on location at Fort Huachuca, Arizona....
, Father Goose
Father Goose (film)
Father Goose is a 1964 romantic comedy film set in World War II, starring Cary Grant, Leslie Caron and Trevor Howard. The title derives from "Mother Goose", the codename assigned to Grant's character...
, The Time Machine
The Time Machine (1960 film)
The Time Machine is a 1960 American science fiction film based on the 1895 novel of the same name by H. G. Wells in which a man in Victorian England constructs a time-travelling machine which he uses to travel to the future...
, and the respective pilots for Columbo (both Prescription: Murder and Ransom for a Dead Man) and Ironside
Ironside (TV series)
Ironside is a Universal television series which ran on NBC from September 14, 1967 to January 16, 1975. The show starred Raymond Burr as the wheelchair-using Chief of Detectives, Robert T. Ironside. The character's debut was in a TV-movie on March 28, 1967. The original title of the show in the...
. Some of Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
's films also saw play on Movie 4, among them Flaming Star
Flaming Star
Flaming Star is a 1960 western film starring Elvis Presley, based on the book Flaming Lance by Clair Huffaker. Critics agreed that Presley gave one of his best acting performances as the mixed-blood "Pacer Burton", a dramatic role. The film was directed by Don Siegel, and had a working title of...
, Kissin' Cousins
Kissin' Cousins
Kissin' Cousins is a 1964 musical film comedy starring Elvis Presley in two roles, one as an American soldier, the other a hillbilly. The screenplay was nominated in the category of best written American musical by the Writers Guild of America...
and It Happened at the World's Fair
It Happened at the World's Fair
It Happened at the World's Fair is a 1963 musical film starring Elvis Presley as a cropdusting pilot.The motion picture was filmed in Seattle, Washington, site of the Century 21 Exposition, the 1962 World's Fair. The governor of Washington at the time, Albert Rosellini, suggested the setting to...
. The show was also among the first times New Yorkers saw the Doctor Who
Dr. Who (Dalek films)
Dr. Who is a character based on the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who. Although based upon the character of the Doctor from the television series, the character is fundamentally different, most notably in being human....
character, via the theatrical releases Dr. Who and the Daleks
Dr. Who and the Daleks
Dr. Who and the Daleks was the first of two Doctor Who films made in the 1960s. It was followed by Daleks' Invasion Earth: 2150 A.D....
and Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. with Peter Cushing
Peter Cushing
Peter Wilton Cushing, OBE was an English actor, known for his many appearances in Hammer Films, in which he played the handsome but sinister scientist Baron Frankenstein and the vampire hunter Dr. Van Helsing, amongst many other roles, often appearing opposite Christopher Lee, and occasionally...
as the title character
Doctor (Doctor Who)
The Doctor is the central character in the long-running BBC television science-fiction series Doctor Who, and has also featured in two cinema feature films, a vast range of spin-off novels, audio dramas and comic strips connected to the series....
. The station also had its share of Japanese monster movie
Monster movie
Monster movie is a name commonly given to movies, which centre on the struggle between human beings and one or more monsters...
s, including Ghidrah, the Three-Headed Monster
Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster
Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster, released in Japan as and originally released in the US as Ghidrah, the Three-Headed Monster, is a 1964 science fiction kaiju film, and is the 5th film in Toho's Godzilla series...
and Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster
Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster
Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster, released in Japan as and known internationally as Ebirah, Horror of the Deep, is a 1966 science fiction kaiju film directed by Jun Fukuda and written by Shinichi Sekizawa. This is the first film in the series with special effects directed by Sadamasa Arikawa...
, but such titles were minuscule compared with the number of such films that ran on rival WABC-TV's The 4:30 Movie.
Other films shown on Movie 4 were Visit to a Small Planet
Visit to a Small Planet
Visit to a Small Planet is a 1960 Paramount Pictures film starring Jerry Lewis, based on a play by Gore Vidal. It was released on February 4, 1960.-Plot:...
, Crawlspace
Crawlspace
Crawlspace may refer to:* Crawl space, a type of basement in which one cannot stand up* Crawlspace , a 1986 horror/thriller film starring Klaus Kinski* Crawlspace , a 2004 animated short film by Peter Sved...
(1972), Lover Come Back
Lover Come Back
Lover Come Back is a 1961 Eastmancolor romantic comedy released by Universal Pictures. The film stars Doris Day and Rock Hudson in their second film together. The supporting cast includes Tony Randall, Edie Adams, Ann B. Davis, and Donna Douglas....
(1961), Ten Little Indians
Ten Little Indians (1965 film)
The 1965 version of Ten Little Indians is the second film version of Agatha Christie's detective novel And Then There Were None . Although its background story is the same as the 1945 version , this one takes place on an isolated snowy mountain...
(1965), The Deadly Hunt, and I'd Rather Be Rich
I'd Rather Be Rich
I'd Rather Be Rich is a 1964 romantic comedy film with musical aspects directed by Jack Smight, produced by Ross Hunter and starring Sandra Dee. The film focuses on dying man who wishes to meet his granddaughter's fiancé, but he is unavailable, so the woman persuades another man to substitute for...
, and such MGM
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
musical
Musical film
The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
s as Annie Get Your Gun
Annie Get Your Gun (film)
Annie Get Your Gun is a 1950 American musical comedy film loosely based on the life of sharpshooter Annie Oakley. The Metro Goldwyn Mayer release, with music and lyrics by Irving Berlin and a screenplay by Sidney Sheldon based on the 1946 stage musical of the same name, was directed by George Sidney...
, The Band Wagon
The Band Wagon
The Band Wagon is a 1953 musical comedy film that many critics rank, along with Singin' in the Rain, as the finest of the MGM musicals, although it was only a modest box-office success. It tells the story of an aging musical star who hopes a Broadway play will restart his career...
, Singin' in the Rain
Singin' in the Rain
Singin' in the Rain is a 1952 American comedy musical film starring Gene Kelly, Donald O'Connor and Debbie Reynolds and directed by Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen, with Kelly also providing the choreography...
, High Society, Kiss Me Kate, and Les Girls
Les Girls
Les Girls, also known as Cole Porter's Les Girls, is a 1957 musical comedy film made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was directed by George Cukor, produced by Sol C...
.
Time slots
When Evening Theatre began in 1956, it ran Mondays through Fridays from 5:30 to 6:45 pm On January 20, 1957, a few weeks prior to its title change to Movie 4, a Sunday night airing commencing at 10:30 pm was added, as well as a screening on Saturday at 5 pm After another scheduling change, a Saturday night edition starting at 11:15 pm went on the air on April 20, 1957. On June 30, 1958, the weekday airings were rescheduled to the 5:00 to 6:30 pm time slot, which largely held, with notable exceptions, through 1965. (In the 1961–62 season, a five-minute program fronted by Kukla and Ollie pushed Movie 4s starting time to 5:05 pm) By 1961, the weekend movies began on both nights at 11:15 pm (There were also early afternoon weekend films run by WNBC throughout this period, usually under the banner of Movie 4 Matinee.) In 1963, WNBC-TV began offering a late-night weeknight movie program that would come to be called The Great Great Show (a play on the title of WCBS-TV's overnight movie series The Late Late Show, with a logo reminiscent of the TV series The Wild Wild WestThe Wild Wild West
The Wild Wild West is an American television series that ran on CBS for four seasons from September 17, 1965 to April 4, 1969....
).
As the years went on, the frequency of Movie 4s airings began to be gradually reduced. In October 1960, the late Saturday afternoon editions were discontinued (they would appear on and off on the weekend afternoon schedule in later years, but such airings were never considered part of the series proper). The program's Sunday night airings ended on September 23, 1962, and was replaced the next week by rerun
Rerun
A rerun or repeat is a re-airing of an episode of a radio or television broadcast. The invention of the rerun is generally credited to Desi Arnaz. There are two types of reruns—those that occur during a hiatus, and those that occur when a program is syndicated. Reruns can also be, as the...
s of Desilu Playhouse
Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse
Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse is an American television anthology series produced by Desilu Productions. The show ran on CBS television between 1958 and 1960...
. From December 1962 to April 1963, the weekday airings were temporarily cancelled by WNBC due to the 1962 New York City newspaper strike
1962 New York City newspaper strike
The 1962-63 New York City Newspaper Strike ran from December 8, 1962 until March 31, 1963, lasting for a total of 114 days.-Preliminary actions:...
, while special newscasts ran in their place; the strike ultimately led to the creation of a 30-minute newscast, The Pressman–Ryan Report, anchored by Gabe Pressman
Gabe Pressman
Gabe Pressman is the senior correspondent for WNBC-TV. Pressman has been a journalist in the New York City area for over 60 years. He is considered one of the pioneers of United States television news.-Early years:...
and Bill Ryan. The Saturday night airings of Movie 4 came to an end on January 2, 1965; the following week, weekend reruns of The Tonight Show took their place. Thereafter, Movie 4 generally aired weekdays only. After WNBC-TV's early-evening local newscast was expanded from 30 minutes to an hour on May 10, 1965, Movie 4 moved to its final time slot of 4:30 to 6 pm, where it remained for the rest of its run.
Opening and closing themes
Movie 4 went through several different openingOpening credits
In a motion picture, television program, or video game, the opening credits are shown at the very beginning and list the most important members of the production. They are now usually shown as text superimposed on a blank screen or static pictures, or sometimes on top of action in the show. There...
and closing
Closing credits
Closing credits or end credits are added at the end of a motion picture, television program, or video game to list the cast and crew involved in the production. They usually appear as a list of names in small type, which either flip very quickly from page to page, or move smoothly across the...
title segments over the years. One such set, made in 1964 and used to about 1966, has shown up online. They were produced by an animation studio
Animation studio
An animation studio is a company producing animated media. The broadest such companies conceive of products to produce, own the physical equipment for production, employ operators for that equipment, and hold a major stake in the sales or rentals of the media produced...
that had done bumper
Commercial bumper
In broadcasting, a commercial bumper, ident bumper or break-bumper is a brief announcement, usually two to 15 seconds that can contain a voice over, placed between a pause in the program and its commercial break, and vice versa...
s for WNBC-TV at the time. The opening theme
Theme music
Theme music is a piece that is often written specifically for a radio program, television program, video game or movie, and usually played during the title sequence and/or end credits...
, "Silhouette of a Dream," was composed by Stan Zabka, a former associate director
Assistant director
The role of an Assistant director include tracking daily progress against the filming production schedule, arranging logistics, preparing daily call sheets, checking cast and crew, maintaining order on the set. They also have to take care of health and safety of the crew...
of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson is a talk show hosted by Johnny Carson under the Tonight Show franchise from 1962 to 1992. It originally aired during late-night....
, and the closing theme was an easy listening
Easy listening
Easy listening is a broad style of popular music and radio format that emerged in the 1950s, evolving out of big band music, and related to MOR music as played on many AM radio stations. It encompasses the exotica, beautiful music, light music, lounge music, ambient music, and space age pop genres...
version of "Petite Fleur (Little Flower)."
Later years
Up to the beginning of 1968, Movie 4 had largely played second fiddle to WCBS's The Early Show. However, in the space of two months in early 1968, came the premiere of what became known as The 4:30 MovieThe 4:30 Movie
The 4:30 Movie was a television program that aired weekday afternoons on WABC-TV in New York from 1968 to 1981. The program was mainly known for individual theme weeks devoted to theatrical feature films or made-for-TV movies starring a certain actor or actress, or to a particular genre, or to...
on WABC-TV
WABC-TV
WABC-TV, channel 7, is the flagship station of the Disney-owned American Broadcasting Company located in New York City. The station's studios and offices are located on the Upper West Side section of Manhattan, adjacent to ABC's corporate headquarters, and its transmitter is atop the Empire State...
in January, followed by the cancellation of weekday airings of The Early Show on WCBS-TV and its replacement with The Mike Douglas Show
The Mike Douglas Show
The Mike Douglas Show is an American daytime television talk show hosted by Mike Douglas that aired in syndication from 1961 to 1982, distributed by Westinghouse Broadcasting and for much of its run, originated from studios of two of the company's TV stations.The program featured light banter with...
in March. While the series had some up-and-down moments afterwards, these moves eventually consigned Movie 4 to also-ran status, and the show's rating
Audience measurement
Audience measurement measures how many people are in an audience, usually in relation to radio listenership and television viewership, but also in relation to newspaper and magazine readership and, increasingly, web traffic on websites...
s began to decline. To make matters worse, WNBC-TV's own ratings plunged to last place among the city's network O&O's in the early 1970s, dragging Movie 4 down with it. This was despite a series of promotional advertisements for Movie 4 published in TV Guide
TV Guide
TV Guide is a weekly American magazine with listings of TV shows.In addition to TV listings, the publication features television-related news, celebrity interviews, gossip and film reviews and crossword puzzles...
and the Daily News with illustration
Illustration
An illustration is a displayed visualization form presented as a drawing, painting, photograph or other work of art that is created to elucidate or dictate sensual information by providing a visual representation graphically.- Early history :The earliest forms of illustration were prehistoric...
s by Robert Grossman
Robert Grossman
Robert Grossman is an American painter, sculptor, filmmaker, and author.In a career spanning nearly fifty years, Grossman's illustrations have appeared over 500 times on the covers of various national publications...
, and later caricature
Caricature
A caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...
s of individual films' star
Movie star
A movie star is a celebrity who is well-known, or famous, for his or her starring, or leading, roles in motion pictures. The term may also apply to an actor or actress who is recognized as a marketable commodity and whose name is used to promote a movie in trailers and posters...
s by Al Hirschfeld
Al Hirschfeld
Albert "Al" Hirschfeld was an American caricaturist best known for his simple black and white portraits of celebrities and Broadway stars.-Personal life:Born in St...
, as run during 1972. In addition, in the show's final years WNBC's inventory of films was becoming alarmingly low, due to their loss of rights to movies that wound up on WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV, channel 2, is the flagship station of the CBS television network, located in New York City. The station's studios are located within the CBS Broadcast Center and its transmitter is atop the Empire State Building, both in Midtown Manhattan....
, WNEW-TV
WNYW
WNYW, virtual channel 5 , is the flagship television station of the News Corporation-owned Fox Broadcasting Company, located in New York City. The station's transmitter is atop the Empire State Building and its studio facilities are located in the Yorkville section of Manhattan...
, WOR-TV
WWOR-TV
WWOR-TV, virtual channel 9 , is the flagship station of the MyNetworkTV programming service, licensed to Secaucus, New Jersey and serving the Tri-State metropolitan area. WWOR is owned by Fox Television Stations, a division of the News Corporation, and is a sister station to Fox network flagship...
and, ironically enough, WABC-TV.
The cancellation of Movie 4 was announced by WNBC-TV on December 12, 1973, as part of its plans for an expanded two-hour newscast that would debut on April 29, 1974 as NewsCenter4. The last Movie 4, a repeat of The Time Machine, was aired on April 26, 1974. The resulting half-hour void left by the cancellation of Movie 4 was filled by reruns of Room 222
Room 222
Room 222 is an American comedy-drama television series produced by 20th Century Fox Television. The series aired on ABC from September 17, 1969, to January 11, 1974, for 112 episodes...
, whose run on ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
had ended only a few months earlier. Movie 4s demise left WABC-TV as the only network O&O to have an afternoon movie show (The 4:30 Movie, which ran until 1981). The end also preceded by nearly two years the introduction of home videocassette recorder
Videocassette recorder
The videocassette recorder , is a type of electro-mechanical device that uses removable videocassettes that contain magnetic tape for recording analog audio and analog video from broadcast television so that the images and sound can be played back at a more convenient time...
s, and by several more years the beginning of the growth of cable television
Cable television
Cable television is a system of providing television programs to consumers via radio frequency signals transmitted to televisions through coaxial cables or digital light pulses through fixed optical fibers located on the subscriber's property, much like the over-the-air method used in traditional...
.
Postscript and aftermath
The end of Movie 4 in 1974 effectively brought to a close WNBC-TV's run as a movie showcase. While the station initially retained some of the films that were aired during Movie 4s final years, most of the packages in their library subsequently went to other New York stations, such as 1960s films from Universal StudiosUniversal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
that wound up on rival WPIX
WPIX
WPIX, channel 11, is a television station in New York City built, signed on, and owned by the Tribune Company. WPIX also serves as the flagship station of The CW Television Network...
, which aired several of the titles (including Father Goose and the Columbo and Ironside pilots) as part of its own The Eight O'Clock Movie that ran from December 1974 until the premiere of The WB Television Network
The WB Television Network
The WB Television Network is a former television network in the United States that was launched on January 11, 1995 as a joint venture between Warner Bros. and Tribune Broadcasting. On January 24, 2006, CBS Corporation and Warner Bros...
in 1995.
As the years went on, the quality of films shown on WNBC-TV became increasingly inferior, with some coming almost exclusively from the public domain
Public domain
Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...
. From 1977 or so, the station began using the all-purpose umbrella title Cinema 4 to replace various individual titles that had been in use since the mid-1960s. Cinema 4 ran with decreasing frequency, in its last years confined to occasional weekend airings and overnight weekend showings, until the late 1980s.
Individual genres
- Women's LibFeminist movementThe feminist movement refers to a series of campaigns for reforms on issues such as reproductive rights, domestic violence, maternity leave, equal pay, women's suffrage, sexual harassment and sexual violence...
Week - Male AnimalPolice proceduralThe police procedural is a subgenre of detective fiction which attempts to convincingly depict the activities of a police force as they investigate crimes. While traditional detective novels usually concentrate on a single crime, police procedurals frequently depict investigations into several...
Week - Murder MysteryCrime fictionCrime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
Week - Love and MarriageMarriageMarriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found...
Week - Hollywood LivesMusical filmThe musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
Week - RomanceRomantic comedy filmRomantic comedy films are films with light-hearted, humorous plotlines, centered on romantic ideals such as that true love is able to surmount most obstacles. One dictionary definition is "a funny movie, play, or television program about a love story that ends happily"...
Week - FlyingAviationAviation is the design, development, production, operation, and use of aircraft, especially heavier-than-air aircraft. Aviation is derived from avis, the Latin word for bird.-History:...
Week
Miscellaneous weeks and months
- AbbondanzaWorld cinemaWorld cinema is a term used primarily in English language speaking countries to refer to the films and film industries of non-English speaking countries. It is therefore often used interchangeably with the term foreign film...
Month - Foreign Film Week
- Academy Award Month
- March of Hits Month
- ColorColor televisionColor television is part of the history of television, the technology of television and practices associated with television's transmission of moving images in color video....
Week - MGMMetro-Goldwyn-MayerMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
MusicalMusical filmThe musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the film's characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline, often as elaborate...
s Week