Here’s a little reel featuring the opening credits of the Friday night network TV show line-up in the fall/winter of 1957–and what a load of crap it turns out to have been! Far from making us misty-eyed for the golden age of television, we are instead rendered inert with boredom as the titles of the shows parade by. ‘My Friend Flicka’, ‘Treasure Hunt’, ‘The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin’, “Blondie” and ‘Schlitz Playhouse’ (how can any anthology show sponsored by Schlitz have been anything but lousy). The only ones I want to see are Murrow’s ‘Person To Person’–largely for the views of the celebrity living rooms–and ‘The Ray Anthony Show’, where the master trumpet player is positioned in shadow on a pillar, on a set that looks like it was designed for a Liberace special–candlelabra, chandeliers, balustrades etc. I don’t know if the show was anything more than this shot but there’s something about it that feels relaxing–not boring like the rest of the evenings shows, It’s looks like a perfect piece of boozy programming to end the work week with, before taking a handful of pills, sleeping a drugged sleep, and finally waking up for a scotch, a cigarette and a golf game before the noon drinking–the real weekend drinking–begins in earnest.