First Person | Floor Crew-alty
By Clint Pressley
I started April
5, 1962, on the WBTV Crew.
Virgil Torrence was Crew Chief along with Ken Furr, and
Doug McDaniel. Others on the crew were Reggie Dunlap,
John Burchett, Tom Wilder, Jim Hughs, Tom King, Dick
Hess, Gil Caldwell, and a couple of others. Soon came
John Reichard, Bob Wood, Jimmy Collins, Bob Chandler,
Mitch Lockhart, our first Black crew member.
We had a lot of fun doing live TV like Betty Feezor
Show, Pat Lee Show, Foot in the Door with Ty Boyd, Carolina
Calling on the early shift. I was late for that show
one morning, and got a refresher course on being punctual
from Virgil. I was never late again, nor have I been
late for anything since.
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| JP crew taping a laundry soap commercial.
From left, actress, Virgil Torrence, Reg Dunlap,
agency producer, Norm Prevatte, Ken Furr, Clint Pressley |
Our Directors were Norman Prevatte, Ed Wade, Gene Birke,
and Don McDaniel. Of course we had the 6pm Esso Reporter
(with Doug Mayes), and the 11pm news with Bob Bean. Alan
Newcomb was the Atlantic Weather man, and Clyde McLean
did the 6pm weather. Alan Newcomb also did the Editorials,
and the Land of the Free show, which we used to tape
on some evenings between the news shows. On Wednesday
evening we did the wrestling show for Jim Crockett for
playback on Saturday. That was my first experience running
camera. There was an extra TK-10 with the standard prime
lenses on it, and Mr. Norm (Prevatte) let me run it on
my own time just to learn. All this makes me remember
how much fun we had, and how different it is today. We
did work hard, and stayed very busy moving sets in and
out, including the News sets. The only permanent set
was Betty's Kitchen.
I don't remember the exact date, but Jefferson
Production was formed and started out using the WBTV
studios and crew doing country and gospel Shows. We used
to do Bill Anderson's show, along with Gospel Caravan,
The Rangers and others. Johnny Cash did a pilot show
with us one time. Ken Helms probably has the 2-inch
copy of that somewhere.
The gospel shows were the worst. That was
the first time I saw men use hair spray and perfume.
They also had their groupies that would come to see them.
I would come to work and see a parking lot full of buses,
and know that we were in for a couple of all nighters.
We would do 13 one hour shows, real time, live to tape.
There was no editing other that a microscope and razor
blade. I learned to loathe gospel music, or I should
say gospel singers. Now I work for Media Comm, and INSP,
and still see them. They haven't changed a bit. I guess
life is a circle.
When a new studio was built exclusively
for JP, several of us went to JP as full time crew members.
It was Ken Furr, Doug McDaniel, Bob Chandler, and myself
to start. I'm not sure if it was because JP wanted us,
or WBTV wanted to get rid of us. John Dillon, Jim Rogers,
Reggie Dunlap, Barbara Ezell Wilson (now Conrad) and
Norman Prevatte were already on JP Staff. We did a lot
of commercials for agencies out of New York, Boston,
and many other larger markets. These were brought here
by the efforts of John Dillon, Jim Rogers, Reggie Dunlap,
and Later Jim Babb. Many changes took place over the
22 years I was there. I left in '84 to form a Film Company
with Bob Newcomb, and Mark deCastrique.
Of course I left out all of the Jefferson
Film history which you [Reno Bailey] know all about
since you were one of the originals in that Group. I
can remember you telling Robert Rogers, "I don't
hear film going through the camera" when he was
deciding what to shoot. (Like any good executive producer
should do.)
Editor's note: They were called
the "floor" crew because they worked on the studio floor.
Others on the crew worked up in the "booth" or studio control
room. These included the director, the technical director,
the audio person and others. Downstairs in video control
and the tape room were, respectively, the video man (who
adjusted the camera brightness and color levels) and
the videotape machine operator. It took a village.
