Richmond Times-Dispatch from Richmond, Virginia • 121

ection I Art 4 Calendar 11 Hobbies 6 Movies 3 Music 2 Television 7-10 Theater 3 Travel 12 13 Sirhmond Simep-Btepatcb Sunday March 6 1983 TV pullout section pages 7-10 Riding herd on TVs final frontier Staff Photos by Cart Lynn Universe the Science Museum of planetariumspace theater will open April 23 Museum system has By Douglas Darden nmesJXspatch Staff Writer Tim McDonald 40-year-old president of The Television Corporation Stations (TVX) likes to talk about his business in terms of excitement and challenge as if independent television is the last frontier and he and his partners are its explorers The first three years he says like being in a poker game where the rules were the same for everyone but you and you had to bet all your chips on each The gamble has paid off for TVX a Virginia Beach-based holding company that is currently averaging a new independent TV station per year In 1979 WTVZ-Norfolk went on the air In late 1980 TVX took over an existing station in Greensboro NC renamed it rebuilt it and had WJTM on the air by April of 1981 Just over a year ago WRLH came to Richmond amidst a flurry of bad weather In mid-April fourth TV station goes on the air in Memphis Twin All are independents meaning they affiliated with networks and are responsible for all their own programming "This is truly the decade of independents and we believe sums up chairman of the board Gene Loving a former radio personality turned radio station owner now successful TV entrepreneur Most of the current coverage of television would have you think otherwise this supposed to be the decade of cable television? Aha gloats McDonald what cable thought You can have channel after channel you can have new delivery systems you can have pay channels but what it still boils down to is on the TV set want McDonald says succinctly care how Cable TV for all of its press has seen its programming failures during this shakedown period CBS Cable an arts channel bit the dust a few months ago ESPN as of last Tuesday had to drop its all-sports look and add business news The Entertainment Channel a classy pay-extra channel has also had to fold although it plans to return later as an advertiser-supported basic cable service (But some new cable services are starting up For instance The Nashville Network premieres this week although not in this area) As a matter of fact most trade publications label independent stations more of a threat to network television (ABC NBC and CBS) than cable And that is because of the growing number of independents In 1969 according to the Association of Independent Television Stations there were only 62 independents on the air Thirteen years later there are 179 such statins The association estimates Independents are available to 78 percent of the TV households In comparison cable is available to only 85 percent That 78 percent does not go unnoticed by producers and advertisers Independent stations formerly the TV graveyard where old series went to die now carry such first run programming as the acclaimed and more recently Like its industry TVX has come a long way in a short period of time It has plans to go even farther Its newest station WMKW is located in the 36th largest TV market compared to Norfolk at 46th and Richmond at 56th TVX now has its sights on a TV station in Nashville the 30th TV market WRLH whichSnade its on-air debut Feb 20 1982 is success story its shining Jewel The station by recent rating figures averages an overall 8 percent share of area TV audiences which represents a much faster growth rate than first station WTVZ (Norfolk differs from the Richmond market however in that it has two independents in the area) Richmond viewers have welcomed Channel alternative programming its movies on Sunday 11 pjn weeknights programming weekday mornings and prime time movies that often offer recent and popular titles Not all of Journey has been smooth sailing the matter of the station in Hartford Conn Another organisation a Los Angeles-based Hispanic agency owned 49 percent of the stock and the contract to purchase TVX was to operate the station Then the Hispanic group came under investigation because of alleged criminal misuse of federal funds made the decision we be in business with said Loving which put an end to Hartford venture Added McDonald: need potential trouble down the WMKW the new Memphis independent represents a more successful Joint venture TVX owns 51 percent of the Televison Corporation of Memphis with the balance of the stock owned by a group of Memphis investors including Kemmons Wilson founder of the Holiday Inns of American In comparison TVX holds 100 percent of the stock of the Television Corporation of Virginia (licensee of WTVZ) the Television Corporation of North Carolina (WJTM) and the Television Corporation of Richmond (WRLH) game plan is to go into progressively larger and larger markets costs just as much to build and By Joy Winstead Times-Dispatch Staff Writer in real life compares to it an illusion you have never experienced before true moving Garry Musgrave engineering manager for the Canadian firm of Commercial Electronics was trying to describe the experience of hearing the 3300000 sound and automation system being installed in Universe the planetarium-space theater under construction at the Science Museum of Virginia He does not know of a comparable system in the United States or Canada When a person walks across the room while talking the sound moves because the source is moving The planetarium system can create the same effect he said Its 34 speaker units each with three speaker components have been installed throughout the interior dome which is 76 feet in diameter A Joy stick similar to the control on an airplane enables the system to produce sounds from one speaker or 34 or any combination the first film selected to be shown in the space theater will show off the Omni sound system Musgrave said The film will take visitors on a flight through billions of years simulating the creation of Earth the splitting of continents the eruptions weighed about 175 pounds Universe also will have an eight-track recording studio capable of making records Musgrave said and sound tracks for new shows can be made in the studio by the museum staff composer will take advantage of the moving sound he said is a quantum leap from all our previous systems The closest to it is one we did in Jackson Min which has 25 channels compared to 34-here To finally hear all 34 in this dome will be quite Financed by state and private funds Universe is being built adjacent to the museum's west wing The planetariumspace theater will seat 300 It has three flows and 32000 square feet (including 9000 square feet of exhibit space) Universe will have the first computer graphics planetarium projector Digistar 1 and Omnimax the largst motion picture system Ominmax will project a high fidelity 70-millimeter motion picture on the inside of the dome The picture will fill a entire field of -vision Musgrave who designed sound systems for rock bands before Joining Commercial Elec- tronics nearly four years ago said one of their systems is on tour with Waylon Jennings I understand it there is a mandate to build the finest planetarium and some of the world's finest equipment is here" he said watts in the average home stereo system The engineering manager said the most difficult job was installing the speakers which have a total weight of 6000 pounds in the dome Workers had to build a false Boar under the dome on scaffolding and lie mi dollies to fasten 18 bolts into each of 34 units Each unit of volcanoes and plunges to the ocean depths Universe which will cost 35 million including exhibits is scheduled to open April 21 The sound system has 11000 watts of amplifier power Musgrave said compared to 90 There are 108 separate speakers (each with its own amplifier) and 54 stereo amplifiers He said the closest comparable experience in terms of power would be hearing a large rock concert Morant9 director has new film By Larence Van Gelder New York Times Service life which was anything like he says of the films seen which show rural life in America showed people as being generally very brutal almost any of the Deep South movies was a script that told a story about a group of people whose preoccupations were very ordinary who went to church on Sunday who murder each other And yet I thought it made an absolutely fascinating Filming of whose cost Hobel puts at 35 million began in Waxahachie Tex Nov 2 1981 and ended NEW YORK have a feeling it really matter what other films I make" says Bruce Beresford always be introduced as Bruce Beresford who made Despite this prognosis of a lifetime of fruitless competition with himself the Australian director who made the highly acclaimed 1979 film about the court martial of Australian troops during the Boer War has continued to make films And the latest of them starring Robert Duvall Tess Harper and Allan Hubbard was scheduled to open last week in New York Continued on Page 3 Col 1 Based on a script by Horton Foote tells the story of a divorced country and western singer tossed up on a tide of alcohol at an isolated gas station-motel in Texas where he meets the young widow of a soldier killed in Vietnam and her son In time they constitute a new family Beresford says three people who had to come to terms with major changes in their lives" Though will be received by many Americans as first effort since the fact is that it is his third The first of the films The dealt with a soccer club and was exhibited in a number of theaters on the West Coast in 1980 The second based on a novel of school life by a 15-year-old girl has never been seen in the United States though Beresford describes it as a financial success more so than he notes In the meantime was giving rise to a steady flow of scripts from the United States say at least 150 over a period of a couple of Beresford says a lot of them very good In August 1980 he recalls the script of dispatched by the American producers Philip and Mary-Ann Hobel arrived at the home Beresford shares with his wife and three children in Sydney he says read it and Just went straight to the phone and rang up and said you really want me to do it come and do Australian director Bruce Beresford (left) on location at his most recent film Mercies said he believes he will always be known as Beresford who 'Breaker The film set in Texas stars (above) Tess Harper Robert Duvall and Allan Hubbard For Beresford held a number of appeals of American.