Eager Beaver

After his first major TV appearance, John Cameron Swayze eagerly phoned his wife Tuffie. "How did I look?" he asked breathlessly. Said Turner "Like you were dead." A bit dismayed, Swayze got rid of most of the television make-up he had been wearing, added a toupee to thicken out his sparse thatch, set himself to cultivating an air of friendly animation. In three years, these simple measures have helped to propel brisk, 45-year-old Newsaster Swayze into a bigger-than-TV prominence. His Camel News Caravan weekdays, 7:45 p.m., NBCTV) now has an audience of some 5,000,000, rates as one of the liveliest news shows on television. Each 15-minute program begins with Commentator Swayze's crisp delivery of he latest news bulletins. As he talks, the camera may switch to an animated war map, or a newsreel film of U.S. troops in action. Sometimes there is a quick jump to Washington, London or Rome for filmed shots of political headliners and recorded interviews. After more news films --supplied by over 50 NBC cameramen cattered from Seville to Seoul--the show goes to Chicago for the weather forecast with the help of a big weather map. Most of the background tricks are no novelty to TV audiences. What gives Camel News the edge is smooth production and Commentator Swayze's knack of tying the whole show together.

Never Say No. His job on Camel News is only one of John Cameron Swayze's many current enterprises. An ex-newspaperman (Kansas City Journal-Post) and radio newscaster, he first made his mark in 1948, during the presidential conventions in Philadelphia. TV was then still feeling its way and cordially welcomed a commentator like Swayze, who was both durable and willing ("I never said no to anything"). From the solid success of Camel News, he moved on to become a permanent panel member of NBC's Who Said That? (Mon. 10:30 p.m.), where he dazzles his audience with a seemingly encyclopedic memory of current hews events.

Actually, Swayze is more eager beaver than elephant. In preparing for the show, he reads the New York Times and the news weeklies avidly, clips whatever seems interesting and restudies his quotes before going on the air. On Sundays, he acts as M.C. of another NBC-TV show called Watch the World, a series of filmed subjects aimed at children.

Never a Pundit. Swayze is also getting some belated recognition from the two mediums in which he worked for 20 years. Early this year, McNaught Syndicate hired Swayze to do a column called "New York," now appearing in 50 newspapers--a sentimental and often arch performance which reminds some readers of the folksy prose of the late O. O. Mclntyre. And last week, Swayze signed with Sponsor Raytheon (TV sets) for a 15-minute radio news program starkly entitled John Cameron Swayze (Sun. 3:45 p.m., NBC).

No pundit, Swayze leaves big political thinking out of all his shows, likes to concentrate on human interest stories. Says Swayze: "Leaving people feeling good--that's my role."

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