"Who's Winning?"

In the junglelike clutter and heat of the Senate caucus room, a battery of microphones and three television cameras caught the drone and tension of the Army-McCarthy hearings. The performers could scarcely match the line-up of the 1951 Senate crime hearings, which starred such unforgettable characters as Bible-quoting Senator Charles Tobey, Underworld Moll Virginia Hill and Frank ("The Hands") Costello, but the cast was fascinating in its own way. There were McCarthy, alternately menacing and benign, doodling or rolling his eyes at the ceiling; slick-haired Roy Cohn, licking his lips and buzzing in the boss's ear; Secretary Stevens, eager but harassed, his horn-rimmed glasses forever sliding down his nose; Arkansas' Senator McClellan. rough and ready, if sometimes confused, the committee's angry man; Senator Mundt, jowls aquiver, chugging at his pipe; Counsel Ray Jenkins, with his formidable scowl and unrelenting legalistic precision.

Audience Apathy. At least during the early stages of procedure wrangles in the caucus room, the size and enthusiasm of the TV audience were well below expectations. Hooper ratings showed that only about 11% of New York City homes with TV sets were tuned to the first two days of hearings--one-third the interest of the 1951 crime show. Trendex and other pollsters found the same audience apathy in other cities. In California, where the afternoon sessions arrive at lunchtime, restaurants reported a marked but not serious customer shortage. In Toronto, interest was greater than in most U.S. cities, with viewers jamming bars and TV demonstration rooms to catch the act beamed from Buffalo's WBEN-TV.

Three networks--NBC, ABC and Du Mont--telecast the opening two days in full. CBS, with the most daytime-sponsor bookings at stake, took the stand that televiewers ought to have a choice of entertainment ("Not everybody wants to get in on the McCarthy fight"), and confined itself to Morning Show and late-at-night filmed highlights. After a look at the ratings, NBC this week announced that it would substitute filmed summaries for the real thing. The first two days, reported the network, had cost it more than $125,000 in canceled commercial programs. ABC, with some 50 stations picking up the hearings, and Du Mont (ten stations) promised to carry the hearings live as long as they last.

When Chicago faced a blackout of the hearings after NBC and Tribune station WGN-TV dropped the show, Marshall Field Jr.'s Sun-Times stepped in, guaranteed "several thousand dollars a day" to help the local ABC outlet keep the show on the air.

Private Snort. The caucus room coverage was smoothly professional. Under pool arrangements, it was ABC's turn to supply equipment and technicians. In a steaming mobile unit parked in the Senate building courtyard, Ed Scherer, a 25-year-old TV director for Baltimore's WMAR-TV, selected the best shots to be fed to the networks. After pedestrian coverage the first morning, the cameramen sharpened, even anticipated Joe McCarthy's points of order. Said one: "When he looks disgusted, we put our camera on him." At one point, McCarthy passed a scribbled note to the TV men: "Could I have time off from cameras for ten seconds to use handkerchief?" It was granted, and McCarthy blew his nose in private.

Many TV viewers felt like the Detroit housewife who told a telephone canvasser: "I was just saying to myself, 'Who is this Schine guy?'"; but the drama of men struggling through the mazes of facts to get at truth was still greatly exciting. Said a Denver TV executive, after a survey of bars and appliance stores: "It's being regarded as a sporting event. 'Who's winning it?'--that's what people say."

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