Semper Chow

After one splendiferous night last week, about as many living, breathing citizens remained unaware of Marine Captain Richard S. McCutchen, 28--the first man to dare "The $64,000 Question"--as there are whooping cranes left on the North American continent.

To 55 million televiewers who saw him conquer an adman's dream of Everest, Dick McCutchen proved a perfect dish. Shaken well, he had the drawling deference of a vintage Jimmy Stewart, the nerve of a riverboat gambler, and the Montezuman morale of a Marine. Not the least, he had an astronomical gastronomical education, inherited from his globetrotting naval-officer father, who has spent years accumulating exotic recipes.

To Paris With Hunger. Now a 55-year-old retired captain (Annapolis '23), father John McCutchen first invaded his wife's kitchen in San Francisco in 1932; between "fiddling with cake-baking," he roamed the city's fabled restaurants, pored over cookbooks. For Dick's tenth birthday party he whipped out a succulent Lobster Newburg ("not exactly for a kid's stomach, but that's what he wanted"). Permanently intrigued, Dick thenceforth stirred while "The Skipper" mixed the local delicacies of Manila, Tsingtao or New Orleans. In Panama, on lazy Saturday afternoons, the gourmets caught and charcoal-grilled barracuda, red snapper or king mackerel together off Farallon Sucio.

The Skipper never served in Paris, the fount of his lore, but Dick did. Foresightedly, the Marine Corps sent the young officer there in 1952 to command the U.S. embassy guard, a plush detail enabling him to swallow new wines and sauces at great restaurants, while adding and subtracting their stars in the Guide Michelin. After a hitch in Korea (where raw spider crabs caked in crushed red pepper failed to thrill him), Captain McCutchen went to Ohio State University to teach naval science.

The Big Gamble. To a man with a wife and three daughters to support on $435 a month, "The $64,000 Question" seemed a highly interesting game. In June he wrote a semiserious letter to the producers, beginning: "Being endowed with normal mental faculties . . ." They paid his way to New York, quickly appraised him as a genuinely knowledgeable candidate whose "warmth" and "sparkle" made him an acceptable contestant. In no time he had mounted the program's cash "plateaus" by identifying flour in five breads for $16,000, five desserts for $32,000 (taxcut to $20,090), found himself with the option of going all the way. Getting ready for his final appearance last week, he took his uniform to be cleaned. Pleaded the tailor: "Let me take it to my synagogue tonight and I'll pray over it." Dick went back to boning up on Volume 23 of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (vegetables, vitamins, wines), The Wise Encyclopedia of Cookery and Simon's A Concise Encyclopaedia of Gastronomy.

As so often happens in final exams, the last minute cramming was wholly unnecessary. The question: identify five dishes and two wines on the now-famous menu of a royal banquet given in 1939 by King George VI for French President Albert Lebrun. The items: Consomme Quenelles, Filet de truite saumonee, Petits Pois `a la franc,aise, Sauce maltaise, Corbeille, Chateau Yquem; Madeira Sercial. The minute he heard it, Captain McCutchen knew he was rich.* Inside the isolation booth he conferred with his father-advisor (for appearance sake only, it seemed), cracked his knuckles, and cracked out the answers. Squealed Emcee Hal March, amid crashing chords of The Marine Hymn: "If you're symbolic of the Marine Corps, Dick, I don't see how we'll ever lose any battles!"

Love That McCutchen. The program's sponsor, Charles Revson, president of Revlon Products Corp., had more than the occasion to be choked up about as he unhanded the Big Check. With an $11 million advertising budget, Revlon was spending a cut-rate $64,000 (plus prizes) weekly for a show that, according to one survey, was being watched on 84.8% of all TV sets in operation. So far, Revlon has paid contestants only $175,000 and two Cadillacs. Sales of such Revlon paints and powders as Love That Pink, Living Lipstick and Touch and Glow are up as much as 50%. Its nearest lipstick competitor, Hazel Bishop, had been forced to pass its quarterly dividend.

On the man Revlon could thank most last week, admiration descended from all directions. Headlined Paris Presse: PRESIDENT LEBRUN'S GREEN PEAS WON $64,000 FOR CAPTAIN RICHARD. British newspapers lovingly frontpaged the event. The U.S. Hearst chain extracted eight articles from McCutchen on his life and times (BE "CAPTAIN COOK'S" GUEST, shouted the headlines). State fairs beseeched his appearance. Publishers begged him to write cookbooks. In a New York delicatessen, the proprietor refused to let him leave without a 3-ft. gift roll of salami. But from Marine Corps Commandant Lemuel Shepherd Jr. came the most important response of all: Captain Richard S. McCutchen, USMC, was ordered to Washington to review the sunset parade and dine (on roast beef) amid the general's shimmering crystal. That almost equaled $64,000 (net $32,850) any time.

*He might have been less sure if asked to identify the entire menu of that 1939 dinner. Dishes left out: Rouennais `a la gelee Reine Elizabeth, Garniture Buzancy, Mignonnette d'Agneau Royale, Pommes nouvelles rissolees au beurre, Poussin Mercy-le-Haut, Salade Elysee, Asperges vertes, Bombe l'Entente Cordiale, Cassolette Bassillac. Wines left out: Sherry 1865, Piesporter Goldtroepfchen 1924, Deidesheimer Kieselberg 1921, Perrier-Jouet 1919, Chateau Haut-Brion 1904, Royal Tawny Port, Brandy 1815.

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