Television: The Biggest Giveaway

One of the chiggers beneath the skins of network bigwigs and Madison Avenue operatives is the custom of the free plug, or “plugola.” A TV comic, disk jockey or M.C. slips a brand name into his patter, e.g., “They said I was drunk, but it was all relative—Old Grand-Dad,” and he or his gagwriter can count on the “payola”—a case or two of whisky in the next delivery. Offenses have occurred most persistently on the Bob Hope, Jack Benny, Arthur Godfrey, Steve Allen and Robert Q. Lewis shows; yet the networks fear to order their stars to stop the practice.

But when a minor comedian named Gene Baylos successively plugged a vodka, a brand of rainboots and a bourbon on a five-minute, five-a-week local show called Punch Line last week, NBC’s Manhattan station WRCA clamped down, announced that it would dock Baylos’ $1,000 salary by $675—the price of three ten-second advertising spots. “It was a flagrant violation of policy,” explained NBC. “We hope to teach him a lesson.” Cried Baylos: “It was only a joke. Why do they pick on a broke little guy like me and never bother the big boys?”

NBC’s answer was broadly evasive: “We have to start with the proposition that if we have particularly topical comedians like Hope, we will also have plugs. A rule which tries to bar all plugs is not only unworkable but undesirable.” NBC also admitted that it had tried with little success “to cut down on the number of trade-name references” used by Hope.

The Baylos threat may succeed in scaring minor offenders away from free-plugging, but the big-timers will undoubtedly go right on stocking their cellars and larders with the old payola.