Was Hitch watching cartoons on tv in colour in 1959? - Hitchcock (2012) Discussion

[–] hadley1905 10 years ago

The first US colour TV broadcast was in 1951. There were some colour TVs in the 1950s, and why wouldn't a film director be an early adopter?

reply

[–] tonaluv 10 years ago

Australia didn't get colour tv until 1975. And I always thought the US went colour around '68 and that's why the Elvis comeback special was such a big deal in colour. So you are telling me USA had colour tv in the 50's?

reply

[–] gamay9 9 years ago

I bought my first color TV in 1963, just before I was drafted. It was a Singer, the company I worked for. Considering Hitchcock's considerable financial resources, I'm sure the film portrayed the cartoon bit 'business as usual.'

reply

[–] tonaluv 10 years ago

Australia didn't get colour tv until 1975. And I always thought the US went colour around '68 and that's why the Elvis comeback special was such a big deal in colour. So you are telling me USA had colour tv in the 50's?

reply

[–] snelling 10 years ago

Why do you post everything twice?

Enter my contest! I need help for a new signature! Maybe I'll choose yours and you'll win a cash prize!

reply

[–] finalfadeout 10 years ago

Color TV was available commercially since 1954, so it had already been on the market for 5 years. Shows like Bonanza in 1959 were filmed and broadcast in color from the beginning. The color changeover you speak of in the late 60s was when networks moved all shows to color, while the first ones had been many years before that. It did remain out of reach for the average consumer for some time though. It was similar to when HDTV first came out and 4K OLED sets today, being too expensive to be common.

reply

[–] Critical_Beatdown 10 years ago

Actually colour TV has been a around a lot longer than that. Flowers and Trees a Disney film produced in 1932 used one the earliest forms of Technicolor... it was basic but there was colour. It's a perfectly feasible scene.

Suicide, it’s a suicide

reply

[–] david-3444 10 years ago

Do you seriously not know the difference between color film and color television? Disney's Silly Symphonies of the 1930s had nothing whatsoever to do with television of any sort.

reply

[–] ameilius 10 years ago

That scene puzzled me too. I was born in 1952 and no one I knew ever had a color tv set until well into the 60's. However, it is possible that the Hitchcocks would've had one. By 1959 color tv probably existed but only as a cuttin edge tech, available to just the wealthy few. Someone like Hitch would have been just the type to go out and buy one regardless of the cost.

reply

[–] jbacks3 10 years ago

I was born in '57 and distinctly remember seeing my first color set (a Curtis Mathis that cost over $1,000) in 1964. And the entire neighborhood schemed to hang out at these folks' house to watch Bonanza every Sunday night. While color shows became somewhat common in '66 it didn't become universal until 1968. I've heard that color sets were sold in the 50's but the cost of color sets didn't really become affordable until the early 70's when more Asian brands came over--- cripes, my family had a monstrous Admiral B&W until 1966 that would go berserk when the tubes got hot (remember those TV tube testers in supermarkets?). To me, UHF sets (1968-69) were more important than color-- which we didn't have until 1974, a year before we scored our Amana Radarange (or in American Hustle lingo, a nutrition-depleting "Science Oven").

reply

[–] macknife-2 10 years ago

I just saw that scene too and it struck me odd. With all of the previous info regarding color television being essentially correct, this scene I am sure is incorrect. They should have had him watching black and white cartoons on TV. Why?
....because even thought their WAS color tv back then, it was very limited. There were no local channels broadcasting cartoons in color I am quite sure in 1959.

reply

[–] liz_anderson 10 years ago

Very limited... to say, people with plenty of money to buy extravagant things?? People in Hollywood, like Hitchcock.

reply

[–] txfilmfan 10 years ago

Local color TV was available, even in markets such as Oklahoma City, at that time. Los Angeles had local color TV stations broadcasting in color in 1959.

reply

[–] stomaino 10 years ago

My grandparents bought a color tv in either 1958 or 1959. Nighttime color shows included stuff like "Bonanza" and the original "The Price is Right."

I would go over to my my grandparent's house every Saturday morning to watch IN COLOR, "The Howdy Doody Show." As anyone can see, the last season of that show was 1959-1960, so it was certainly in 1959. That show was followed by "Ruff and Ready", Hanna-Barbera's first cartoon show and that was also IN COLOR.

So, yes, Hitchcock could have been watching color cartoons in 1959. If my grandparents, who had made their money repairing and selling shoes in a small town could afford one, Hitchcock certainly could.

And, there was, at least, one color cartoon TV show, broadcast on (of course), NBC.

Sam Tomaino

reply

[–] liz_anderson 10 years ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_television

It was expensive, but had been around for a few years before. The money would not really have been an issue to him though.

reply

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] taticat 9 years ago

I can't speak from first-hand experience (relying on family memories of those who are now early eighties), but the type of tv/hi-fi combo deelybob they showed in the movie was quite certainly period in the US, and quite certainly colour. One side had a turntable and radio tuner, and the other side held records or liquor, depending on the design or the owner's wishes.

reply