Startime (TV series)

Startime
Eve McVeagh in "Incident at a Corner" directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Also known as	''Ford Startime – TV's Finest Hour Lincoln-Mercury Startime''
Genre	Drama/comedy/music anthology
Country of origin	United States of America
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	33 episodes
Production
Running time	60/90 minutes
Production company(s)	Hubbell Robinson Productions, Shamley Productions
Release
Original network	NBC Television Network
Original release	October 6, 1959 – May 31, 1960

Startime is an anthology show of drama, comedy, and variety, and was one of the first American television shows broadcast in color. The program was aired Tuesday nights in the United States on the NBC Television network in the 1959-60 television season.

The show was known as either Ford Startime—TV's Finest Hour or Lincoln–Mercury Startime, depending on which division of the Ford Motor Company was presenting commercials within that show. The contents varied from week to week — dramas, musical comedies, and variety shows were all presented.

The show was always broadcast on Tuesday nights. Initially, from the premiere through the end of 1959, the show was broadcast 9:30–10:30 PM (EST) -- but, starting on January 5, 1960, the show was broadcast 8:30–9:30 PM (EST). Furthermore, some of the shows first broadcast in 1959 were ninety minutes long, continuing to 11 PM.

Some of the presentations of this series might be considered tryouts—for example, Dean Martin hosted two variety episodes within this series, several years before he began his own successful variety show. The same is true for Mitch Miller, and, to a lesser extent, Art Linkletter.

The Music Corporation of America (MCA), under Lew Wasserman, was the "packager" of the series, providing stars who would not ordinarily appear on American television, such as Alec Guinness and Rex Harrison at reduced rates, in exchange for an overall packaging fee for the entire series paid to MCA. Wasserman was also the agent for Alfred Hitchcock, who directed one Startime episode, "Incident at a Corner" (aired April 5, 1960).

For example, Ingrid Bergman, who at that time commanded a salary of $750,000 per film and who had never appeared in a dramatic role on American television, was paid $100,000 for her role in Startime's presentation of The Turn of the Screw. Though MCA only received $10,000 (10% of Bergman's salary) as commission, the company also received, as packager, 10% of the entire production schedule of the entire Startime season (which was $7.24 million). In other words, MCA received $724,000 solely for providing to Startime the services of stars such as Bergman, in addition to the commissions for each individual star.