Cable was a big deal in 1980. It was the hot new medium. Everybody’s life was going to be changed by it. Everyone could have his or her own public access program. Everyone could communicate his or her own vision to the community. Local access, baby! The electronic hearth! We would no longer be fed viewing choices dictated solely by big media corporations.
For those who thought TV was a wasteland filled with crap, well, we could now begin to make our own crap. On shoestring budgets. I made mine at Sunflower Cablevision in Lawrence, Kansas. It became a laboratory of the absurd. Here's an example that we made in my home one day over lunch break.
You might actually be familiar with this. Another example of extreme low budget nonsense with a $14 budget.
Dip Head actually made it to "America's Funniest Home Videos."
Directed by Dave Clark. Featuring Rusty Laushman. I get concept, writing credit. We did this after work one day at Sunflower.
I was the self-appointed Marketing Director at Sunflower. Originally I had been hired to sell advertising time on the local Kansas Jayhawks and Lawrence Lions delayed cablecasts on Sunflower 6. That is a high-powered ad sales position! But I wanted to expand beyond selling ad time so I suggested that I be named the Marketing Director. That had a nice ring to it. GM Dave Clark had no objections, which he rarely did, so I was now a cable marketing man.
Sunflower GM Dave Clark & I cementing a deal.
The concept of HBO for Christmas was real groundbreaking stuff.
Like every situation I find myself in, this new cable arena was ripe for songs. Below is my singing resume, "I'm the Cable TV Marketing Man." This video enjoyed a certain vogue at various cable conferences and annual meetings. It aired a number of times on WTTW's (Chicago) Image Union and KTWU, the PBS station in Topeka( thanks to Gerry Cullen). Directing credit to Dave Clark, the only cable GM I ever knew who could also edit and direct.
During this time frame, Ted Turner, the industry's star, had been making his move. He was brash. He rubbed broadcast execs the wrong way. He told them that they were doomed. He was a cablecaster not a broadcaster. It wasn’t just television anymore. It was the delivery system and the promise of what could develop because of this new technology.
In 1982 I attended a seminar in Atlanta hosted by CNN for local cable companies. When we broke for lunch, sitting at one of the dining tables was The Man—Ted Turner. I slid into the seat next to him. "Hi, Ted. I'm Roger Bain from Lawrence, Kansas." "Hi, Roger. Excuse me while I take a bite of my sandwich." The guy was frenetic, freewheeling, juiced up on his own self, full of swagger, and worried that we were going to get blasted into the Stone Age by a nuclear firestorm. (Reagan had been rattling the sword of late, creating a feeling of dread.)
Ted had just returned from a trip to Cuba where he’d hung with Castro. He told me that Fidel was also mighty nervous about the world situation. That stoked Ted’s own nervousness. "If Fidel's worried, I'm worried." (This was probably the time when the cable mogul began thinking of buffalo ranching.)
Ted puffs on a recent gift from Fidel Castro while
I get in a word
After the CNN seminar meal, which consisted of variety lunch meats and cheeses, tomato slice, lettuce and condiments, including pickle, Ted lit up one of Fidel’s cigars and told me with a wave and a puff that Castro had actually cut a CNN promo but Ted couldn’t air it because of a guaranteed backlash from the Miami Cubans. "This is Fidel Castro and you're watching CNN."