One of Today‘s most famous features in the early years was the big window along 49th Street. Not only could people watch Today as it was being produced live, but often the people on the street became part of the show. The RCA Exhibition Hall became kind of a tourist magnet in those years, and there are many stories of how some onlookers used that window and the chance to be on television for purposes sweet (a man who stopped by the window and greeted his mute mother in sign language) and sneaky (a man who used the window to plug a competing show).
But the window didn’t last forever, and Today moved out of the RCA Exhibition Hall in July 1958. Part of it was practical – putting the show in a storefront had brought challenges, and there was only so much space. Part of it was because a rival television manufacturer had charged that it was unfair competition for NBC to put on a television show in its parent company’s glass-fronted exhibition hall, where RCA’s products could be seen on television.
So came the move across the street, and on July 7, 1958 Today began to originate from Studio 3K1 in the RCA Building2 Although there was some amazement at how much more spacious the new studio was (associate producer Mary Kelly marveled to a reporter that the new control room seemed as big as the old studio), there were things the show missed. A lot of memories and a lot of history had been made in the Exhibition Hall. Betsy Palmer3 would remember that the window provided a form of connection with the audience, and the audience with the show. It was live and spontaneous. “When we went into the third-floor studio,” she said, “all of a sudden it was like losing the air.”4
And it didn’t take long to realize something was missing. That big window had provided more than just a trademark for Today; it also had a practical function. When there was time to fill, or when there was a cutaway to a break, that window and the people on the other side were a convenient and interesting visual. Now, inside the studio, that was gone. This became obvious the first day. Stage manager Fred Lights5 would later remember a gap of about thirty seconds they had to fill with something. “No one had thought about a replacement for the window,” Lights said. “We had nothing to shoot. You should have seen the shock, the chaos, that first morning in the studio. It looked like the chariot race for Ben Hur.”
And immediately after the show was finished, they solved the problem. A fish tank was brought into 3K. Now, when a visual was needed, the camera would linger on sights aquatic. Sometimes this would be built into the show’s rundown; during the five-minute “co-op” made available to local stations, those remaining with the network might see Garroway and the rest of the cast chatting, or they might get the fish swimming lazily along as music played behind.
Other tactics were employed to bring back some spontaneity. In January 1959, bleachers for a studio audience were set up in the studio, and 40 people each day were allowed to watch the show (but were not provided with coffee).6 But that experiment proved short-lived. The fish tank remained, but it couldn’t take the place of what had been left behind on the street below.
In 1962 Today took another try at capturing the spontaneity of a decade before. Through an arrangement with Florida’s tourism board, NBC originated Today from the Florida Showcase, the state’s tourism office on the ground floor of 30 Rock, with big display windows along 49th Street. For three years passersby could look in, watch the show on the air, and occasionally be captured by the cameras. But this came at a price, as each day the set had to be taken down and all the television equipment stowed away so Florida’s tourism office could conduct business. Plus NBC, going full-color, couldn’t justify keeping several precious (and HUGE7) color cameras down on the ground floor when they were needed in the main studios upstairs. So once again, Today lost its window on New York. For nearly three decades, the views of New York from within the Today studio would be through graphics.
In June 1994 Today went back to where it all began – or, at least, next door. A building on the corner of Rockefeller Plaza and 49th Street was converted into a modern television studio known as Studio 1A. With large glass windows along two sides, Today had gone back to its roots. And just as happened in the days when Garroway held court in the Exhibition Hall just down the street, it didn’t take long for the people outside the window to become part of the show. And, once again, a big window on 49th Street has become a must-see for tourists visiting New York.
- 3K is historic for many reasons. It includes the space once occupied by Studio 3H, which RCA took over in 1935 to conduct experiments in television, and thus became NBC’s first television studio when regular broadcasts began. In 1951 3H began being used as a testing ground for concepts in color television, then in 1955 NBC took out the wall between it and the adjacent Studio 3F. This expanded studio was designated 3K, with the “K” reportedly standing for “Kolor.” The last five years of Howdy Doody, including Clarabell’s famous “Goodbye, kids,” came from there. Like the other third-floor studios, 3K has in recent years been used by NBC News, MSNBC, or WNBC-TV.
- Architectural trivia: the “RCA Building” – or “30 Rock” – is really an assemblage of three buildings. There’s the big iconic skyscraper that you can buy tickets to visit the top of. But behind it is a long, flat building – that’s the Studio Building, which houses all the studios you know and love. And on the Sixth Avenue end of the complex is a smaller office tower, the West Building. But the magic of architecture makes it all look like one city block full of giant building. How about that?
- The actress, whose diverse career is probably most remembered by modern audiences for her villainous role in Friday the 13th, served as a “Today Girl” for a few months in 1958.
- Palmer’s quote, along with the quote below from Fred Lights, is from The Today Show: An Anecdotal History: The First Thirty-Five Years by Gerry Davis (Quill William Morrow, 1987), p. 34.
- One of the first, and possibly the first, African-American stage managers in network television.
- This really wasn’t a new idea for Today. A 1951 proposal suggested originating what would become Today from Studio 8G with a live audience, along with a band, a resident comedian and singers as part of the cast. It would more or less have been NBC’s televised version of Don McNeill’s Breakfast Club.
- This is not me trying to be funny. Having been up close and personal with a TK-41, it’s huge. And really heavy.