compère or master of ceremonies to introduce the items in the elaborate global show
that would be watched by half the human race.
Heaven knows how much conniving,
blackmail, and downright character assassination went on behind the scenes. All
we knew was that a week before the great day, a nonscheduled rocket came up to
orbit with Gregory Wendell aboard. This was quite a surprise, since Gregory
wasn’t as big a TV personality as, say, Jeffers Jackson in the US or Vince Clifford in Britain . However, it seemed that the big boys had
cancelled each other out, and Gregg had got the coveted job through one of
those compromises so well known to politicians.
Gregg had started his career as a
disc jockey on a university radio station in the American Midwest, and had
worked his way up through the Hollywood and Manhattan night-club circuits until he had a daily,
nationwide programme of his own. Apart from his cynical yet relaxed
personality, his biggest asset was his deep velvet voice, for which he could
probably thank his Negro blood. Even when you flatly disagreed with what he was
saying – even, indeed, when he was tearing you to pieces in an interview – it
was still a pleasure to listen to him.
We gave him the grand tour of the
space station, and even (strictly against regulations) took him out through the
air lock in a space suit. He loved it all, but there were two things he liked
in particular. ‘This air you make,’ he said, ‘it beats the stuff we have to
breathe down in New York . This is the first time my sinus trouble has gone since I went into
TV.’ He also relished the low gravity; at the station’s rim, a man had half his
normal, Earth weight – and at the axis he had no weight at all.
However, the novelty of his
surroundings didn’t distract Gregg from his job. He spent hours at
Communications Central, polishing his script and getting his cues right, and
studying the dozens of monitor screens that would be his windows on the world.
I came across him once while he was running through his introduction of Queen
Elizabeth, who would be speaking from Buckingham Palace at the very end of the programme. He was so
intent on his rehearsal that he never even noticed I was standing beside him.
Well, that telecast is now part of
history. For the first time a billion human beings watched a single programme
that came ‘live’ from every corner of the Earth, and was a roll call of the
world’s greatest citizens. Hundreds of cameras on land and sea and air looked
inquiringly at the turning globe; and at the end there was that wonderful shot
of the Earth through a zoom lens on the space station, making the whole planet
recede until it was lost among the stars …
There were a few hitches, of course.
One camera on the bed of the Atlantic wasn’t ready on cue, and we had to spend some extra time looking at the Taj
Mahal. And owing to a switching error Russian subtitles were superimposed on
the South American transmission, while half the USSR found itself trying to read Spanish. But
this was nothing to what might have
happened.
Through the entire three hours,
introducing the famous and the unknown with equal ease, came the mellow yet
never orotund flow of Gregg’s voice. He did a magnificent job; the
congratulations came pouring up the beam the moment the broadcast finished. But
he didn’t hear them; he made one short, private call to his agent, and then
went to bed.
Next morning, the Earth-bound ferry
was waiting to take him back to any job he cared to accept. But it left without
Gregg Wendell, now junior station announcer of Relay Two.
‘They’ll think I’m crazy,’ he said,
beaming happily, ‘but why should I go back to that rat race down there? I’ve
all the
that would be watched by half the human race.
Heaven knows how much conniving,
blackmail, and downright character assassination went on behind the scenes. All
we knew was that a week before the great day, a nonscheduled rocket came up to
orbit with Gregory Wendell aboard. This was quite a surprise, since Gregory
wasn’t as big a TV personality as, say, Jeffers Jackson in the US or Vince Clifford in Britain . However, it seemed that the big boys had
cancelled each other out, and Gregg had got the coveted job through one of
those compromises so well known to politicians.
Gregg had started his career as a
disc jockey on a university radio station in the American Midwest, and had
worked his way up through the Hollywood and Manhattan night-club circuits until he had a daily,
nationwide programme of his own. Apart from his cynical yet relaxed
personality, his biggest asset was his deep velvet voice, for which he could
probably thank his Negro blood. Even when you flatly disagreed with what he was
saying – even, indeed, when he was tearing you to pieces in an interview – it
was still a pleasure to listen to him.
We gave him the grand tour of the
space station, and even (strictly against regulations) took him out through the
air lock in a space suit. He loved it all, but there were two things he liked
in particular. ‘This air you make,’ he said, ‘it beats the stuff we have to
breathe down in New York . This is the first time my sinus trouble has gone since I went into
TV.’ He also relished the low gravity; at the station’s rim, a man had half his
normal, Earth weight – and at the axis he had no weight at all.
However, the novelty of his
surroundings didn’t distract Gregg from his job. He spent hours at
Communications Central, polishing his script and getting his cues right, and
studying the dozens of monitor screens that would be his windows on the world.
I came across him once while he was running through his introduction of Queen
Elizabeth, who would be speaking from Buckingham Palace at the very end of the programme. He was so
intent on his rehearsal that he never even noticed I was standing beside him.
Well, that telecast is now part of
history. For the first time a billion human beings watched a single programme
that came ‘live’ from every corner of the Earth, and was a roll call of the
world’s greatest citizens. Hundreds of cameras on land and sea and air looked
inquiringly at the turning globe; and at the end there was that wonderful shot
of the Earth through a zoom lens on the space station, making the whole planet
recede until it was lost among the stars …
There were a few hitches, of course.
One camera on the bed of the Atlantic wasn’t ready on cue, and we had to spend some extra time looking at the Taj
Mahal. And owing to a switching error Russian subtitles were superimposed on
the South American transmission, while half the USSR found itself trying to read Spanish. But
this was nothing to what might have
happened.
Through the entire three hours,
introducing the famous and the unknown with equal ease, came the mellow yet
never orotund flow of Gregg’s voice. He did a magnificent job; the
congratulations came pouring up the beam the moment the broadcast finished. But
he didn’t hear them; he made one short, private call to his agent, and then
went to bed.
Next morning, the Earth-bound ferry
was waiting to take him back to any job he cared to accept. But it left without
Gregg Wendell, now junior station announcer of Relay Two.
‘They’ll think I’m crazy,’ he said,
beaming happily, ‘but why should I go back to that rat race down there? I’ve
all the
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