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...[TV Guide's] immediate concern was the television quiz show scandal, which had reached its climax two weeks earlier when Charles Van Doren, the appealing young man who'd taught viewers the value of learning while winning big on MCA's Twenty-one, stood before a House committee and admitted he was a fraud. But the issue went well beyond rigged quiz shows. The charge was that through their stranglehold on talent, MCA and William Morris monopolized the medium to the detriment of their clients, the industry, and the public at large. This was why the Justice Department had launched a secret investigation of both agencies more than two years before.
The Morris Agency had started the quiz show vogue in 1955, when it packaged The $64,000 Question for Revlon and sold it to CBS. While the show won praise for its "educational" nature, the real source of its appeal was in its crapshoot format ­ the idea that once contestants' winnings hit the $32,000 mark, they had to decide whether to go double or nothing on the final, $64,000 question, or play it safe and go home. The response was tremendous. Within weeks, the show knocked I Love Lucy out of the number-one slot in the ratings. Casinos in Vegas emptied out when it went on the air. Bookies took odds on whether the first contestant to go for the big one ­ a marine captain whose specialty was cooking ­ would get the answer right. (He did.) Revlon sold so much Living Lipstick that its factory was unable to meet the demand.
The $64,000 Question quickly inspired imitators, among them an MCA package called Twenty-one. Based on the card game, more or less, Twenty-one was a dismal failure at first. "Do whatever you have to do," the sponsor ordered angrily, so the producers put the fix in. In December 1956, when Charles Van Doren, a boyishly attractive English instructor at Columbia University, beat Herb Stempel, a short, squat, nerdy grad at City College, Van Doren became the first intellectual hero of the television age. Honors and acclaim poured in ­ the covers of Time, letters by the hundreds, offers of movie roles and tenured professorships and a regular guest spot on The Today Show. But Herb Stempel didn't like being told to lose, especially to some Ivy League snot. He went to the press. The DA's office started to investigate. The walls began to close in.
Meanwhile, the show's producers agreed to sell the rights to NBC for $2 million. One of them started to feel queasy about selling the show without letting the network know the score, so he went to Sonny Werblin, MCA's top man in New York, and asked his advice. Werblin, the man behind such hits as The Ed Sullivan Show and The Jackie Gleason Show, ran the television department as if it were a football team coached by Attila the Hun. "Dan," he asked the producer, "have I ever asked you whether the show was rigged?" No, he hadn't. "And has NBC ever asked you whether the show is rigged?" No, they hadn't either. "Well," Werblin concluded, "the reason that none of us has asked is because we don't want to know."

And with good reason. Not only was Twenty-one an MCA package and Van Doren himself an MCA client; Werblin had a special relationship with NBC's president, Robert Kintner. Kintner had been president of ABC until...ABC's chairman forced him out in his determination to move the network out of third place. MCA used its influence to place him at NBC, where he proved an extremely pliant customer. In the spring of 1957, when the networks were putting together their schedules for the next season, Werblin went to a meeting of NBC programming executives led by Kintner and his boss, RCA chairman Robert Sarnoff. "Sonny, look at the schedule for next season," Kintner said when he walked in, "here are the empty slots, you fill them."
The information in the passage would support the following claims EXCEPT:

  1. Werblin had an influential role at NBC.
  2. Before 1955, quiz shows did not predominate in television ratings.
  3. While a contestant on Twenty-one, Charles Van Doren was aware that he was cheating.
  4. Concern over fraud in television game shows was the primary reason why the Justice Department investigated MCA

Answer(s): D

Explanation:

As discussed in the explanation to #105 above, investigation of the agencies and the television industry had been initiated prior to the scandal of rigged quiz shows broke out. This is stated towards the end of paragraph one.
Choice A is clearly supported by information presented in the last paragraph.
Choice B can be inferred from the statement at the beginning of the second paragraph that the quiz show vogue began in 1955.
Choice C is supported by Van Doren's admission mentioned in paragraph one.



...[TV Guide's] immediate concern was the television quiz show scandal, which had reached its climax two weeks earlier when Charles Van Doren, the appealing young man who'd taught viewers the value of learning while winning big on MCA's Twenty-one, stood before a House committee and admitted he was a fraud. But the issue went well beyond rigged quiz shows. The charge was that through their stranglehold on talent, MCA and William Morris monopolized the medium to the detriment of their clients, the industry, and the public at large. This was why the Justice Department had launched a secret investigation of both agencies more than two years before.
The Morris Agency had started the quiz show vogue in 1955, when it packaged The $64,000 Question for Revlon and sold it to CBS. While the show won praise for its "educational" nature, the real source of its appeal was in its crapshoot format ­ the idea that once contestants' winnings hit the $32,000 mark, they had to decide whether to go double or nothing on the final, $64,000 question, or play it safe and go home. The response was tremendous. Within weeks, the show knocked I Love Lucy out of the number-one slot in the ratings. Casinos in Vegas emptied out when it went on the air. Bookies took odds on whether the first contestant to go for the big one ­ a marine captain whose specialty was cooking ­ would get the answer right. (He did.) Revlon sold so much Living Lipstick that its factory was unable to meet the demand.
The $64,000 Question quickly inspired imitators, among them an MCA package called Twenty-one. Based on the card game, more or less, Twenty-one was a dismal failure at first. "Do whatever you have to do," the sponsor ordered angrily, so the producers put the fix in. In December 1956, when Charles Van Doren, a boyishly attractive English instructor at Columbia University, beat Herb Stempel, a short, squat, nerdy grad at City College, Van Doren became the first intellectual hero of the television age. Honors and acclaim poured in ­ the covers of Time, letters by the hundreds, offers of movie roles and tenured professorships and a regular guest spot on The Today Show. But Herb Stempel didn't like being told to lose, especially to some Ivy League snot. He went to the press. The DA's office started to investigate. The walls began to close in.

Meanwhile, the show's producers agreed to sell the rights to NBC for $2 million. One of them started to feel queasy about selling the show without letting the network know the score, so he went to Sonny Werblin, MCA's top man in New York, and asked his advice. Werblin, the man behind such hits as The Ed Sullivan Show and The Jackie Gleason Show, ran the television department as if it were a football team coached by Attila the Hun. "Dan," he asked the producer, "have I ever asked you whether the show was rigged?" No, he hadn't. "And has NBC ever asked you whether the show is rigged?" No, they hadn't either. "Well," Werblin concluded, "the reason that none of us has asked is because we don't want to know."
And with good reason. Not only was Twenty-one an MCA package and Van Doren himself an MCA client; Werblin had a special relationship with NBC's president, Robert Kintner. Kintner had been president of ABC until...ABC's chairman forced him out in his determination to move the network out of third place. MCA used its influence to place him at NBC, where he proved an extremely pliant customer. In the spring of 1957, when the networks were putting together their schedules for the next season, Werblin went to a meeting of NBC programming executives led by Kintner and his boss, RCA chairman Robert Sarnoff. "Sonny, look at the schedule for next season," Kintner said when he walked in, "here are the empty slots, you fill them."
Based on the passage, which of the following must NOT be true?

  1. Sonny Werblin was a difficult and exacting man to work with.
  2. Herb Stempel refused to offer information to the media concerning his appearances on Twenty-one.
  3. The $64,000 Question was rigged.
  4. Sonny Werblin was unfamiliar with Robert Kintner before he was made president of NBC.

Answer(s): B

Explanation:

It is stated in line 42 that Stempel went to the press, presumably to reveal that he was being "told to lose" on the show. Choice B must therefore be false, and is thus the correct answer. There is no information presented in the passage that requires choice A to be false: indeed, if one recognizes the reference to Attila the Hun, one would know that the characterization is correct. There is no evidence that The $64,000 Question was rigged, but again, nothing in the passage indicates that it must not be either. There is also no indication that choice D has to be false.



...[TV Guide's] immediate concern was the television quiz show scandal, which had reached its climax two weeks earlier when Charles Van Doren, the appealing young man who'd taught viewers the value of learning while winning big on MCA's Twenty-one, stood before a House committee and admitted he was a fraud. But the issue went well beyond rigged quiz shows. The charge was that through their stranglehold on talent, MCA and William Morris monopolized the medium to the detriment of their clients, the industry, and the public at large. This was why the Justice Department had launched a secret investigation of both agencies more than two years before.
The Morris Agency had started the quiz show vogue in 1955, when it packaged The $64,000 Question for Revlon and sold it to CBS. While the show won praise for its "educational" nature, the real source of its appeal was in its crapshoot format ­ the idea that once contestants' winnings hit the $32,000 mark, they had to decide whether to go double or nothing on the final, $64,000 question, or play it safe and go home. The response was tremendous. Within weeks, the show knocked I Love Lucy out of the number-one slot in the ratings. Casinos in Vegas emptied out when it went on the air. Bookies took odds on whether the first contestant to go for the big one ­ a marine captain whose specialty was cooking ­ would get the answer right. (He did.) Revlon sold so much Living Lipstick that its factory was unable to meet the demand.
The $64,000 Question quickly inspired imitators, among them an MCA package called Twenty-one. Based on the card game, more or less, Twenty-one was a dismal failure at first. "Do whatever you have to do," the sponsor ordered angrily, so the producers put the fix in. In December 1956, when Charles Van Doren, a boyishly attractive English instructor at Columbia University, beat Herb Stempel, a short, squat, nerdy grad at City College, Van Doren became the first intellectual hero of the television age. Honors and acclaim poured in ­ the covers of Time, letters by the hundreds, offers of movie roles and tenured professorships and a regular guest spot on The Today Show. But Herb Stempel didn't like being told to lose, especially to some Ivy League snot. He went to the press. The DA's office started to investigate. The walls began to close in.
Meanwhile, the show's producers agreed to sell the rights to NBC for $2 million. One of them started to feel queasy about selling the show without letting the network know the score, so he went to Sonny Werblin, MCA's top man in New York, and asked his advice. Werblin, the man behind such hits as The Ed Sullivan Show and The Jackie Gleason Show, ran the television department as if it were a football team coached by Attila the Hun. "Dan," he asked the producer, "have I ever asked you whether the show was rigged?" No, he hadn't. "And has NBC ever asked you whether the show is rigged?" No, they hadn't either. "Well," Werblin concluded, "the reason that none of us has asked is because we don't want to know."
And with good reason. Not only was Twenty-one an MCA package and Van Doren himself an MCA client; Werblin had a special relationship with NBC's president, Robert Kintner. Kintner had been president of ABC until...ABC's chairman forced him out in his determination to move the network out of third place. MCA used its influence to place him at NBC, where he proved an extremely pliant customer. In the spring of 1957, when the networks were putting together their schedules for the next season, Werblin went to a meeting of NBC programming executives led by Kintner and his boss, RCA chairman Robert Sarnoff. "Sonny, look at the schedule for next season," Kintner said when he walked in, "here are the empty slots, you fill them."
The author's description of Kintner as "an extremely pliant customer" (line 64):

  1. reinforces his description of Werblin as an exacting taskmaster.
  2. supports his contention that NBC lacked strong leadership.
  3. indicates the degree of MCA's influence over the network.
  4. contradicts the implication that NBC knew their quiz show was rigged.

Answer(s): C

Explanation:

The description is used by the author to describe the level of control Werblin had over NBC, with Kintner as its representative. Choice A is irrelevant to the question. Choice B can perhaps be inferred from the relationship between MCA and NBC, but the weakness of NBC's leadership is not a point that the author is making specifically. Choice D is incorrect because it does not contradict the implication that Kintner was unduly influenced by Werblin.



...[TV Guide's] immediate concern was the television quiz show scandal, which had reached its climax two weeks earlier when Charles Van Doren, the appealing young man who'd taught viewers the value of learning while winning big on MCA's Twenty-one, stood before a House committee and admitted he was a fraud. But the issue went well beyond rigged quiz shows. The charge was that through their stranglehold on talent, MCA and William Morris monopolized the medium to the detriment of their clients, the industry, and the public at large. This was why the Justice Department had launched a secret investigation of both agencies more than two years before.
The Morris Agency had started the quiz show vogue in 1955, when it packaged The $64,000 Question for Revlon and sold it to CBS. While the show won praise for its "educational" nature, the real source of its appeal was in its crapshoot format ­ the idea that once contestants' winnings hit the $32,000 mark, they had to decide whether to go double or nothing on the final, $64,000 question, or play it safe and go home. The response was tremendous. Within weeks, the show knocked I Love Lucy out of the number-one slot in the ratings. Casinos in Vegas emptied out when it went on the air. Bookies took odds on whether the first contestant to go for the big one ­ a marine captain whose specialty was cooking ­ would get the answer right. (He did.) Revlon sold so much Living Lipstick that its factory was unable to meet the demand.

The $64,000 Question quickly inspired imitators, among them an MCA package called Twenty-one. Based on the card game, more or less, Twenty-one was a dismal failure at first. "Do whatever you have to do," the sponsor ordered angrily, so the producers put the fix in. In December 1956, when Charles Van Doren, a boyishly attractive English instructor at Columbia University, beat Herb Stempel, a short, squat, nerdy grad at City College, Van Doren became the first intellectual hero of the television age. Honors and acclaim poured in ­ the covers of Time, letters by the hundreds, offers of movie roles and tenured professorships and a regular guest spot on The Today Show. But Herb Stempel didn't like being told to lose, especially to some Ivy League snot. He went to the press. The DA's office started to investigate. The walls began to close in.
Meanwhile, the show's producers agreed to sell the rights to NBC for $2 million. One of them started to feel queasy about selling the show without letting the network know the score, so he went to Sonny Werblin, MCA's top man in New York, and asked his advice. Werblin, the man behind such hits as The Ed Sullivan Show and The Jackie Gleason Show, ran the television department as if it were a football team coached by Attila the Hun. "Dan," he asked the producer, "have I ever asked you whether the show was rigged?" No, he hadn't. "And has NBC ever asked you whether the show is rigged?" No, they hadn't either. "Well," Werblin concluded, "the reason that none of us has asked is because we don't want to know."
And with good reason. Not only was Twenty-one an MCA package and Van Doren himself an MCA client; Werblin had a special relationship with NBC's president, Robert Kintner. Kintner had been president of ABC until...ABC's chairman forced him out in his determination to move the network out of third place. MCA used its influence to place him at NBC, where he proved an extremely pliant customer. In the spring of 1957, when the networks were putting together their schedules for the next season, Werblin went to a meeting of NBC programming executives led by Kintner and his boss, RCA chairman Robert Sarnoff. "Sonny, look at the schedule for next season," Kintner said when he walked in, "here are the empty slots, you fill them."
The quote by Werblin (lines 55-56) is offered primarily as support of which of following contentions?

  1. Werblin did not believe that quiz-show rigging was in the best interest of the public.
  2. Werblin was an ambitious person who sought admiration for his successes.
  3. Werblin was a ruthless executive who was influential with the William Morris Agency.
  4. Werblin was a shrewd character who knew the consequences of knowingly promoting a rigged game show

Answer(s): D

Explanation:

The exchange between Werblin and the producer clearly indicates that the former knows that the show is being rigged, but would like to be able to claim to the public that he has no such knowledge if called upon to do so. He therefore forestalled the producer's attempt to inform him of this officially. This testifies to his shrewdness, and implies that he must have been aware of the consequences if it were known that he promoted a show that he knew to be rigged.
Choice A is incorrect because Werblin clearly was not interested in public interest.
Choices B and C are both incorrect because even though they may be true, that is not the point of citing the exchange.






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