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Franklin J. Schaffner Award
Robert N. Van Ry
Since 1991 there have been ten recipients of the DGA's Franklin J. Schaffner Award. The accolade is bestowed upon an associate director or stage manager in recognition of service to both the industry and the Guild. This year's recipient is Robert Van Ry.
A member of the Guild since 1964,Van Ry has been interested in television since high school.
"When I got out of college, I went around to the networks, looking for work, but they didn't want to talk to you if you hadn't been in the military, so I joined the Army and spent 1959 and 1960 in Europe," recalled Van Ry. When his military service was up, he went to visit his college friend, DGA member Dave Wilson.
"Dave was working at NBC and helped me get a job," he said. "In those days you had two choices, you could start in the mailroom or in guest relations. I took the mail room and was there for about a year until an opening in the scheduling department happened."
During his 2 1/2 years working in the scheduling department, Van Ry took care of the daily schedules of technicians and stage managers and learned what their jobs entailed. "I didn't have any camera experience, and I just liked the stage manager part better, so in 1964 I became one."
The first show Van Ry was assigned to observe was Say When. In those early game show days, before computers and video monitors, someone had to physically pull cards and turn things to reveal numbers and clues. Complicated shows like Jeopardy! required three people to work the boards. "When I got to work my first day, the guy I was to observe had been pulled over to manage The Today Show, so I ended up stage managing on my very first day," he said. He explained that under normal circumstances it would be several years before a trainee would be allowed to stage manage, but Van Ry was in the right place at the right time.
"On my second day of work, it was an election day, and they sent me to the campaign headquarters of Senator Keating on the day Bobby Kennedy beat him," he said. "This was in the days when the stage manager was the communications link between the reporters and the control room. The reporters would walk around and find people to interview and I would then wave a card so the control room could find us in the crowd."
This practice changed in the 1970s when the news department decided to put producers on the convention floor and stage mangers worked the interview booth next to the anchor booth, or the back room. Van Ry has worked four political conventions in his career.
The Guild has also played an important role in Van Ry's Guild career.
"When I first joined the Guild, it was just down the street from CBS, and someone at work said why don't you come along, so I did," he said. That casual beginning led to more than 20 years of service.
Van Ry spent nearly 20 years on the Eastern AD/SM/PA council (1969-1988), four years on negotiating committees (1972, 1975, 1978, 1984) and serving as the alternate to the National Board from 1985 to 1987. The work he found most difficult was on the negotiating committees.
"I was honored to have been selected to represent my fellow Guild members, and would do it all over again," he said. "Negotiating was tough and frustrating with very long hours. I never felt we had an outright win on the issues, but I'm proud that I stuck with it and we did make progress. We've still got a long way to go."
During Van Ry's long and distinguished career, which has included The Hullabaloo Show, The Kraft Music Hall Show, Miss America Pageants, NFL Live, Super Bowls, World Series and Summer Olympics, Van Ry has had the opportunity to meet many of the greatest names in television, sports and politics. His favorite people, however, were fellow Guild members Joe Disco, Ralph Douglas, Martin Hoade, Dwight Hemion and Dave Wilson.
"Dave Wilson was the AD on the Kraft Music Hall Show, and when he was asked to direct Saturday Night Live, he asked me to work with him again. I stayed 25 years and he only did 17," Van Ry said.
Van Ry says he worked 472 of the 485 shows during the first 25 years of Saturday Night Live. When he retired at the end of Saturday Night Live last season, Van Ry was given a gold watch and his "O" crew (nicknamed that because Van Ry always would call out "Oh, crew!") begged him to stay. The 65-year-old Van Ry, however, chose to bow out with grace before his age started to show in his work.
"People ask me if I miss work when I go back to visit, and I always say 'no.' But I miss my friends at work," he comments. "And I don't miss the commute. Thirty-five and a half years is a lot of underwater commuting through the Lincoln tunnel."
Being selected as the Franklin J. Schaffner Award recipient is, to Van Ry, the ultimate reward for giving his time and energy to a job and a Guild he loves so much. "I was an associate director for one summer and didn't enjoy it," he notes. "I never wanted to do anything else but stage manage. The most satisfying thing about my show business and Guild career is that, not only did I do what I wanted to do, and was happy doing it, but I'm also getting recognized for it. It's not what you do, it's how you do it.
"I tried to treat everyone the same, whoever they were, from Her Royal Highness Grace Kelly to the newest person on my crew."
-Mary Hardesty
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