Former communications head to receive lifetime Emmy
8/19/2002 News media contact: Linda Bloom · (646) 369-3759 · New York
NOTE: A photograph is available.
By United Methodist News Service
A CBS executive vice president who served as president of the United Methodist Commission on Communications from 1976 to 1984 will receive a lifetime Emmy award.
Charles "Capp" Cappleman will be honored Aug. 21 in North Hollywood at the Engineering and Interactive Television Programming Awards. He is the 2002 recipient of the TV Academy's Charles F. Jenkins Lifetime Achievement Award.
Currently executive vice president for West Coast operations and engineering, the 76-year-old Cappleman is credited as the creative vision behind the new building at CBS Television City, the network's live and videotape production facility in Los Angeles, completed in 1992. He continues to be responsible for ensuring that the network's West Coast operations remain technologically up to date, and he oversees production operations and personnel at CBS Television City and CBS Studio Center, the network's motion pictures studio.
"Obviously, I am grateful to my colleagues in the entertainment industry for this honor," Cappleman said. "I can't think of a business that's more fun to be in and one in which you meet more interesting people."
He added, "I've discovered that there are a number of religious-minded people of all faiths in this business, although we tend to hear more about the other type."
A member of St. Paul's United Methodist Church in Tarzana, Calif., Cappleman also belongs to the National Council of Churches' national advisory board and the board of trustees at United Theological Seminary of Dayton, Ohio. He is a member of the Los Angeles Mid City West Community Council and founding member and director of Mastermedia International. He served on the foundation board of Methodist Hospital of Southern California from 1986 to 1991.
During his career at CBS, Cappleman brought the first videotape recorders to the network and supported other technological advances. In the early 1960s, he worked on "The Judy Garland Show," where he was credited with arranging the up-to-date art production and technical facilities. He also applied his technological skills to shows such as "The Smothers Brothers."
Other shows he worked with included "Playhouse 90," "All in the Family," "Person to Person," "The Young and the Restless," "The Bold and the Beautiful," "The Price is Right" and "The Steve Harvey Show." For "The Carol Burnett Show," he set up the Studio 33, with its recessed theater-type seating.
"I'm happy here because I am working for a company that likes to be in the forefront of technology," Cappleman remarked. "The rapid advance of communications needs to be used fully by the church as well."
He said that Jesus was an excellent communicator, using storytelling, the contemporary medium of the day, and the Protestant church was the first to use the printing press when it became the contemporary medium of the day. Now the church needs to use every medium available to preach the good news, he said, confessing that he had been preaching the same sermon for 25 years. "I'm convinced that UMCom (United Methodist Communications) is doing that, too."
Cappleman began his training by studying electrical engineering at Virginia Polytechnic Institute from 1945 to 1947 and receiving a bachelor of fine arts degree in drama and speech in 1951 from Richmond Professional Institute at the College of William and Mary. He graduated that same year from the NBC Summer Radio-TV Institute at Northwestern University and in 1961 received his FCC First Class License. Later, he attended the executive program at the UCLA Graduate School of Management, graduating in 1974.
His other positions at CBS have included general manager of Television City, 1977-1980; vice president, production facilities, 1980-83; vice president, operations, 1983-90; vice president, West Coast operations, 1990-94; and senior vice president, West Coast operations and engineering, 1994 to June 2001.
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