Exhibitors Herald World (Oct-Dec 1929)

October 12, 1929 EXHIBITORS HERALD-WORLD I J Television Draw Will Make Theatre Better, Says Paley Why Paley Thinks Television Ally Of Theatres "The coming of radio broadcasting brought fears that the public would prefer to stay at home to listen to radio program. The groundlessness of these fears is proved by the fact that the attendance at film houses has increased consistently year by year." "The progress of science was not destructive to the entertainment industry. It simply gave the public the right to demand more for its money." * * * "This advent of an element (radio talking pictures, television) into each field that was formerly peculiar to the other has resulted in a mutuality of interest of such far-reaching significance that unlimited new possibilities are dawning in the entertainment world." * * * "Usually new inventions simply make old ones more useful." * * * "Far from driving out the phonograph, radio stimulated it to new usefulness." * * * "When television comes, whether it be in five years or a score, it will play a large part in the operation of the very theatres that some feel it threatens. Consider what can be done in the field of newsreels alone." * * * "Perfections in the projection of motion pictures will play a large part in making television applicable to theatre rather than home presentation." '"The home can hardly be expected to be transformed into a modern theatre having all the perfected devices and appurtenances available to the theatre." "We have not seen the cheap and popular use of filming cameras and projecting machine affect the motion picture industry perceptibly." * * * "The combination of these elements (supersized screen, third dimension, color) with spoken dialog, music and natural sound will set a standard for screen entertainment that audiences will naturally expect and demand when television becomes a commercial practicability." * * * "Someone will have to foot the bill for home television, and it is hard to conceive of an advertising sponsorship of the filmed efforts of Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks." * * * "Experienced engineers are proving invaluable in the. recording and other technical phases of talking picture production. They will still be speaking the language of radio when television comes." Home Can't Be Changed into Playhouse, Industry Is Told More Applicable to Theatres Than Private Residences, Says Columbia Broadcasting System's President Just as the radio has become a valuable ally of the motion picture theatre, so television will stimulate theatre going, and "play a large part in the operation of the very theatres that some feel it threatens," says William S. Paley, president of the Columbia Broadcasting System, in an article in the October issue of Nation's Business, published by the Chamber of Commerce of the United States. Paley, as head of the broadcasting organization which recently became affiliated with Paramount Famous Lasky, predicts that perfections in motion picture projection will help make television "applicable to theatre rather than home presentation." It is illogical to believe that the home can be changed into the modern theatre with all its perfected devices and appurtenances, such as supersized screen, color and third dimension, Paley holds. Public Must Be Amused His article, with the title, "Radio and the Movies Join Hands," follows: TT is more than an axiom that the public -* has to be amused and entertained. It is an economic necessity. What the motion picture has done for the worker wearied by a day of toil has been dealt with in pulpit and press, debated for years by statesmen and educators. Now we have radio, with its manifold potentialities and problems. People have assembled to be entertained and instructed for thousands of years. They will, I believe, continue to gather for these purposes for many generations to come. The theatre is as natural an institution_ as is the school room. It is the expression of group psychology. Man being a social creature, he likes to rub shoulders with his fellows. Emotional response in an audience is infectious. Laughs engender laughs, thrills sweep like electric currents through multitudes. Scenes of dramatic poignancy, on stage or screen or platform, affect a group mind that exists for the moment as one, though it may, be composed of thousands of individuals. The theatre is a major industry in the national economy. Millions of dollars and hundreds and thousands of persons are engaged in this industry. The theatre is at once a stable institution and a capricious one. It is affected by a multitude of factors. Not the least important factor now enter Maybe Santa Will Come Via Television Work on the development of Television is progressing very rapidly and it is predicted that sets will make their appearance on the market by Christmas, according to J. E. Smith, president of the National Radio Institute of Washington. Television was demonstrated at the Radio World's Fair in New York under the supervision of R C A engineers. These demonstrations included the voice of the subject as well as their image. ing into the theatrical business is the radio, youngest and most ambitious of entertainment mediums. We of the broadcasting branch of the radio industry, the branch that now enters almost as intimately into the daily lives of the citizenry as the newspaper, are constantly beset with inquiries about our present and future activities, about the possible and probable effect of radio on the basic medium of entertainment, which is the theatre. Cynosure of Industrialists We are asked again and again whether a clash is not imminent between the parvenu radio and the old established theatre. Particularly since the introduction of the socalled "talkies," which demonstrated that the motion picture industry is also a creature of the laboratory whence radio sprang, have we become the cynosure of industrialists and sociologists. These "talkies," emerging from the electrical laboratories ahead of television, have served as the basis of much speculation about radio and the theatre. Will not the simultaneous reception by radio (or wires) of vision along with sound shake the theatrical business — and I must refer especially to the motion picture business — to its foundations? Radio and Films Now Allies The recent affiliation of the Columbia Broadcasting System with one of the greatest of the film organizations, the Paramount Famous Lasky Corporation, has served to stimulate all sorts of theories and conjectures. My own interest has been whetted and my fancy intrigued, for I must guess along with the others. Radio and motion pictures, once considered potential rivals, have become allies. Scientific progress has served to introduce sound into motion pictures. Science gives us reasonable prospect for vision in radio broadcasting. This advent of an element into each field that was formerly peculiar to the other has resulted in a mutuality of interests of such farreaching significance that unlimited new possibilities are dawning in the entertainment world. Talking motion pictures are an accomplished fact and apparently are here to stay. Television, we are told by the best minds in the laboratory, is "just around the corner." I shall not attempt to pre{Continued on page 26)