Motion Picture News (Nov-Dec 1925)

2248 Motion Picture News Holding Company for Fox Theatres Formed; Assets Are Over Twenty Millions ANNOUNCEMENT was made this week of the formation of the Fox theatre Corporation, incorporated under the laws of the State of New York, which will in effect be a holding corporation for all the Fox theatres and equities in real estate and other theatres. The assets of the new corporation are in excess of $20,000,000, of which $11,000,000 is cash and $9,000,000 equities in theatres and so on. Four million shares of no par value common stock are being issued. The corporation will take over all theatres and interests in theatres now controlled by Fox. It is interesting to note that, starting with an initial investment of $5,000 by William Fox in 1905, the theatre assets, solely through earnings, have advanced to the $9,000,000 figure. Also, according to the New York Commercial, about $6,000,000 in earnings has been drawn out, making a total earning on the $5,000 of about $15,000,000. It was rumored in New York this week, though not confirmed, that the new Roxy theatre, being built by S. L. Rothafel, would be the Fox first run house on Broadway. Hollywood Enjoys Anniversary Al Christie Shot First Picture There Fourteen Years Ago in October HOLLYWOOD last week observed the fourteenth anniversary of t lie advent of motion picture making there. It ■was fourteen years ago that Al Christie took the first motion picture in Hollywood with a group of then unknown actors. Coincident with the anniversary on the evening of October 27th C. H. Christie, as head of the Producers' Association presided at a dinner at the Hollywood Athletic Club at which were guests of honor ten members of the United States Senate Committee in the west considering the details of the huge Boulder Canyon dam project. The fourteenth anniversary saw twentyfour studios actively making pictures in the film center of which Hollywood is a hub. A total of 114 new films were in actual production on the anniversary of the original •date. A $3,000,000 issue of Universal Pictures Corporation preferred stock made its first appearance on the New York Stock Exchange during the week and showed a turnover of 800 shares during the first day of trading. The stock has a par value of $100. On the opening day it reached a high of $103 and a low of $100. Universal with its subsidiary companies showed a consolidated balance sheet as of May 9, 1925, as follows; Assets: Cash, $1,257,051; marketable securities, at cost, $304,688; notes receivable, $43,562; account receivable, after reserve for bad debts, $738,093; inventories, $6,817,380; lease deposits, $309,390; charges to foreign branches, etc., $208,669; investments in companies partly owned, $408,991; investment in Selznick films and liens at cost, less net proceeds from liquidation to date, $120,830; real estate, plant, equipment, etc., after depreciation, $3,382,057; deferred charges, $257.570: ooodwill. si ; total. $13,848,888. Liabilities: Notes payable, $873,606: accounts pavable, $1,418,784; advance payments, $472,195: remittances from foreign Al Christie took Hollywood's first pictures as manager and comedy director of the Nestor Company which prospected westward in 1911. The first picture was a 300-foot affair which was shot in an orange grove on Hollywood Boulevard where now stands the Regent Hotel, owned and operated by Christie Brothers, Al and Charles. Fourteen years after the first picture was made now sees fifteen thousand people in and around Hollywood engaged in making pictures regularly with an aggregate payroll of twenty-five million dollars a year. The picture companies operating are capitalized at $17,170,000 and make 85 per cent of the total picture production of America. The payroll figures do not include the many allied industries to the motion picture industry. offices, $332,847; real estate, mortgages. 000; federal tax provision for six months, $105,000 ; reserve for contingencies, $700,$150,000; first preferred 8 per cent stock. $2,920,000; second preferred 7 per cent stock, $2,000,000: balance (including $308.707 of undivided profits of predecessor company Nov. 9, 1924, to Dec. 31, 1924) represented by 250,000 shares of no par stock, $4,173,950: surplus, $702,446; total. $13,848,888. All Modern Conveniences in Educational's New Exchange The new building housing the office; of Educational 's Los Anseles exchange, located at Vermont Avenue and Washington Boulevard, is a thoroughly modern and fire-proof structure. Everything possible in the wav of business convenience has been arranged, such as a comfortable booking office and richly furnished waiting rooms for men and women. The business office is beaut'frlly arranged, the furniture matching the woodwork. The building ;s somewhat out of the business section of the city. British Quota Plan Now Formulated (Continued from page 2243) Picture News says: "For years this journal has, in common with the whole leaders of the British industry, entreated America to look at our pictures and entourage their production Inputting them on the American market. Admittedly they have not all been good, but some of them have been very worth-while. It would not have required any great amount of courage for half-a-dozen of the leading concerns on the other side to make a friendly gesture, instead of which they have merely handed us empty, meaningless speeches. The lack of sincerity is what hurts. The way American leaders come over here and talk utterly insincere phrases is becoming nothing short of a scandal. The British manufacturers have asked for bread and been handed talk." Ernest W. Fredman, editor of the aforementioned publication, has this to say: "Frankly, there are many exhibitors up and down the country who view with a great deal of trepidation the thought of Government interference in the running of their business, and with those views we entirely concur." The Kinematograph Weekly has this to say in regard to Anglo-American film relations and the quota plan : "The concerns who take most money from this country, and who have vastly increased the difficulty even of small scale production here by their policy of wholesale blind booking, have done nothing — and less than nothing— for the British film. "And our opinion is that they will continue to do just that amount — subsidy or no subsidy — for British producers until it is made plain to them that their future British profits depend entirely on a fair American distribution for British films. "Our own canvass of Trade opinion in regard to the F. B. I. Memorandum showed a considerable degree of hostility to the suggestion that exhibitors should be required to show a fixed percentage of British films." Hungary has put a quota system of one to thirty into effect, as announced exclusively in these columns some months ago. Also, there is talk of such regulations in France, Spain and Italy, though none of them have reached a definite basis. Lay Cornerstone of New Fox Exchange ITH more than 150 exhibitors of the Greater New York district and executives of the Fox Film organized presented at the ceremonies, Julius Miller, president of the Borough of Manhattan, presided at the cornerstone laying of the new Fox Exchange Building in New York City on October 28. The event was f ollowed by a luncheon at the Astor with Harry H. Buxbaum, manager of the exchange, acting as host. Containers of film, including selected scenes from "The Iron Horse" and bits clipped from pictures taken in 1894. 1895 and 1896. were sealed in the stone. Borough President Miller, John C Eisele, treasurer of Fox, James R. Grainger, general sales manager, and Mr. Buxbaum made short addresses at the luncheon in celebration of the cornerstone laying. On New York Exchange $3,000,000 Preferred Issue Makes First Appearance With 800 Shares Turnover