Motion Picture News (Oct-Dec 1930)

HM&m IMsiMf© Mwm Vol. XLII NEW YORK CITY. NOVEMBER 1, 1930 No. 18 PANSY SHOWMANSHIP GOES OUT OF THE PINK THE opposition will tell you that Amos 'n' And}* are freaks, circus stuff, naturals for any box-office with or without ballyhoo, advertising, headline broadcasting. Radio Pictures will admit that "Check and Double Check" is the freak it is claimed to be, but the record tells you that it was two-fisted, allembracing and infinitely smart merchandising in the trade, and without, that went miles to make exhibitors and their public conscious of the entertainment festival about to be dumped in their laps. understand that his spiel must get across to the men of the theatre before he could enthuse them into the job of putting the picture across with the public. He upset precedent because he smashed his message across week in and week out. Some of his copy might have made the Harbords and the Sarnoffs, perhaps the Browns, wince, but what it may have lacked in restraint it whammed across in effectiveness. Overboard with the Routine HERE was a real commodity to sell. The radio team, reaching into many thousands of homes six nights a week, was almost its own gaiarantee that an audience was readymade and waiting to see what the comics looked like on the screen. All this, RKO knew. It would have been easy to sit back, do the perfunctory things in the perfunctory industry-fooled fashion. But the company of the Titans sensed its opportunity and turned smart enough to launch something that proves its right to use that selfselected monicker. Adjectives Do A War Dance IT was circus-ey, it was hard-hitting, it tossed superlatives about in bewildering and, often, amazing fashion, but Hy Daab, whose job it was, made the trade understand that the air was thick with something and that something was Amos V Andy. He planted his advertising campaign where such campaigns belong — no matter how you look at it — in the industry's trade papers, because he had the tine showmanship sense to The Grand Push Crashes Through THEN Joe Schnitzer pulled the day and date stunt and Daab followed in with his newspaper splash : single pages and double trucks, many in color, in eighty-nine newspapers in fifty cities and in thirty states at a cost of only $75,000. The intensity of the grand push became contagious. Elsewhere in this edition today you may read for yourself what Amos 'n' Andy are doing for some of the country's biggest theatres. The Lesson of the Upset THE personalities, of course, cannot be discounted. Nor the entertainment characteristics of the picture. But what Daab has done with Amos 'n' Andy lends itself to a Lloyd, a Chaplin, a "Journey's End," a "Big Trail" and all other big-time attractions that stride the boards. Merchandising — intelligent, emotional, sweeping, colorful, specialized — merchandising, in the trade and without, but in the trade always, has turned the trick. K A N N Published weekly by Motion f'icture News, Inc. Founded in September, 1913. Publication. Editorial and General Offices: 729 Seventh Avenue, New York City William A. Johnston. President and Publisher, E. 1. Hudson. Vice-President: Maurice Kann, Editor; Charles F. Hvncs. Managing Editor: Robert Hage. News Editor James P C unningham. Technical Editor: Raymond E. Gallagher, Advertising Manager: Los Angeles Office: Hotel Roosevelt. Hollywood: William Crouch. Western Representative Chicago Office: 910 So. Michigan Avenue. Harry E. Holquist. Central West Representative. Subscription Prices: $3.00 per year in United States. Mexico and all V S Possessions. Canada. $5.00. Foreign. $10.60. Copyright, 1930. by Motion Picture News, Inc.. United States and Great Britain. Title registered in United Stales Patent Office and foreign. Entered as second class matter at the Post Office. New York. April 22, 1926. under Act of March 3. 1879.