Showmen's Trade Review (Oct-Dec 1943)

October 2, 1943 SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW 55 HOLLYWOOD STUDIO ROUXD-LP Studio activity hit a new peak this week with seventeen new pictures started in camera work. The productions by studios: COLUMBIA SWING OUT THE BLUES— Principals : Bob Haymes, Lynn Merrick. Director, Mai St. Clair. COWBOY CANTEEN— Principals: Charles Starrett. Tex Ritter, Jane Frazee. Director, Lew Landers. KLONDIKE KATE— Principals : Ann Savage, Tom Meal. Director, William Castle. MONOGRAM HER BACHELOR HUSBAND— Principals : Johnny Downs, Wanda McKay, Etta McDaniel. Director, William Beaudine. PARAMOUNT DOUBLE INDEMNITY— Principals: Barbara Stanwyck, Fred M.'cMurray, Edward G. Robinson. Director, Billy Wilder. MAN IN HALF MOON STREET-— Principals : Nils Asther, Helen Walker. Director, Ralph Murphy. RAINBOW ISLAND — Principals: Dorothy Lamour, Eddie Bracken, Gil Lamb. Director, Frank Tuttle. PRC JIVE JUNCTION— Principals: Dickie Moore, Tina Thayer, Gerra Young, Johnny Michaels. Director, Edgar Ullmer. BOSS OF RAWHIDE— Principals: Dave O'Brien, Jim Newill, Guy Wilkerson. Director, Elmer Clifton. REPUBLIC WHISPERING FOOTSTEPS — Principals: John Hubbard, Rita Quigley, Cy Kendall. Director, Howard Bretherton. FIGHTING SEABEES — Principals: John Wayne, Susan Hayward, Dennis O'Keefe. Director, Edward Ludwig. RETURN OF CASANOVA — Principals: Joe E. Brown, Dale Evans, June Havoc. Director, Les Goodwins. UNITED ARTISTS KNICKERBOCKER HOLIDAY— Principals : Nelson Eddy, Charles Coburn, Constance Dowling, Ernest Cossart. Director, Harry Joe Brown. TIMBER— Principals: William Boyd, Andy Clyde, Jimmy Rogers. Director, Lesley Selander. BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY— Principals : Lynn Bari, Francis Lederer, Louis Calhern, Akim Tamiroff. Director, Rowland V. Lee. UNIVERSAL SWINGTIME FOR JOHNNY— Principals : Andrews Sisters, Harriet Hilliard, Peter Cookson. Director, Edward F. Cline. WARNER BROTHERS MR. SKEFFINGTON — Principals: Bette Davis, Paul Lukas, Faye Emerson, Richard Waring. Director, Vincent Sherman. TITLE CHANGES •■Tropicana" (Col.) now THE HEAT IS ON. "Passport to Dakar" (Univ.) now THE IMPOSTOR. "Honor System" (Mono.) now FOLLOW THE LEADER. "For the Love of Mike" (MGM) now LOST ANGEL. •'White Clififs of Dover" (MGM) now THE WHITE CLIFFS. "Russian Girl" (UA) now THREE RUSSIAN GIRLS. Adv. What Are Your Needs: Joe Hornstein Has Jt Young Soprano Signs Contract While Leon Fromkess beams approval, 16-yearold Gerre Young, Los Angeles girl, signs a longterm contract with PRC Pictures, Inc. Gerre, a crioratura soprano, will be groomed for stardom, makes her debut in "Jive Junction." UA Buys 'Voice in the Wind' Concluding a three-cornered bidding race, United Artists has landed distribution rights to the Ripley-Monter production, "Voice in the Wind," starring Francis Lederer. George Bagnall, UA vice-president, viewed the film in a projection room at General Service studio and immediately thereafter signed for the distribution rights. The picture, originally made as "Strange Music" for PRC release, was made in the hope of attracting major release. Produced by Rudolph Monter and Arthur Ripley, with Ripley directing, the cast has, in addition to Lederer in the starring role, Sigrid Gurie, J. Carroll Naish, J. Edward Bromberg and Alexander Granach. Ratoff Signs With 20th-Fox Gregory Ratoff, colorful Russian director and actor, has returned to the 20th Century-Fox fold,where he got his start in American pictures. Joseph M. Schenck has announced that Ratoff has been signed by the studio to a long-term contract as director-producer and will return to the lot in a few days. As his first assigniment under the new contract, Ratofif will direct and produce "Band Wagon," a lavish Technicolor musical which will have an all-star cast. The picture is expected to go into production within a few months. Selander to Direct 'Timber' Lesley Selander is slated to direct the next Hopalong Cassidy film, "Timber," according to an announcement made by United Artists Producer Harry Sherman. Monogram Signs Rick Valiin Monogram is convinced that it has acquired an unusually promising player in Rick Vallin, who has been signed to a four-picture deal. Sandburg to Write 'Cavalcade' Carl Sandburg, famed American poet and biographer of Abraham Lincoln, has been commissioned by MGM to write a novel of American life, manners and morals which that company will make into a motion picture. WANDERING AROUXD HOLLYWOOD When I was a kid, Hopalong Cassidy was a great western hero. We youngsters read every book about him that Clarence Mulford wrote. The other day I reviewed a new adventure of Hopalong Cassidy that Harry Sherman turned out. I asked myself what did I remember of the original range fighter? First Hopalong walked with a limp, hence his appellation. That didn't matter. I recalled clearly, however, his insistence that his opponent draw, or move to draw, first. Then he was a heller in action. But the thing that stood out most in my mind was that he always beat the other fellow to the draw, AND, never drew that gun to fire a shot but that it went to the heart, or through an ace on a post at 50 yards, or through a coin flipped into the air before he drew his gun. Hopalong Cassidy in pictures rarely draws his gun, and seldom fires it. When he does, that's all that happens. No one is hit. Why such a dismal shot? The "names" of the west, Billy the Kid, Bat Masterson, Wild Bill Hickok, and Wyatt Earp among many, and the source for innumerable movie stories, were famous only because of their crack shooting. That's what the western addict wants. That's what I expect when I see a western. After ten ineffective shots by a supposedly crack shot, I get quite disgusted. So I hied me off to see Cecile Krarner, story editor and staff writer for Harry Sherman. Cecile started about five years ago as a secretary for writers, and then went on to show the writers who came to the studio how to write the continuity. She has had to coach and help other writers to understand screenwriting, and recently collaborated on the "Buffalo Bill" screenplay. One of her most important functions is to watch continuity. With 30 main camera angles and about 100 trick shots, it is very important that the script show what will happen at each scene, how it will be done, and when. That gives the assistant director an opportunity to prepare his schedules for the day, call the right people and keep things running. She pointed out that a story editor must be able to visualize what she has been reading and what it will look like on the screen. After the preliminaries, I wanted to know why Hopalong Cassidy, achieving his fame as a crack shot zvith a hair-trigger draw, does little or no shooting, and zvhy what he does is ineffective? Ah, says she, the Hays Office says only three men can be shot in a western. Let the features kill off ten thousand in one picture, it doesn't matter. In westerns only three die. Why, says I, doesn't Hopalong kill them with quick shots? That same Hays Office : the youngsters, who see all the war pictures, should see no killing, no kissing, and no lots of things in vjesterns. (She doesn't tell, but I happen to know it costs $35 a fall when a man is .■shot.) How about all that, "Pop" Sherman? 'So Little Time' Leads Named Joseph Gotten and Valerie Hobson have been selected by David O. Selznick to play the leading roles in the screen version of J. P. Marquand's best-selling novel, "So Little Time." The book sold 465,000 copies in the first two weeks off the presses. Miss Hobson has been under contract to Selznick for six months, and Gotten is also under contract to the producer.