Variety (Jan 1949)

Wednesday^ January S, 1949 Farty.third P^^RESTY Annivenary PICTURES S9 Bar Assn. s Copyright Study Newly-created copyright committee has been named by th« American Bar Assn. to delve into proposed amendments to the U. S. copyright laws directly affecting show biz, particularly with respect to foreign relations. Among the urgent changes which the committee will mull is a proposal to reduce registiation fees of $4 on musical compositions of foreign tunesmiths. Composers have been protesting the boosted rate because of the dearth of remit- table dollars in foreign countries. Named to the committee of legalites are Max Choprilck, chairman; Herman Finkelstein, attorney for the American Society of Com- posers, Authors & Publishers; Don E. Petty, general counsel for National Assn. of Broadcasters; and Sam Bass Warner, U. S. reg- ister of copyrights. Recent rise of television poses numerous tangles in international copyright law which the lawyers will study. Proposed study by UNESCO of copyright laws o£ all . countries which looks towards over-aU' revisions will also capture the .committee's attention. Nuts to 'Conditioning' and 'Audience Penetration'; Vet Ballyiiooer Explodes tlie Hooey Please, Mr. Exhibitor, Stop Killing The Audience! By IRVING BRECHER .Hollywood.'.'. . Let's face it, there's more to the decrease in the number of ftlm patrons than just television! Or even poor pictures. Where formerly 80 000.000 people were buying a ticket for a film every week; the latest statistics show that only 69,000,000 people are now attending regularly. " And since that vanished 11*000,000 customers represents the margin of profit to the exhibitor and the producing company, X set out to find out what has happened to them! Checking up on ll,OOOiOOO Americans, scattered from coast to coast, is -ho cineli. Besides, I was in the midst of shooting "The Life of Riley " which meant I was getting up at seven every morning, working from B;30 to 7 p.iii; at the stti!di0i and then, hitting the sack at 10 p.m. AH I had was the hour from 9- to. 10 at night,: and I devoted this time to un- earthing the facts. "You're making a survey, kid," I said to myself. "It's a little out of your line. Why not get Gallup or Roper to do this for you?" I ignored this suggestion, as I was determined tO'get the facts. But, and I admit this with a deep sense of hypocrisy, I did steal a little of the Gallup-Roper technique. What would they do if they wanted to get accurate information from. 11,000,000 people? They ' Would take a sampling poll! They would contact not quite oil the ll.OOOjOOO, but a sizeable portion* which would reflect, by multiplica- tion, the thoughts and opinions of all. Using the Gallup-Roper meth- od, I contacted 11 people, and multiplied their answers by a million.. Brother, hav e 1 got facts! ' ; ; - : . I Figures Don't Lie j My question; put squarely to all 11 people, was subtly phrased, so as .not to put them on the guard and "get a false or misleading reply: Question: Why have ymi stopped, going to the momes? > . Answer: "What are you; crazy or somethin'? Shuttup, I can't hear the picture!" : (i had made the slight error of conducting miy poll in the bolcony of the Fox Westwood Theatre. I soon realized thot I had better con- tact people who had actually stopped goingi.) . I will spare the reader the details of how i Anally tracked down the : 11 people, who had quit attending motion pictures, and plunge into the more acute subject of why. Herewith are the- actual replies to the ' question: . "Why have you stopped going to the movies?'' ^ No.: 1; (Ludwing Jones, Age :55, bachelor, no children; retired nut- pick-magnate;-income of $41-a week,)- "I've been attending. Graut man's Hungarian for 20 years, once a week, and then, a few months , ago, I noticed the lobby looked different. Not only did they have a candy counter like the other tlieatres, but now they were selling hot food! I wasn't hungry, but the usher said there were no seats for the. next hour. (A reissue of,''.'Parnell' was playing); -. So .1 sat down on a stool at the food counter. The waiter a.sked me for my order. "I'm not hungry, thank you," I ,told him. "Just waiting here till I can get a seat for the picture." The waiter'sneered. "You wanna sit here, you gotta order. House rules." I'm not a very belligerent man, despite the fact that 1 weigh well Over 100 pounds, so 1 decided to humor him. "What have you got," I asked him. "Today we're featuring marinated herring, gedaenifte rinderbrust, noodles Grauman, and apple strudel Skoura.s." I really wasn't hungi-y. "I'll just have apple strudel, please, and a cup of coffee." The, waiter smiled'at me. It was a smug smile, the kind the aver- age film salesman used to wear before the Government cracked down on blockbooking. "You'll take the whole dinner or nothing. A fine : gross'we'd do if we let you wiseguys pick your own dishes." "But I don't like gedaemfte rinderbrust," i pleaded.: "And herring makes me sick." ,'The -waiter permitted a sympathetic note- to creep Into his tone. Frankly, the rinderbrust stinks. But we've got two-million-one in tnat rinderbrust. Four hundreid grand alone in the writing charges on the recipe. You know what happens when you let one of them ■ dopey producers alone. They go arty. You should've seen this rinder- brust when we sneak-pfeViewed it at Glendale. It was great! The audience ate it up. But would the producer ship it? No! He hadda : make retakes. He added more onions, re-braised everything, and then Ije .stuck in some paprika from another recipe that was a hit last year." By now he was weeping. "We got our backs to wall—take the whole dinner." "I did what any decent American would have done when ho realizes that a great industry like the movies stands at the crossroads. I took the whole dinner. That night I was rushed to the hospital with an. ulcer. Now I'm on a milk diet,, and my doctor hills come to $30 a week. That leaves me $11. for all my other living expenses. And I'll "^ver go to a movie again." The other 10 replies indicated that selling candy, popcorn and reg- ular diilhers in theatres had this effect: Three people had lost fillings from sating toosie-roUs, requiring extensive dental work running into hundreds of doljars. : ■ Four people had their clothes ruined by being hit by greasy rinder- Prust that was thrown down on them from the balcony; requiring the; purchase of new clothing, and wiping out the savings they ordinarily would have spent on movies. .fwo ipen, having enjoyed the apple strudel, casually remarked to their wives: "Sweetheart, if you could only bake like Spyros Skouras." ihis so aroused the wives that the resultant quarrels led to divorces, ^"^.the alimony has made both men penniless. ^ Ihe final case was the most tragic of all. In a cheap third run theatre, the unscrupulous manager used horseraeat instead of beef 11,the hamburgers. A derrick salesman, whiling away an hour in the movies, sat down in a seat, holding a horsemeat hamburger. Lassie, making a personal appearance on the stage, got the scent, attacked '"^man, and severely injured him. • "If, Exhibitor, I rest my case.' ' Terry Turner By TERRY An ad agency exec, appointed by a film companj^ to guard its destinies, called all the studio flacks i together for a general confab, then opened up With this classic: "There is no difference in selling tlie public a can of soup or a can of film." After dropping that pearl of wisdom, he proceeded to "chart up" the joint, so that at a glance, the boss, or anyone interested, could follow a line to discover "who had been see- ing his pictures," then transfer to a second line to discover "who was not seeing hi? pic- ture," and if he was not dizzy by this time, follow another line to discover his "potentials," Gf course,:. if he became too dizzy following the charts, he could call up the treasurer and find out in dollars and cents how many did see his picture, then subtract from a neigt)boring gross to ascertain just who did not see his picture, and then maybe look over his story and cast for his,next opus and get a pretty good idea of how. many would want to see his next picture. ■ ■ " '. '••' -.: In days gone by^ I worked for a chap by the name of Marcus Loew who had the very bad habit of always saying, "Figures don't lie," when the alibi boyS: began chirping. Ho also had the nerve-wrack- ing habit of summing up by saying,, "The only thing wrong with this business are all the excuses why I business is bad." This was during the days before i agency influence had begun to assert itself so richly I and so fully, as of today, and when they gave you ia can of film ( and irregardless, of the cast and story) you just had to slug it out to try and get your money back. Even in those days, if you failed, the .studio::thought the sales and advertising policy all wrong and the latter thought the studio was all wrong, and generally they had the public to back up their opinion, all of which was possibly a fore- runner of that "blue" line on present day charts, which could be labeled "want to see" but "just ■ couldn't make.it that month.'' In these days of high stress, rising costs and with income leveling off to its pre-war status, maybe we should start with that ad agency exec who says, "There is no difference between selling a can of soup and a can of film" and sort of take him apart. No one will deny that agencies'can sure sell cans of soup, whether it be by radio, newspaper or maga- zine advertising, and I, for one, think they do a grand job. BUT i . i what the. ad agency man forgets is that his can of soup is on :the'market and on the grocer's shelf 365 days out. of the yearv purchasable: any time any one feels like a rich can of soup, whereas the can of film is only ready for consumption in : any given market a very limited period of any time of the year. perhaps a part of^aTmontli 'ffKd'rperhaps^ even part of a week. *■ A magazine ad for soup is fine and dandy any time of the year, because soup is always available, but advertise your can of film too far in advance and your public will have forgotten it when it is; ready for the buying public, Not only will, they:. have forgotten- it, but the cost has been so- great; that you generally find yourself ''fresh out of money" when it. comes time to localize your cam- paign, when you actually are asking Mr. and Mrs. John Q. Public for their cash. Don't get me wrong. I ani not against advertising agencies, who have done so much for industry in general, but'there should be a limit to their-influ- ence in a market and field they know so little about. I like magazine: advertising, but even that has its limits. I' like radio, and 1 think I was one of the first to apply its mighty pressure to the advantage ol motion picture exploitation, but there are pic- tures that do -not fit into extensive radio campaigns and even pictures that magazine advertising is wasted upon. TURNER particularly if that star has any real interest in the picture. The second is the one with the pro- ducer's name in 100% type. Then there might b» a series (a), with sex, and the clinch, (b) without sex and action (you know, the ''He Man" stuff),- and then- they are loaded off to New York to get the reaction of the sales department and the East-: em Advertising, Publicity and Exploitation Depart- ments. There is a hustle at this time to reserve space in the better periodicals (they ain't maga- zines no more by this time) and those Eastern De- partments; ■ better make up their minds quick, or some other company will beat them to their space. The fact that the picture • might not be on .the re- lease schedule for some months is beside the point. , because (we want the.public, to^get the feel of tha picture). Now wha' hoppens? Months pass (the folks have been conditioned) and the picture is ready to open. The chart boys are as busy as bees , with their high averages, of "folks who want to see," and "highest penetration in years," and really, everything looks quite; rosy.: Comes a wail from the field, "How's about some money to give this turkey a little, push in Squee- dunk?", and goes out the answer, "We must stop somewhere. Your public has been conditioned, your penetration.is the highest ever, and if you opened your doors right now the ushers would probably catch a cold," Now you relay this information to the exhibitor, who somehow didn't get "conditioned in this new era and process," and he gives you tho . fisheye. Somehow, you get the sudden feeling that; this exhibitor thinks you have been drinking a little.,: too much.. And you almost wish you had. Nothing can be done because you really must stop spending some time; and you did that about; six - months ago. So you take your: pin money, and dis- tribute it the best you can and wait for the opening. You discover that if the folks had been ''conditioned'' they are suddenly out of condition, for the gross don't match the popcorn sales and it is so reported to New York, - : , .. The Switch Prodacer'a Billing I New phrases have had their effect on producers, I such as"conditioning the public," or "stressing pub- lic importance" (together with the producer's name in star-size type . . . and oh, brother, that helps) so heads bob up and heads bob down, and soon you have o seriea of ads as suggested for the "condition- ing the public" campaign. Now the series is- im' portantj The first is to catch the eye of the star,' Now comes .the "ifs" and the new campaign. In- stead of having Gloria Milksop wave a banner she gives Harold the bunnyhug and we have a new campaign in a jiffy, and somehow they scare up a little money and we try it all over again; Tha producer sends on a wave, of representatives to ,find: out just what is the matter, and they think the ex- ; hibitor .is sort of dumb when he explains that "the folks just don't come in, and when the folks just don't come in, we haven't anything to add up." Now when they tell him about the folks all having been "conditioned," he looks around the lobby, dreamy like,, sort of measuring space as to how many cars;he can store there ... just in case. All of which brings me back to the point of why is it not sensible to RESERVE A LARGE CHUNK OF ADVERTISING MONEY TO BE USED ON A PICTURE, WHEN AND AT THE PRECISE TIME A PICTU RE IS BEI NG S OLD TO THE PUBLIC. 'Any man, or anyTagency^whd itiirperSt in^fiihlS ~ ing that a can of film can be sold on the same basis as a can of soup is doing this business, and, as a matter of fact, his own business, a very grave in- justice. Any good, solid campaign never consists of paid advertising alone, or of radio alone, or exploitation alone. It is the blending of these three elements, evenly divided, both as to cast and effort, that make a good, solid campaign. Go overboard on one, or time it wrong, and you are in trouble.^ There is another element of business that is not based on.advertising, whether it be local or national. That is the;habit a family may-have of going to the neighboring movie, on a certain given night, irre- spective of what the film might he. Certain big com- panies used to recoginze this fact and notified this source of business through a weekly mailing piece. Yes, it was the old weekly throwaway (which now is outdated) but Mom and the kids always gave it the otfce-over, and if it happened to bring the news that a picture they really like was going to, come around, you can bet they didn't miss that week. ; This is a grand business, and it will continue to be a healthy business, despite radio, television or any other forms of amusement that will help, and never hinder, but I think we have got to get around to the knowledge that a greater bulk of our adver- tising money will soon have to he expended WHEN OUR CAN OF FILM, as in the case of THE CAN OF, SOUP; is on: the shelf and ready for sale, with a little less "conditioning" and "penetration" when your merchandise is not ready for sale. REP. MARKS NEW YEAR WITH PRODUCT UPSURGE Hollywood. Production at Republic will be going full. blast during- the first two months of 1949 with 10 pic- tures lined up at the starting gate. Sound stages will be filled to capacity for the first time in sev- eral months. January starters are "Eagles in Exile," "Susanna Pass,"' ''Prince of the Plains,""Death Valley Gun- fighters" and a 12-chapter serial, "Ghost of Zorro." Starting in Feb- ruary are "Streets of San Fran- cisco," "Tuscon Trigger Man," "Fort Dodge Stampede," "Outcast of Virginia City" and an untitled John H. Auer production. / : Leo Winds Year With 8PixLensing,2Testing Hollywood. Metro wound up the old year in a burst of production activity, with eight pictures before the cameras and two in. the testing stage. Testing were "Any Number Can Play" and "That Midnight Kiss." On regular shooting, schedules were "Madame Bovary,'' "The ! Good Old Summertime," The For- i syte Saga," "Highland Lassie" and , "The Great Sinner." Back for re- I takes were "Edward, My Son," j "The Barkleys of Broadway" and I "Nepttme's Daughter." BIG ARRAY OF PIX NAMES FOR PRESS FOTOGS'BALL Hollywood. Stanley Richardson of the HoI» lywood Coordinating Committee;Is ■ lining up an exceptionally big ar- ray of film names for the Press Photographers dinner, March 19, I in Washington, where President I Truman will be guest; of .honor. I Hollywood talent was-invited to the dinner for the first time last j year. The cast consisted of Georga Jessel, Jimmy Durante, Pat, I O'Brien, Celeste Holm, Eddia [Bracken and Andre Previn. In view I of the special nature of the dinner j this year, the iilm contingent, will I be larger.