Boxoffice (Apr-Jun 1937)

"RIVIERA" PROVIDES HOPE HAMPTON ROLE Hope Hampton, star of the silent screen a dozen years ago, will make her film return in a featured role in “Riviera” at Universal, having been signed to a term contract by Charles Rogers. Miss Hampton has been singing with the Chicago Civic Opera and in concert engagements. B. G. DeSylva will produce “Riviera,” based on the Earl Derr Biggers novel, “Love Insurance,” with filming to start in August. Jerome Kern and Dorothy Fields are doing the music and lyrics. LONG-TIME TERMER TO FRED MacMURRAY Fred MacMurray has signed a new seven-year contract with Paramount, and goes into “True Confession” as his next assignment, opposite Carole Lombard. Wesley Ruggles will direct. MacMurray has appeared in 14 pictures since he signed his first contract with the studio in 1934. The new agreement is a straight deal in three optional periods of two years each, with an additional optional year. FIRST PRODUCTION IN ENGLAND FOR FIELDS A sudden switch in production plans has caused 20th Century-Fox to announce that Grade Fields’ first picture for the company will be filmed in England instead of in Hollywood. Monte Banks will direct the English comedienne’s vehicle, with Sam Engels going abroad to act as associate producer. An English cast will be augmented by Hollywood players. Surveying Studios' Use of Radio The amount of radio transmitting and receiving equipment owned by the major studios and the extent to which it is used for communication between the studios and location units will be determined in the course of a survey just launched by the Academy Research Council’s committee on short wave radio communication. Information will also be assembled on the number of location trips to which companies have been sent by the studios during the past year. The committee intends to formulate plans for obtaining maximum benefit from the use of radio communication between the studios and units working on locations where no other communication is available. Committee members include E. H. Hansen, John Aalberg, Ellis Gray, Lorin Grignon, John Hilliard, Burton F. Miller, Gordon Sawyer, Stewart Wainwright and Gordon S. Mitchell. Metro Radio Show Over Major Network bij Fall STRIKE ECHOES AFAR Hollywood Percenters Halt Palestine Fund Meet Even far-off Palestine is destined to feel the repercussions of Hollywood’s current motion picture strikes and all the turmoil that has been surrounding the efforts of various studio crafts to gain recognition. This unfortunate circumstance came to light this week after Agent M. C. Levee had announced that he would be host at a meeting of certain members of his craft at the Hillcrest Country Club at which plans would be made for funds for relief of Palestinians. The fact, however, that the Screen Actors Guild, after obtaining producer recognition for its members, is reported to have turned its attentions toward establishing a Guild franchise for agents, provided excellent fodder for Hollywood’s dopesters when the Levee meeting was called, with reports being spread that the percenters were getting together in an effort to head off the proposed Guild moves, using the philanthropic discussion as a blind. To show, however, that the suffering and privation in Palestine is close to his heart and that the fund drive topic was really to be discussed. Levee this week called off the meeting, rather than “have the wrong interpretation placed upon it,” according to one of his spokesmen. Sound Technicians Propose Revisions Proposed new standards for sound track dimensions and placement on film were discussed when major studio sound department heads and representatives of the sound equipment companies met early this week under the auspices of the Research Council of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Sound directors are utilizing the facilities of the Research Council to prepare standards in advance to which new equipment may be manufactured. Such procedure, in contrast to old hit-or-miss methods, results in a considerable economy to the industry by making certain in advance that all push-pull film recorded by all companies will reproduce properly on all theatre equipment. Attending the conference were John Aalberg, E. H. Hansen, Nathan Levinson Franklin Hansen, Thomas Moulton, John Livadary, Douglas Shearer, Homer G. Tasker, K. F. Morgan, J. G. Frayne, Barton Kreuzer, Wallace Wolf and Gordon S. Mitchell. Exhibitors who have been complaining about the steady drift of motion picture personages into radio work were this week furnished with a substantial morsel to sink their teeth into when it became known that Metro, which has long held out against broadcast tieups of any sort, has capitulated, and that a “Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer-on-the-Air” program has been set to go out over the ether next fall. The announcement, unconfirmable at the studio, emanated from the Hollywood offices of the William Morris agency, into whose hands the details of the venture have been placed. With Louis K. Sidney, who handles Station WHN in New York for Loew’s, Inc., at the guiding helm, the show will comprise a lineup of all Metro talent with one or two exceptions, using a studio orchestra and director, and appearances by Metro players selected according to the material being used each week. No Peak-Hour Rivalry The sting has been taken out, so far as exhibitors are concerned, as nearly as possible through plans to time the airings in such a way that there can be no interference with theatre attendance at peak hours — long one of the lustiest showman complaints against such broadcasts. Preview broadcasts of forthcoming pictures will also be handled by Sidney with a minimum of harm to the films’ boxoffice values. Future broadcasting by any Metro player, after his present radio commitments have terminated, will be handled exclusively by the studio, eliminating guest appearances on other programs and bringing Metro into the fold of motion picture makers which have established radio bureaus. New Wanger Transcription Other indications of continued interest by producers in radio tieups as evidenced this week included plans by Walter Wanger to produce a new type of radio transcription to ballyhoo his “Vogues of 1938.” Construction work on the new Columbia Broadcasting System studio at Sunset and Gower came to a temporary halt last week when a strike of truck drivers and shovel runners was called by the Los Angeles Building Trades Council as a protest against the asserted anti-union feeling of William Simpson, president of the construction company in charge of the CBS structure. Donald Thornburgh, western head of CBS, has asked Simpson to accede to union demands, and an early settlement, probably before the end of the week, was expected. The studio must be completed and ready for occupancy by November 15. While work on the CBS studio was at a standstill, however, Victor Dalton, owner (Continued on page 34) BOXOFnCE May 22, 1937. 31