Boxoffice (Oct-Dec 1938)

Exhibitor-Distributor Conferences Start October 19, Says Rodgers Screening Room. The first program will be presented on Thursday, October 27. The membership of the Film Group will be limited to 200. A subscription price of $3.75 per person for the five programs to be presented has been worked out. R. M. Zorn, missionary, is using a fourreel film of India to illustrate the lectures he is presenting at various Lutheran halls . . . Members of the service staff at Loew’s Theatre are still seeking a football game with laddies from some other theatre here. Through the courtesy of Fanchon & Marco the fire prevention division of the St. Louis safety council will be able to use the Missouri Theatre for the annual fire prevention show for elementary school children to be given on Saturday, October 15, from 9 to 11 a. m. Tickets are being distributed through engine houses throughout the city . Marathon golfers better look to thenlaurels if Harry Zulauf, manager of the Norside Theatre and his trusty stagehand, Elmer Moran, can play pasture pool as long and well as they can talk it. They got the idea of striving for marathon honors during a round at their favorite golf course, the Creve Coeur Country Club, one day last week. Louise (Pat) Daugherty, cashier, has been transferred from the Shenandoah Theatre in South St. Louis to the Tivoli Theatre on Delmar boulevard in University City . . . Final background shots for “Jesse James” have been taken by the 20 th Century-Fox camera crew in the vicinity of Eldon, Mo. Sign Equipment Contracts For Cape Girardeau Unit Cape Girardeau, Mo. — Tire Fox Midwest Agency Corp., owners of the 1,250-seat Broadway Theatre, has awarded contracts in connection with the remodeling of that house as follows: For seats to the American Seating Co.; drapes to Great Western State Equipment Co. of Kansas City; carpets and projection equipment to National Theatre Supply of St. Louis; a new marques' to the Claude Neon Federal Southwest of Wichita, Kas.; light fixtures to Summerour & Devine of Kansas City; decorating and painting to Schanbacher & Son of Springfield, 111., and minor alterations, including a new acoustical ceiling and a 10-year bonded roof to Cape Girardeau concerns. When the remodeling and reequipping process is completed the theatre will rank with the finest in this section. The improvements will cost about $30,000. Roy Cato is manager of the Broadway. "Can't Take It" Grosses High Hollywood — Columbia’s “You Can’t Take It With You,” nationally released on September 29, has opened in over 70 cities, and is now playing to phenomenal business. Kohlberg in Sheboygan Falls Sheboygan, Wis. — Stanford S. Kohlberg, operator of the Granada Theatre in Racine, has taken over the Falls Theatre in Sheboygan Falls from Mike Lencione. Any Extreme tor Publicity Chicago — Because he liked to read about himself in the papers, Frank Cheme, 22, confessed, police say, that he robbed the cashiers of nine local theatres in the last year. He said he never used a gun, but made his victims believe he had one. The houses he is said to have held up are the Rove, Shore, Joy, Commercial Tower, Rhodes and Maryland theatres in the South Side, and the Parthenon and Paramount in Hammond, Ind. The Vogue Quits • Double Features Indianapolis — Carl Niesse’s Vogue Theatre, which attracted wide attention when it opened its doors with single feature programs early last spring, has gone over to double features. The single feature policy, according to Niesse, proved successful only temporarily. Since the Vogue has taken on double features, business has jumped 30 per cent. With the change to double features, he finds more of the younger set in the theatre. Chicago — Stopping off here, en route from New Orleans to the Michigan Allied convention this week in Grand Rapids, Mich., William F. Rodgers, M-G-M sales manager, said that the conferences on industry trade practices would get under way in New York, October 19. The length of the time to be alloted to the conferences for the various groups will depend upon how soon representatives from each of the exhibitor associations come to New York to meet with the distributors. ‘‘We are very hopeful that as a result of these meetings a great deal will be accomplished for the good of the industry,” said Rodgers. “Of course, we can’t tell what the negotiations will lead to or how far they will go, though every phase of the buyers and sellers relationships will be discussed. Naturally, of course, rental terms specifically cannot be brought up. “Everyone can rest assured, however, that a serious effort will be made to straighten out all of the differences between the two branches of the industry.” Rodgers intimated that his address on Wednesday before the Michigan Allied unit would probably touch on the forthcoming conferences. He also took time to praise M-G-M’s English-produced “The Citadel,” starring Robert Donat and Rosalind Russell. “This can easily be one of our biggest pictures this year,” he said. “And with ‘Too Hot to Handle,’ ‘The Great Waltz,’ ‘Sweethearts,’ and others following up on ‘Boys Town,’ and ‘Three Loves Has Nancy,’ we are really geared up to do big things for the exhibitors.” Along the Line of March An engineer of the 40 and 8 society locomotive from Ft. Wayne, Ind., approaching one of the “Motion Pictures Are Your Best Entertainment” billboards along the line of march for the American Legion parade in Los Angeles. BOXOFFICE :: October 15, 1938 83