Boxoffice (Oct-Dec 1938)

Federal Wage-Hour Law Does Not Affect Time Schedule in Plants Confident that working conditions for their 30,000 employes are well above the minimum wage and maximum hour limitations prescribed by the federal government’s wage-hour legislation, which became effective throughout the nation on Monday, and acting on the advice of the special committee appointed last week to consider the ramifications of the measure, Hollywood’s film plants this week were operating virtually as usual in regard to time schedules. Uncertainty as to provisions of the law, however — which has prevailed because of the government’s “do the best you can” attitude in answer to repeated pleas by the Hays office for federal cooperation— this week prompted Victor Clarke, labor contact for the producers’ association, to entrain for New York to meet Pat Casey, also of the Hays office, from where they were to journey to Washington to discuss the situation with Administrator Elmer Andrews on Friday. Clarke asked for and obtained the appointment late last week, after hearing the report of Maurice Benjamin, Ross Hastings, Bill Holman and Keith Glennon, who had been selected to thresh out the matter with studio managers and attorneys representing every major film plant. Using data compiled by Casey over the past six months, the committee conferred at length over the weekend and advised studio executives that, pending government action, their safest course would be one of maintaining the status quo. Holman and Glennon are studio managers at Columbia and Paramount, respectively, while Benjamin and Hastings are attorneys. 1. Clarification of the wage-hour measure in relation to present working agreements held by the studios with numerous Guilds and labor unions. With the exception of the Screen Actors Guild contract, which provides for a 48-hour minimum week, the union pacts specify wage and hour scales which are well above the government’s mark, while the SAG, representing actors, is, to the best of local belief, a “professional” organization and its members, consequently, exempt. 2. Definite demarcation of the line between those workers who are exempt and those who will come under the provisions of the act. The local investigating committee reported to Clarke that approximately 620 classifications of duties involving professional, executive, artistic, managerial and manual services had already been tabulated. The answer to these problems, now being more-or-less sidestepped, is expected to be forthcoming when Clarke, after his conferences with Andrews, returns to the coast. Until that time, studio managers and executives have placed production crews, clerical workers and a few other classifications of workers on a 44-hour week in those plants where they have heretofore been putting in longer hours. Parade Off; Drive Quiet Having called off preparatory plans for the "Parade of Stars” which was to have been Hollywood’s next contribution to the “Motion Pictures Are Your Best Entertainment” drive, the local campaign committee apparently has arrived at a stalemate in its efforts to stimulate interest in the nation-wide back-to-the-boxoffice campaign. After gaining assurances from studios that they would cooperate to the fullest in staging the parade pageant, local committeemen scrapped all plans when notified by the general committee in New York that it is too late in the campaign for the stunt, which will be shelved for possible inclusion in the industry’s “Golden Anniversary” jubilee in 1939. Police parade permits had been granted and the spectacle, in which film stars from every studio were to participate, was to have marched down Hollywood Blvd. on the evening of October 25. The committee completed one task when the all-industry featurette, “The World Is Ours,” was previewed at the Westwood Village Theatre on Monday night. Negatives and prints have been shipped to New York for release early in November. Meantime, until further instructions are received from the general eastern drive headquarters, local committeemen are doing but little. Pascal to Produce Shaw Play for Metro Release Final plans have been set for Gabriel Pascal to produce "The Devil’s Disciple,” from the George Bernard Shaw play, at M-G-M's Culver City lot. Pascal, who produced “Pygmalion,” another Shaw play, in England, has taken space on the lot and plans to get into production about January 1 on a profit-sharing deal, the picture to bear Metro’s release banner. “The Devil’s Disciple,” according to plans threshed out at studio conferences, will have a preponderantly American cast. Pascal also holds film rights to Shaw’s “Caesar and Cleopatra,” but whether it will be made here or in England has not been decided. Sign Cossacks The Don Cossacks Male Choir of 50 voices has been signed by Boris Morros, Paramount musical director, for singingacting chores in “Hotel Imperial,” costarring Isa Miranda and Ray Milland. SPEARHEADS (Continued from page 19) light than has been done through the more serious efforts of such crusaders as Cantor. Having at long last decided on an actor, Sidney Toler, to succeed the late Warner Oland in the “Charlie Chan” series, — but only after a publicity department talent search which dwarfed the now-famous hunt for a Scarlett O’Hara — 20th Century-Fox’s blurbists are trying to repeat with an equally mythical and prolonged quest for a player to replace Keye Luke as Chan’s Number One son. Proving that originality is still one of Hollywood’s publicists’ rarest qualities. If production on the popular “Chan” series is held up much longer while the suspense of selecting a cast is milked to the limit for publicity possibilities, some of this super-searching will be necessary to find an audience to attend the resumed features if, when and as any of them are completed. In which connection it might be pointed out that a refreshing and welcome change of pace could be displayed if Errol Flynn ever started on a trip without the accom • paniment of a “mysterious disappearance.” Latest Flynn “mystery” found its way into type, with Bob Taplinger and his able crew acting as midwives, when the Warner studio was reported to be running around in circles after Flynn, who ostensibly sailed for a Honolulu vacation, could not be located on the boat. A great load was allegedly removed from the collective Warner brain when the studio’s dashing star turned up in San Francisco with the simple explanation that he disembarked when the vessel stopped there. Warner Plans Sequel To "Four Daughters" As a sequel to “Four Daughters,” Hal Wallis, executive producer at Warner, is planning early winter production on “Four Sons Meet Four Daughters,” with several members of the former picture’s cast appearing in the new vehicle. George Brent, Eddie Albert, Jeffrey Lynn and John Payne will have the top male roles, while the feminine contingent will comprise Priscilla, Rosemary and Lola Lane and Gale Page. Michael Curtiz will direct from a script being written by Julius Epstein. English Firm to Produce "Two Orphans" in Colony Max Mack, managing director and producer for Ocean Films, English production organization, has announced plans to produce “Two Orphans” in Hollywood for English and American distribution. Mack, who has been visiting here for two weeks, is searching for available shooting space. Ocean Films recently acquired film rights to the story from a French com?, pany. D. W. Griffith once made it as a silent under the title “Orphans of the Storm.” 22 BOXOFFICE :: October 29, 1938