The Canadian Motion Picture Exhibitor (May 15, 1941)

May 15th, 1941 THE » CANADIAN MOTION PICTURE OR STARS OR STORIES? |R.K.0. RADIO BEGINS) OLD-TIMERS COME Times change, and taxes too. NEW SEASON'S 2-REEL Ten years ago Constance Bennett received $30,000 a week from Warners, and now she is doing it for $2,000. If this were an indication that stardom in general is on the wane, things would be pretty bad. But they are not quite as bad as that. There are still plenty of stars who are drawing $30,000 a week — not of course that they work every week of the year. But even if they could, they wouldn't. If a star gets $30,000 a week, and it takes him or her five weeks to make a_ picture, simple arithmetics shows that he or she gets $150,000 for a picture. Now, taxes are so heavy in the United States that the stars of that calibre have found out that they do not net more when they make four or five pictures than they net when they make two pictures. We don't want to argue here whether they are right to confine themselves to making two pictures only, but many of them do, for instance Cary Grant, Irene Dunne, Claudette Colbert. The effect is that there is a shortage of stars, and _ that shortage is difficult to overcome, for stars, like Napoleon's corn fields, don’t grow in the palm of the hand. So we may get a lot of pictures of inferior quality, inferior that is, as far as star value goes. “But: is’ that “the only ‘value a picture has? Yes and no. It is; if the-industry is right. For since its ‘nfancy the industry hasn't sold —A BARGAIN — 11500 Box Spring Leather Seats Whipcord Panel Backs Double Channel Sampson Amplifier DeForest Sound Heads Spare Tubes P.E. Cells Lenses ROYAL THEATRE WINDSOR, ONT. PRODUCTION RKO Radio Pictures is off on its production program of two-reel comedies. With the opening of ithe new show year _ several months away, the first of the two-reelers starring Edgar Kennedy has just gone before the cameras with Clem Beauchamp directing, and Bert Gil roy producing. This vehicle marks the 67th short production the comedian nas made under the RKO Ra dio banner. Kennedy has starred in RKO Radio “briefies’’ for some eleven years as well aappearing in many features. For the 1941-42 season, the “Slow Burn” star will make a ~eries of six snicker units. VEIDT INFLATION Conrad Veidt has received dozens of letters from persons whose last name is Veidt. They all state “I wonder if this is your own name, for I have never heard it outside my own family.’ The letters have come from such far apart places as Camden, N.J., Fort Peck, Montana, Atlanta, Georgia, Fort Worth, Texas, and Fargo, North Dakota. pictures but stars, and when it made pictures without stars it looked upon them with the embarrassment with which the Victorians looked upon illegiti mate children. But the industry isn’t right, that is, not entirely. Although nobody would have admitted it at the moment — looking back we can all remember pictures which the greatest names couldn't prevent from being washouts. On the other hand, it takes a hell of a bad actor to spoil a] Shakespeare play entirely. So, if there are good plays and non-star actors there is no saying what new heights the industry might attain. And the necessities of war financing may yet turn into a virtue for the picture industry. BACK One consequence of the approaching shortage of stars is the return to the screen of a number of actors who have retired: long: ago.. ‘The: -list: is headed by Gloria Swanson who plays in RKO’s ‘Father Takes A Wife” with Adolphe Menjou. Ann Harding has been tested by Metro for the role of Spencer Tracey's mother-inThe Yearling”: .Lilian Gish may appear in Columbia's "Ladies In _ Retirement”. Lilian Gish's last role was in Para's. “His Double Life = in 1934. Ann Harding was last seen in 1937 in United Artists “Love From A Stranger’. Gloria Swanson ended her career in 1930 in a picture that was never released after more than $1,000,000 had been spent on it: “Queen Kelly”, directed by | Erich von Stroheim, produced by Joseph P. Kennedy, later American Ambassador to England. Disagreement among the orincipals was the reason why the picture was never completed. Hobart Bosworth has been signed to an acting contract by Warners. His first role will be in support of Frederic March in “One Foot In Heaven.” Bosworth, who won renown as the Wolf Larsen of the 1913 production of ‘The Sea Wolf,” his first film, retired from the screen following an illness in 1921, but returned in 1930 and has appeared in about one picture a year since then. Bosworth is now 74 years of age. BUSTER KEATON ALMOST JOINED CAST OF “PUDDIN’ HEAD” Buster Keaton was to join the cast of Republic's Judy Canova starrer, the $750,000 budgeted comedy with music which was placed before the cameras last week. He was to play Judy’s home town hillbilly boy friend who comes to the city to see that it does right by Judy. But he had hardly started when illness forced him to withdraw. Francis Lederer has the lead opposite Judy Canova as a frayed-at-thecuffs count. HISTORIC RKO THEATRE REVAMPED FOR “CITIZEN KANE” The historic RKO Palace Theatre on Broadway, New York, has been given new decoration inside and out for the current road-show run of Orson Welles’ “Citizen Kane.” Just above the marquee, covered with three flat iridescent signs, the largest of which is 20 x 9, is a 70-foot neon-effect sign with various size figures of Orson Welles, graduated from 65¥2 feet high to 25 feet high. The arms slowly rise and fall and at the top extend close to a giant sign reading “It's Terrific.” Steam in alternating colors rises from each side of these figures to the triple-flasher “It's Terrific.” Above this is a Parisian innovation called a Wonder Sign:. This is 30 feet square and within its mechanism is 24,000,000 feet of wire tied in to 27,000 bulbs. There are several stencils carrying billing and catchlines. Just below the Wonder Sign is a news flash strip with official Trans Radio news along with excerpts from reviews of “Citizen Kane’ and various selling phrases. Inside the Palace on both sides of the house are miniature replicas of Niagara Falls. These water cascades in color are sight feet high.. Seven boxes on each side of the theatre were removed to allow for the cascades. Trees, foliage and plants throughout the box areas further carry out the woodland effect. There has been a complete new seat coverage in white and green linen. An imitation neon display of 18 units highlights the lobby decorations. This marks the first use of this type of lighting in the show world. SPECIAL “HAMILTON” SCREENING FOR MALAYA SAILORS Fifty officers and men from H.M.S. Malaya recently were the guests of Alexander Korda at a special screening of “That Hamilton Woman’. While the Battle of Trafalgar constitutes only one sequence in the picture, it is presented in all its technical details. ad