20th Century-Fox Dynamo (August 5, 1939)

2i NEW DYNAMO RECORD NEW SEASON VOLUME OF QUALI TY DEALS G REETS K-7! Significant Accomplishments Indicate 1939-40 Will Be Productive of New Marks for Circulation and Revenue as Studio Can Boast the Greatest Production Lineup in History of This Company With what looms the greatest product lineup in its history, with some 700 more contracts on K-7 than it had on K-6 at the same time last year and with sales volume speedily increasing daily, this corporation was enthusiastically winging its way into another season. Fully prepared and with every prospect of obliterating all past records, the stage was perfectly set for the in- auguration this week-end of the gala 1939-40 season! Some 1700 employees working under the domestic leadership of General Manager of Distribution Herman Wobber were this week clearing decks for the season that promises to be extraordinary for many reasons. Notwithstanding the presence of many factors that are making distribu- tion this year somewhat dilferent in procedure from past years, the combined U. S. and Canadian contingents greet the K-7 years with unprece- dented strength insofar as potential earning power is concerned. While the sales forces were fully mobilized to make more brilliant history, the creative organization under the leadership of Darryl F. Zan- uck, boasted a record at the very outset of the new season. Of the minimum 48 productions that are scheduled to be made at Movietone City for K-7 release, some 15 had been completed, were in the editing and cutting department or actually before the cameras. Of the expected four specials to be made at this company’s British studios in London, one (Gracie Field’s “Shipyard Sally”) had been completed and another was in work. At no time in its history has the company’s product for an ensuing year been so well set. The feature output for 1939-40 includes 52 feature attractions, of which at least six will be Technicolor super specials produced by Zanuck. The latter will personally produce 24 big specials. The short subject output for K-7 includes 26 one-reel featurettes, including some six in Technicolor, produced by Truman Talley’s Movietone organization. Paul Terry will deliver 26 Terry-Toons, including a minimum of 10 in Technicolor. In other words, the number of Technicolor attractions, feature and shorts, that will be released during 1939-40 is at the outset of the season guaranteed to be twice greater than the K-6 year just expiring! In story and starpower the new season, at its beginning, is assuredly unprecedented. Among those topnotch stars who are scheduled to appear in 1939-40 feature productions are: Tyrone Power, Sonja r j Henie, Alice Faye, Don Ameche, Shirley Temple, Claudette Colbert, Henry Fonda, Nancy Kelly, Spencer Tracy, Ann Sothern, George Brent, Myrna Loy, Fred MacMurray, Basil Rathbone, Warner Baxter, Joan Blondell, Edward Arnold, Richard Greene, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Sidney Toler, Richard Dix, Gladys George, Jane Withers, Randolph Scott, Gene Autry, Ritz Brothers, A1 Jolson, Gracie Fields, Elsa Maxwell, Mack Sennett, Alice Brady, Walter Brennan, Henry Hull, George Raft, Ida Lupino, Lionel Atwill, Cesar Romero, Binnie Barnes and many others. Furthermore, the list of best selling novels is extraordinary, being headed by “Grapes of Wrath,” “The Rains Came” and “Drums Along the Mohawk.” Add to these such powerful story properties as “Stanley and Livingstone,” “Hollywood Cavalcade,” “Swanee River,” Maeterlinck’s “The Blue Bird,” “Johnny Apollo,” “Brig- ham Young,” “Shadows in the Snow,” “Lady Jane,” “Public Deb No. 1,” “Little Old New York,” Irving Berlin’s “Say It with Music,” Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes” and others, and the reader will encounter no difficulty in locating the numerous reasons for the un- paralleled enthusiasm prevailing in the sales ranks over the new season’s prospects. Further reason for this en- thusiasm is the presence of the finest contracts this company’s managers and salesmen have ever sold, embodying terms en- abling the K-7 lineup to earn a return that is patterned to make this the corporation’s most lucra- tive season. In no past year has the distri- bution organization’s decks been so clear insofar as tasks kindred to the old season have been con- cerned. Throughout the United States, “Elsa Maxwell’s Hotel for Wo- men,” a breezy comedy drama of youth of today, was to launch the 1939-40 season. In New York, however, it was Zanuck’s “Stanley and Living- stone,” which was three years in the making, that was to usher in the new year. The world pre- miere of that $2,500,000 super special with an all-star cast headed by Spencer Tracy, Rich- ard Greene, Nancy Kelly, Sir Cedric Hardwicke, Charles Cor- burn and Henry Travels, was scheduled for the Roxy theatre on Friday. But, nationally, the introduc- tory release was “Elsa Max- well’s Hotel for Women.” An acknowledged exploitation “nat- ural,” this attraction will mark the debut of a young actress destined to further augment the South Nearing Pacing Atlantic Harry Ballance’s South continues to menace the K-7 feature product lead- ership of Edgar Moss’ At- lantic. The latter are now sepa- rated by a half dozen points, a margin that can be wiped out in a single week. That August will effect radical changes in stand- ings of branches and dis- tricts is indicated by press- time reports from the field to New Dynamo. list of stars developed by Zan- uck in the past four years. She is none other than Linda Darnell, whose work in “Elsa Maxwell’s Hotel for Women” is of such tri- umphant qualities that she is currently appearing in one of the major K-7 super specials, the Technieolored “Drums Along the Mohawk,” co-starring Henry Fonda and Claudette Colbert. EVERYTHING IN READINESS Meantime, the, studio this week was making plans to pre- view two of its greatest cine- matic undertakings: Teasing Atlantics Harry G. Ballance (1) “The Rains Came,” based on Louis Bromfield’s best sell- ing novel, with Tyrone Power, Myrna Loy, George Brent, Bren- da Joyce, and others, and (2) The Technieolored “Hol- lywood Cavalcade” with Alice Faye, Don Ameche, Mack Sen- nett and hundreds of others. Both carry added significance aside from their extraordinary entertainment strength. “The Rains Came” has been characterized by those who have seen it as “unquestionably the greatest talking picture ever made.” And in this production another Zanuck “find”—Brenda Joyce—proves her right to star- dom, something she will realize when she appears in “Here I Am a Stranger.” “Hollywood Cavalcad e,” a spectacular dramatization of the romance of picture-making and development of thd' past 20 years, all done in color, will be released at a time when the in- dustry is planning the 50th anni- versary of. the invention that be- IK-7 FE ATURE SALES! Following is the standing of every branch, district and division on the sale of the 1939-40 (K-7) feature product, based on total contracts (including recorded franchises) sold against total possibilities, as of July 31: BRANCHES July 31st 1 3 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 * 15 * 16 17 18 19 Branch (Manager) July 13th Pittsburgh (Cohn) 1 Memphis (Young) 8 Washington (Wheeler) 2 Atlanta (Wilson) 3 Dallas (Beiersdorf) 5 Winnipeg (Huber) 4 St. Louis (Reingold) 6 Salt Lake (Walker) 7 Charlotte (Longdon) 9 Minneapolis (Podoloff) 10 Milwaukee (Lorentz) 11 Philadelphia (Gross) 16 St. John (March) 13 Vancouver (Patterson) 13 New Haven (Simon) 15 Albany (Grassgreen) 14 Boston (Callahan) 17 Cincinnati (Grady) 19 Los Angeles (Dillon) 18 July July 31st District (Manager) 13th 30 Kansas (Fuller) 30 31 Seattle (Edmond) 31 33 Denver (Morrison) 33 33 Omaha (Scott) 33 34 Cleveland (Sclunertz) 34 35 Oklahoma (Clark) 39 36 New Orleans (Landaiche) .... 35 37 Des Moines (Mayer) 36 38 Toronto (Bailey) 38 39 Frisco (Ballentine) 37 30 Portland (Powers) 34 31 Indianapolis (Landis) 30 33 New York (Buxbaum) 33 33 Calgary (Skorey) 33 34 Buffalo (Samson) 34 35 Montreal (English) 35 36 Chicago (Eckhardt) 36 37 Detroit (Sturm) 37 * Tied. July 31st Branch (Manager) DISTRICTS July 13th . . . 1 Atlantic (Moss) 3 South (Ballance) 3 3 Northeast (Bailey) 3 4 Midwest (Scott) 4 5 Prairie (Levy) 5 DIVISIONS July July 31st Division (Manager) 13th 6 Coast (—-) G 7 Canada (O’Loglilin) 7 8 Mid-East (Roberts) 8 9 Great Lakes (—) 9 -July 31st District (Manager) 1 West (Kupper) 2 East (Sussman) . . . July 13th . . 1 July 31st Division (Manager) 3 Central (Gehring) . . July 13th . . 3 came what is today known as motion pictures. Before the cameras this week were “Drums Along the Mo- hawk,” “Little Old New York” with Alice Faye, Richard Greene, Fred MacMurray and others, and “Swanee River,” another Technicolor super special with Don Ameche, A1 Jolson, Nancy Kelly and others. By the end of the coming week Maeterlinck’s “The Blue Bird,” with an all-star cast headed by Shirley Temple, also was scheduled to go into production. The latter, too, is a 'Technicolor special. j In the (hitting rooms were “Adventures of Sherlock Holmes” with Basil Rathbone, Nigel Bruce, Ida -Lupino, Alan Mar- shal and others; Jane Withers’ “Roughnecks” with the Ritz Brothers, “The Escape,” and others. Executive Producer Sol M. Wurtzel was preparing to start “shooting” on “20,000 Men a Year,” with an all-star cast headed by Randolph Scott, cur- rently triumphant in “Frontier Marshal”; the Jones Family in Too Busy to Work,” “Charlie Chan in a City in Darkness” and several others. Thus, at no outset of any new season in the past has produc- tion been in healthier condition that it is now. At the very beginning of the season, the studio has expended something like $11,000,000 in Continued on Page 15