Exhibitors Herald (1927)

April 23, 1927 EXHIBITORS HERALD 49 [THE THEATRE O^ASDcpartmtnt of Practical Showmanship House Organ a Poor Relation Theatre Owners Miss Golden Opportunities Much correspondence has changed hands since this department devoted its available inches to the analysis of current theatre house organs in the issue preceding this one by five weeks. No such response as the analysis brought forth was anticipated. No attempt to fully present it will be made at this or any time, most of the mail being of confidential nature. It can be definitely stated, however, that much of the seeming error prevalent in theatre publications has been traced to its several sources. First of these sources, in scope of influence at least, is the indifference of the theatreowner employing a representative to publish his house organ. This indifference, in reality an outgrowth of misunderstanding, is accovmtable for much of the bad printing, faulty subject matter and consequent lack of effectiveness which characterize theatre publications. Perhaps the first thing to talk about in a summary of the house organ situation is the attitude toward it of the man who foots the bill. “I’m sorry,” says the man who edits one paper which wasn’t flatteringly discussed in the recent analysis, “I know the paper’s pretty bad, but it’s the best I can do with the boss hounding me to cut the expense every issue and demanding to know what the darn thing’s good for anyway.” Another writes, “I know good printing when I see it, but they make me get this out at the cheapest plemt in town and that’s the result.” Sill another says, “When the guy that pays the bills insists on having the paper filled with pictures of his pet stars and press book clippings, what can you expect?” Such responses might not be overly significant if the papers concerned did not so clearly bear out the statements made. With the papers for reference, however, there is evident truth in the assertions made. Without going into these and other individual cases, a word as to the genuine purpose, function and value of the theatre publication might be in order. * * * Obviously, the primary purpose of a house organ is to promote box office welfare. As obviously, this can be done by just one method, which is a two-phased affair. The first step is to get the house organ read. The second step is to get it read in the right instead of the wrong manner. The house organ that is read — and read for the news of pictures that is in it — obtains the box office result for which it is published. But the matter of getting a house organ read is no Reproduction of modified program calendar ("954 by fpA inches, black on white) submitted for criticism by R. R. Winship, Majestic theatre, Phillipsburgh, Kansas, whose letter appears at the close of the article beginning on this page. simple thing. It does look simple. It seems a small matter to tell a man to print four or eight pages of stuff about the pictures and the theatre and hand the pages to the patrons, mail them to him, or smuggle them into his automobile while it is parked in the neighborhood. But it is not that simple. The world is flooded with free reading matter, much of it composed by more gifted writers and illustrators than those who work for the paid publications. The house organ that starts out to blaze a trail for itself goes into competition with this mass of advertising material the minute it comes off the press. It is pretty stiff competition. The building of a successful house organ does cost money. How much it will cost cannot be predetermined. In all probability, if the sum a successful house organ is going to cost were known before it is launched it would not be launched. Most of the successful papers in the field became successful on the increased investment necessitated by early failure, the “good money after bad” spent by determined theatre owners who refused to quit. * * Theatre owners do not like the prospect of consistently maintained financial outlay. They avoid getting themselves onto long film contracts, into long service connections of any sort, and the house organ represents an item that will grow much larger before it gets