Exhibitors Herald and Moving Picture World (Oct-Dec 1928)

22 BETTER THEATRES SECTION OF November 24, 1928 jector Corporation asking what the average circumferential play or lost motion was in the rotating shutter of new projectors, measured at the rim of the same. I also asked that tests be made of several projectors. Here is the answer: After examining several new projectors, we find that the amount of lost motion at the shutter rim, when holding the flywheel stationary, is approximately fixe-sixteenths of an inch. In some of the new mechanisms it was as much as three-eighths of an inch, but in none did it exceed that amount. You will of course appreciate that this amount of play is allowed for in the master blade width, and when using a projection lens within the average range of focal length ordinarily used for motion picture projection, the allowance is ample to take care of considerable wear. We feel, however, that when the wear is such that the shutter rim may be rotated as much as three-fourths of an inch while the flywheel is held stationary, it certainly is time an adjustment was made. There, gentlemen, you have it, though I personally would not permit the gear train of a projector in a theatre in which I was projectionist to become worn enough to permit of quite three-fourths of an inch lost motion measured at the shutter rim. We may certainly accept it as fact that when the gear train of any professional projector has become worn sufficiently to permit of three-quarters of an inch rotation of the shutter rim while holding the flywheel stationary, then the wear should be reduced by installation of new gears. Covered Ports And Sound Projection Every sound projectionist should have his ports all covered with optical glass. For the best glass see page 310, Vol. 1, of your Bluebook on Projection. With sound projection the monitor horn plays a very important part and with open ports, except in theatres where no part of the audience is located anywhere near the projection room — if any there be — the monitor must be kept very low — too low in fact to be effective as a guide to sound volume. Cover your ports with high grade thin glass, preferably optical glass, and then CLEAN BOTH SIDES OF THE GLASS DAILY. The glass should be mounted in a frame hung on hinges so that this may readily be done. Not Good Procedure It most emphatically is not the intention of this department to interfere in union affairs. However, it is impossible always to altogether side-step such things, and at the same time give honest service to the readers of this department, to the motion picture industry and to the union itself. When we do feel obliged to comment, though, the comment will always be intended as friendly and constructive, and honest, earnest union officials and men will welcome that. From a high official in a pretty large theatre chain comes a letter, one excerpt from which reads as follows: ^ ^i^ * We would very much like to see such comment as you may feel at liberty to make in your department in the Exhibitors Heeald-World on the following proposition. From reading your writings in the past I have been impressed with the idea that you have a very correct view on most things having^ to do with projection. I have had many of your articles passed along to our managers and projectionists in the form of mimeographed letters. The union in one large city where we have theatres has the fixed idea that we have absolutely no rights in the matter of selection of projectionists. It claims the right to just send us any man it may desire, and we are expected to keep him, regardless of whether or not he is an efficient projectionist, or agreeable to our manager and the other projectionists. We ourselves hold that our man who is in charge of projection matters should have the right to select any member of the union he may wish who is out of employment, or even a union man who may be working m another theatre, if we can by fair means induce him to come to us. We hold that, provided we employ a member of the union, and abide, as we do abide, by union rules and regulations, it_ is none of the union's legitimate business what individual we may employ. You will agree, I think, Mr. Richardson, that in order to get the best results, we must have projecitonists who are able to get along with the manager and with each other harmoniously. Moreover, we have very large sums invested in some of our theatres, which is, as you have said many times, dependent for its income, at least in considerable measure, upon excellence of projection. It seems only common sense to hold that under these conditions we should have the right to select our own staff of projectionists, free from union interference. That is the point I ask you to, if you will, comment upon. ^ ^ ^ There are wheels within wheels in this matter. Broadly it cannot be denied that your position is absolutely right, but there are necessary modifications and qualifications just the same. It has long since been found that in order to secure desirable positions, some men are willing, in the sense that they will do it, to make a secret agreement to work under the scale, or to do other things not in accordance with union rules. This the union has the unquestioned right to guard against. It therefore must keep a watchful eyes upon things. Another thing, unions wish to be fair to all members, and proportion the available jobs out in rotation. That is to say, if three men are out of work, the one who has been out longest should have the first job. This is, however, presumed to be, but is not always administered with common sense. If the available job is in a theatre requiring a high grade projectionist, and the first man on the list is not such a one, then he should not be and is not presumed to be sent. However, the fault lies in the fact that usually this decision lies in the hands of some one union official, who in too many instances is a union politician, and builds a "machine" for himself with jobs. That statement will not be appreciated by those gentlemen, but they know and we all know it is true, and right there lies the real answer to your question. There are some very powerful "machines" in some of the large unions. They have been erected and function with and by the knowledge that if you oppose the "machine," you just plain won't get the good jobs. By reason of this situation it is entirely possible for one man to become so powerful that he can and does become, in effect, a dictator, with absolute power, and he will invariably try to bring about exactly the condition you have described, usually succeeding, by the way. In such matters you therefore are NOT THE VICTIM OF THE UNION ITSELF, which by and large wants to be fair, but of a union "machine," corresponding in every way to the political machine, which also usually wields a great deal of power. Such machines are bad in their effect. They do ultimate harm in every way. They stifle ambition in the men. They force upon theatres men selected for "machine" reasons, rather than because of their fitness for the particular job, though of course policy forbids that this latter be carried too far. I am strong for vmions. I have been a union man ever since 1884, when I joined the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen. I would not knowingly do anything to injure any union. I would willingly do anything I could to aid them, but I would do almost anything I could to put out of business the "machine," which means the union politician, who seeks union office, not with anxiety to benefit the union itself, except