Exhibitor's Trade Review (Sep-Nov 1921)

October 29, 1921 EXHIBITORS TRADE REVIEW 1515 Short Subject News CONDUCTED BY CLIFFORD KNIGHT "Sunshine Sammy" to Be Starred in Two Reel Comedy Frederick E. Morrison Only Eight Years Old Will Be Featured in "The Pickaninny," Released by Pathe December 4. Frederick Ernest Morrison, otherwise "Sunshine Sammy," for several years past ray of joy in comedies produced by Hal Roach for Pathe distribution, is now a screen luminary. This eight-year-old colored boy, who has become almost inseparable from "Snub" Pollard m his Roach productions, will be seen this winter in a special two-reel comedy called "The Pickaninny." Hal Roach produced this picture, which gives the colored youngster every opportunity to show just how keen a master of funmaking he really is, to satisfy his legion of admirers who virtually demanded his elevation to stardom. Pathe will release "The Pickaninny" on December 4. It will be part of the exceptionally strong series of two-reel comedies with which Pathe will campaign during the current season. Releasing arrangements for the Harris Dickson comedies in which all colored players are featured, and the series of tworeelers starring Ernest Truex, Broadway's comedy favorite, have now been completed. Amadee J. Van Beuren produced the Truex pictures. , "The Custard Nine," first of the Harris Dickson comedies produced from a story in the Saturday Evening Post, will inaugurate the campaign with the release scheduled for November 1. Two weeks later Pathe will inaugurate the Truex series with "Little, but Oh My!" On December 4, "The Pickaninny" will be released, and on December 18, "Stick Around," second of the Ernest Truex offerings, will be issued. "The Beauty Contest," which completes the Harris Dickson series, is slated for issuance on January 1, and on January 15, "The Bashful Lover," third of the Truex attractions, will go out to exhibitors. Pathe regards this series of two-reel offerings as attractive an assemblage of pictures as could be gathered. They augment the highly successful Hal Roach comedies Pathe distributes, including those featuring "Snub" Pollard, Gaylord Lloyd, Eddie Boland, and the re-issued Harold Lloyd one-reel triumphs. Urban's "Wild Babies" at the N. Y. Criterion Theatre "Wild Babies," one of Charles Urban's Kineto Reviews which is playing at the New York Criterion co-incidentally with "Peter Ibbetson," is a typical example of the Kineto Review where several famous naturalists and photographers have cooperated in gathering the material. The picture was edited and put together under Mr. Urban's personal direction. Among the contributors to its subject matter are Raymond L. Ditmars, curator of the New York Zoological Society; v Arthur H. Fisher, a well-known naturalist-photogra pher, and F. Percy Smith, a famous London scientist whose work is quite familiar to American audiences through the Kineto releases. "Wild Babies" pictures a score of different birds and animals in their relations between the parents and the offspring; life's story told and retold in the whole animal kingdom. Educational' s Kinograms Out to Surpass All Others Expansion and improvement until "there will be no question that Kinograms is the best reel on the market." This is the program that has been mapped out for Educational's news reel, according to a letter written a few days ago to E. W. Hammons, president of Educational Film Exchanges, Inc., by Capt. G. McL. Baynes, head of the Kinograms Publishing Corporation. "This is just one example of the increased activity, expenditure and effort generally that is being exerted on all of our product for the new year," said Mr. Hammons in announcing receipt of Capt. Baynes's letter, which was written following a tour of many key cities made by Capt. Baynes. Capt. Baynes's letter to Mr. Hammons said, in part: "As you know, I have just returned from a tour of some of your branches — six in all — and I want to express to you the enthusiasm and satisfaction I feel in having our product, Kinograms, in your hands. I have had a great deal to do with a number of distributors and have called on a number of branches throughout the country and I have yet to see an organization as complete as yours for handling the product you are handling. "I probably called on some seventy or eighty well-known and substantial exhibitors and every one of them was most enthusiastic, not only about your product — which they all claim they could not get along without — but as to the service they are receiving from your exchanges. Kutinsky Head of Short Subjects for Universal Louis I. Kutinsky, one of the leading salesmen of the Big "U" Film Exchange, Universal's New York branch, has been promoted to head the Short Subjects Department of that exchange, under Universal's new Short Subjects organization. Kutinsky has been with Universal for five years and is personally acquainted with every exhibitor in the New York territory. As a salesman he has consistently broken sales records for the Big "U." Abe Stern Back from Coast Abe Stern, secretary and treasurer of the Century Comedy Company has returned to Los Angeles from New York City. Immediately upon his arrival he went into conference with Louis Jacobs, production manager and Charles Rubin, business manager, in regard to plans for the busiest season ever enjoyed by Century. A list of productions has been outlined which will call into play the best abilities of the Century comedy players. Charles Urban Is Out in Defense of the Serial Idea Places His Movie Chats in Serial Division — Says They Create Regular, High-Class Patronage In the discussion about motion pictures which has occupied much space in newspapers and magazines lately, the question of serials has played an important part and much adverse criticism of the motion picture in general has been caused by serials. Charles Urban this week came to the defense of the serial idea. "There is no reason whatsoever," he said, "to criticize the motion pictures on account of serials. Every serial should be criticized separately on its merits, but the idea certainly is a good one. I believe in serials. "The serial idea does bring steady circulation to the magazine and newspaper, and in the same way it brings steady patronage to theatres. I place the Charles Urban's Movie Chats in the class of serials. Anything that is issued and released regularly falls into the serial division, and the Movie Chats certainly should be classed as a serial. The fact that each one is complete in itself; the fact that it is informa.tive and instructive rather than fictional does not make it any less a serial. "The Movie Chats are the sort of motion pictures that create a regular, high-class patronage; when people know they appear week after week in a theatre they patronize that theatre week after week." Margaret McWade Plays Mother in "White Mouse'' Twenty-one years ago the audience at Wallack's Theatre in New York City was held spellbound in the third act of a famous Civil War play, "Winchester," by the introduction of a dramatic innovation — motion pictures of the most thrilling part of the drama. Margaret McWade, who was the heroine of that remarkable play and who bears the distinctive honor of having been the first actress to introduce motion pictures into the spoken drama, has a part in the all-star cast of The White Mouse, the fourth of the Selig Rork Photoplays made for Educational release. Miss McWade enacted the role of the pathetic mother in The Ne'er to Return Road, the third of this series of short features, which recently had its first showing at the Strand Theatre on Broadway. She played opposite Wallace Beery in this picture. In The White' Mouse, which is adapted from the famous story by James Oliver Curwood, she again has the part of "mother," living with her daughter (Ethel Grey Terry) in a little cottage in the Canadian Northwest. She is a prominent member of a cast headed by Lewis Stone and including Wallace Beery, Willard Louis, Bessie Wong and others.