Independent Exhibitors Film Bulletin (1952)

.Sltort Subjects By BARN "TELEVISION'S MOST exciting coup of the year," accordings to Ed Sullivan, will immortalize the fabulous Samuel Goldwyn on the nation's TV screens. Sullivan has designated his "Toast of the Town" hourlong shows on December 14 and 21 as the vehicle for the producer's biography. The show will combine live action with film shots, the former featuring Goldwyn star discoveries, and the latter bridging the various eras from Goldwyn's beginnings as pioneer up to and including his current release, "Hans Christian Andersen". The producer's long holdaut against any treatment of his success story, finally agreed after a meeting with Sullivan on the West Coast and a careful study of the treatment accorded the biogs of such celebrities as Rodgers and Hammerstein, Helen Hayes and Robert E. Sherwood. There is little doubt that Sam Goldwynu's life should make SAMUEL GOLDWYN High Standards the movie houses, that would indicate that the theatre take dropped about 15 per cent from the 1951 nine-month period. Total general tax receipts were $249,027,000 in the '52 period, $267,350,000 in '51. THE WORST polio year in the U. S. history is inspiring the nation's exhibitors to a record support of the March of Dimes campaign next January. Pledges received by officials of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis included, by the end of the first week in November, some 12.000 theatres which will run the trailers and take collections of some type. If your theatre hasn't yet been contacted and you wish tc hop on this Samaritan bandwagon, call your local chapter of the March of Dimes or write to Bill E. Danziger at the Foundation's New York headquarters. 120 Broadway. THAT THE 20 per cent Federal admission tax is closing large houses as well as small was shown in a letter from an exhibitor received by COMPO's Tax Repeal Committee. The writer's theatre has a 2,000 seat capacity, 35 employees with a $l,000-per-week payroll, and represents a half-million dollar investment. "This year," the exhibitor says, "we will pay $30,000 in Federal admission tax and we'll lose money, not a great deal but perhaps $2,000." Adding that he is looking for a tenant to take the property off his hands, the exhibitor notes: "The elimination of the tax would, of course, keep us in business . . ." Information of this sort is a valuable aid in the campaign to repeal the tax. It should be made available to the National Committee, as well as being used on the local level to impress the theatreman's representative. mgrossing telling, but, as Sullivan says, 'The only problem is to measure up to joldwyn production standards." =:iGHT MOVIE people were in North and ;outh Carolina last week on a Movietime lour. It's nice to note that most of the , roupe of stars and writers, which included j\od Cameron, Chill Wills, Laura Elliott, Alice Kelley, William Lundigan, Kathleen trowley, Robert Hardy Andrews and | Douglas, are long-time veterans of the Tours ampaign. Their continued appearances indicate the deep satisfaction they receive Irom these grass roots trips to meet their >ublic and gain new fans. ADMISSION TAX receipts in the first nine nonths of 1952, as reported by the Treasury department, took a whopping $18,323,000 Irop from the same period total last year. Vith approximately 75 per cent of the ,;eneral admission tax receipts coming from UA IN FULL DRESS It took a presentation to England's Princess Margaret to get Arnold Picker and M'ix Youngstein out of shirtsleeves and into the fancy togs. Above, the L A executives at the grand premiere of "Limelight" in London. THE CINERAMA showing at the Broadway Theatre in New York is beginning to take on the aspect of an "Oklahoma" or "S.-utli Pacific". Sold out for months in advance, orders for tickets are being taken and filled for dates through April 26, 1953. TALK ABOUT guts. Jerry Wald gets the nomination for the bravest man in the industry. The producer, as part of the promotion for "The Lusty Men", which premieres in Texas next month, will personally select the Lone Star State's "prettiest cowgirl." As RKO exploitation head Terry Turner, who set the promotion, puts it, "In the state where all women are beautiful, he (Wald) hasn't got a chance. All he can do is point and then run." ROBERT MOCHRIE In Familiar Territory OF MEN AND THINGS: Robert Mochrie's appointment as vice-president of Samuel Goldwyn Productions, Inc. keeps him in familiar territory. As RKO's distribution v.p., Mochrie handled the Goldwyn product . . . Karl Herzog has resigned as president, treasurer and a director of Cinecolor Corp. . . . B. Bernard Kreisler's wide and varied experience in the movie industry has garnered him the presidency of I FA-TV Corp., distributors of foreign films to TV . . . Leo Jaffe has been upped to vice president of Columbia International, but maintains his post of assistant treasurer in the parent company . . . Big sales coupled with print limitations have prompted Allied Artists to extend the Morey "Razz" Goldstein sales drive for two more months through January 30 . . . Paramount's trade press contact succeeding Maurice Segal is Charles Franke, formerly with the Motion Picture Dailv. (Continued on Page 14) FILM BULLETIN November 17, 1952 Page 13