Independent Exhibitors Film Bulletin (1963)

WHAT CAN EXHIBITORS DO TO COMBAT THE FILMS ON TV? At the risk of being garroted by exhibitors, I feel compelled to say a few words about the distributors' latest orgy of selling or leasing their feature films to TV. My position, maybe, is due to some little holdings in a company which bravely heralded its forthcoming red or rubric balance sheet. And for this reason a substantial revenue will accrue from showing its films on the home screen with the comforting thought that no gamble is involved. To get a hunk of green-backs without worrying about whether the public will accept the pictures is like finding some errant jewels in the attic. The distributors argue, rather speciously, that this bounty will enable them to furnish exhibitors more and better pictures. Of course, this makes no sense whatsoever, but is less embarrassing than saying that they lack the ingenuity to develop a capacity for turning out more pictures at less overhead. Furthermore, the windfall from television gives stout heart to stockholders and, whether we like it or not, stockholders are important and at times can be very annoying. My quarrel with exhibitors is that they have become so attached to the wailing wall that they have lost the ability to fight back. How can they fight back? The question is from the man in the back row. Number one, they should appoint Ben Stack, the Boston theatreman, to head a committee that sets out to raise an emergency fund on a regional basis to conduct an advertising campaign telling the public how much they are missing by not paying their way into a movie theatre. Mr. Sack is doing this in Boston and placing such ads right smack in the television section of the newspaper. Instead of joining in the proposed MPA campaign to create a better image for the industry (more about this later on) the exhibitors should mobilize in each state to create the image that theatres have the new pictures and that it is more fun to hold hands in a dark movie house than in the living room with the old folks and the kids yapping around. In each state, metropolitan newspapers blanket wide areas. For example, in Ohio, a state which presented to the world a number of U.S. presidents and your correspondent, between the Cleveland Pla'm Dealer, the Columbus, Dispatch and the Cincinnati Enquirer the whole reading public can be reached with a relatively modest expenditure. The same holds true with many other Iii Focus ADAM WEILER states and areas. I would like to see this tried in Ohio because the Allied organization there has an able young man directing its community relations. Such a campaign should be strictly institutional. It should not only fight the television competition; it should combat all other competitors of the boxoffice, because we know that television is only one of the reasons the boxoffice has declined. But under proper professional guidance from a good advertising agency, no exhibitor who joins up would have to worry about the strategy and tactics of this type of campaign. It is my professional guess that for ten thousand dollars a good pilot campaign could be conducted. At least such an approach is better than crying about what the distributors are doing to hurt business. We have to sell the idea that the public should again take up the movie habit, not at home, but in a theatre. If my theatre were going to hell, I would rather make less money and make a little more noise on my own initiative and money. I'm not absolving the distributors, mind you. They should gladly pitch in for any institutional campaigns undertaken by any group of exhibitors. The film companies will profit, too, if the campaigns improve business. Exhibitors, when they meet with MPA on the forthcoming "improve our image" campaign, should stoutly maintain the position that the best image that can be created is the one reflected at the boxoffice. As a former image maker, I believe that of all the nonsense that has crept into our business through a vicarious attachment to surveys and the like, none can eclipse the random talk about how to improve our image. But as long as the MPA thinks something should be done about it I gratuitously make a few suggestions: In Mr. Eric Johnston, the industry has a most attractive spokesman. It is unfortunate that Mr. Johnston has limited his platform appearances to special occasions. If Mr. Johnston would devote one year to touring the country and carry along on each trip a few Hollywood creative persons, including actors, producers and directors, I am confident our image would improve in a comparatively short time. I appreciate Mr. Johnston's work in foreign trade and acknowledge that he has done an heroic job in consolidating the American industry's position in this sector. I also find his essays and lectures on diverse subjects most helpful and stimulating. I have greatly admired his ambassadorial performances during the Eisenhower administration. All of this has indirectly benefited the industry's image. But this is not like getting out and talking to just plain folks, as the late Eddie Guest used to say. So may I sugset to the special committee of advertising executives who are now talking of re-fashioning the p.r. program that they can accomplish a great deal of good by urging Mr. Johnston and such other celebrated emissaries as he can mobilize for a series of tours to talk up the virtues of movies and movie-going. Bo Belinsky, the hedonic fast-ball artist of the Los Angeles Angels, will probably never be another Bob Feller, but he certainly knows how to attract the press and the ladies. At this writing Bo (call me Beau) has announced his engagement to Miss Mamie Van Doren, a robust and handsome young lady who works at intervals in pictures. She gained a special niche by walking out on a film because she wanted equal billing with Miss Jane Mansfield. Belinsky, who has been cited by his manager for thinking more of breaking training than conforming to the sports regimen, revealed while in Phoenix for spring training that he paid fifteen bucks to get his hair done, not as you would expect in a crew or en bross style but really manicured in the Tony Curtis fashion. Bo said he didn't want any butchers cutting his hair and that's \\h\ he invested such a large sum with a hair dresser. The point is that Belinsky is good screen material and has a personality that really could shine in the Hollywood milieu. He should give up hurling and get an agent. If he did, I predict he would mean money at t lie boxoffice, not because he might become capable of acting, but because he ne\ er \\ ould reach this artistic point. He fits in with the Adam Weiler two-year plan to take non-actors and sell their faces and their appeal to the younger generation. Film BULLETIN April 15, 1963 Page 17