The Film Daily (1929)

THE Equipment Combine's Set-up is Outlined (Continued from Page 1) made will own all the outstanding stock of these companies. The company also will acquire 50 per cent of the outstanding capital stock of Grandeur, Inc., which through a wholly owned subsidiary, will acquire all the business and assets of Mitchell Camera Co. All capital stock of Hall & Connolly, Inc. and, through wholly owned subsidiaries, the properties, businesses and assets of Strong Electric Co., J. E. McAuley Manufacturing Company and Ashcraft Automatic Arc Co., also are to be acquired. National Theater Supply Co. has exclusive selling arrangements for products of International Projector except those held by Grandeur, which was organized to distribute and service the new types of projectors developed by International. Grandeur has entered into a contract under which Fox Theaters Corp. or any affiliated company, agrees to lease from Grandeur, all of its requirements of the new type projecting equipment. A banking group consisting of Chase Securities Corp. Pynchon & Co., Halsey Stuart & Co., Inc., West & Co., and W. S. Hammons & Co. is expected to offer shortly an issue of $6 000,000 IS year 6 per cent convertible Gold Debentures of General Theaters Equipment, Inc. Coast Wire Service 4 Talkers Finished at U. A. Warners to Withdraw From Arbitration? (Continued from Page 1) it is understood they will be minus the arbitration agreement, uniform with all distributors, but otherwise will be identical with the standard contract. Membership in Film Boards of Trade will be continued it is stated. Whether some other form of arbitration, similar to that provided for in Vitaphone contracts under the five year franchise plan used by the company and First National will be used, has not been indicated. NEW PRODUCT SCHEDULED FOR EARLY FALL RELEASE Four more all talkers have been completed at the United Artists studio. Among the productions finished, two are adapted from stage plays while one is the screen version of a novel and one an original by Edmund Goulding. Herbert Brenon first all talker, ''Lummox" adapted by its author Fannie Hurst has Winifred Westover in the lead supported by Ben Lyon, William Collier, Jr., Dorothy Janis, Edna Murphy and others. Gloria Swanson's talker "The Trespasser" directed and written by Edmund Goulding is an original while pictures taken from stage plays include George Fitzmaurice's "The Locked Door" with Barbara Stanwyck, Rod La Rocque, William Boyd and Betty Bronson and Thornton Freeland's "Three Live Ghosts" featuring Claude Allister, Robert Montgomery and Charles McNaughton. The Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks co-starring production "The Taming of the Shrew," being directed by Sam Taylor still is in production. A Little from a Lots yy By RALPH WILK There is nothing to report that Warners plan to withdraw from arbitration, Sam E. Morris, vice president in charge of distribution states U.S. Policy on Merger Change Unconfirmed (Continued from Page 1) expected soon to come in for a thorough questioning by a senatorial committee, regarding the radio industry cases. It is not anticipated that any great change with respect to merger investigations will be made in the near future, but it is considered probable that the department will be asked by the President to adopt a policy of keeping more closely in touch with the activities of merged companies, which after having been given approval of amalgamation, may have gone further than the department contemplated when it approved the merger plans. 16 Productions in Work at Paramount Studio There are 16 production units now in operation at the Paramount studio preparing the talker pictures for the new season. Among the pictures now in the photographing stage are: "The Love Parade" starring Maurice Chevalier being directed by Ernst Lubitsch ; "The Virginian" with Gay Cooper, Mary Brian being directed by Victor Fleming ; William Wellman's latest with Hal Skelly and E\elyn Brent in "Woman Trap"; "The Mighty" starring George Bancroft under John Cromwell's direction; "Illusion" with Charles Rogers and Nancy Carroll being directed by Lothar Mendes ; Harry Green and Mary Brian in "Kibitzer" under Edward Sloman's direction and "Fast Company" with Edward Sutherland directing. Four more productions scheduled to go into production shortly are: "The Saturday Night Kid" with Clara Bow; "Behind The Makeup" with Hal Skelly and Esther Ralston; "The Love Doctor" with Richard Dix and "Sweetie" with Nancy Carroll and Helen Kane. ALLEN McNEIL, who adapted •£*■ "The Taming of the Shrew," which Sam Taylor is directing with Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks as the stars, likes to reminisce about "the good old days" when he was an amateur fighter. Not so many years ago he won two titles in a Pacific Coast boxing tournament, winning the 115 pound and 125 pound championships in the same week. He fought five fights in three nights. Freddy Welsh and Mike "Dad" Butler, now trainer of the Detroit University football team, taught McNeil how to box. * * * Our Passing Show: Ivan Lebedeff taking a fencing lesson for scenes in "They Had to See Paris"; Bert Levy busy, guarding the press row at Equity meetings. * * * The DeWitt Clinton high school, New York, has furnished production with many of its former students. The list includes Rowland V. Lee and his brothers, Donald and Robert; Arthur Hornblow, Jr., Al Kingston, Paul Perez, Clark Silvernail and Joe Rock. * * * Monte Carter is busy at Univer^ sal. He staged the dialogue for "Barnum Was Right," starring Glenn Tryon. Gets "Hold Everything Lead Sally O'Neil has been cast in the lead of "Hold Everything," musical production scheduled as a Warner roadshow. Marion Byron, Joe E. Brown and Lillyan Tashman are in the cast. Columbia Signs D. A. Doran D. A. Doran, former scenario editor for Pathe has been signed by Columbia on a long term contract Doran now is at the coast studio. Gibson Starting Work Under New "U" Contract "The Long, Long Trail," by Arthur Rosson, is to be Hoot Gibson's first picture under his new contract with Universal, reported to involve $1,000,000. Eight pictures are called for in the agreement. Hoot, who heads his own unit, is negotiating with Sally Eilers for the lead. Production starts tomorrow. Jay Marchant has been appointed contact man for Carl Laemmle, Jr., in connection with the productions of Hoot Gibson and Ken Maynard. Studio Idea Man to Be Butcher's Title at Fox E. A. Butcher, studio manager at Fox, is to be made studio idea man, it is understood, with Max Golden named purchasing agent. $75,000 Damage Caused by Tec-Art Explosion Explosion and fire which occurred while a preview was in progress, caused damage estimated at $75,000 at the Tec-Art studio. The loss was in negative and equipment. Wednesday, July 17, 1929 -AND THAT'S THAT By PHIL M. DALY T7DDIE QUILLAN is one screen ** player who does not have to depend on the publicity department to write his nifties for him. If you've ever tried to wisecrack with Eddie, you'll know what we mean. So Eddie sends us the following, having a sneaking notion that we have a tieup with Murad cigarettes, and that he can horn in on the graft. Eddie blurbs as follows: When nearing a railroad crossing while a train is approaching, what to do? For the Pessimist: Stop your car about a block from the crossing and shut off the motor. For the Optimist : Step on the gas %nd try and beat the train. For the Nonchalant: Light a Murad, and hope it isn't a tie. * * * Not so long ago Florenz Ziegfeld and Samuel Goldwyn went into a huddle in the former's office in the presence of us newspaper men. They were flashlighted as additional proof that they had merged on screen productions in case somebody made away with the signed contract. * * * Well, girls and boys, it was a pretty pastoral scene. Here was Ziggy, who has transplanted the shapely shafts of the shredded wheat belt to the dough fields of Broadway, and Sam who has transplanted Vilma Banky from Poland to Doughland. So it was only natural that the two original Transplanteers (coined word, copyright applied for) should get together. Samuel once put ac-cent in Vilma's banky, and now the cent has grown to a million yen. What a percentager' t And the lesson to be learned from this, children, is as follows: If you want real success in the fillum business, be a Transplanteer. Consider History's progress chronologically: Buccaneers — Musketeers — Pioneers Profiteers — Exploiteers ■ — Racketeers — and NOW Transplanteers. You can't go wrong. It's Evolution. * * * Mur-Ad If you come out of the wrong end of a merger, be nonchalant — light a Murad and jump into another merger with the Atlantic. * * * "Mysterious Mame" (Editor's note: Mame mysteriously disappeared at that American Sound Studio racket last Thursday night, and has not been heard from since. If you're a real friend of ours, for the love of Pete root for her return. We've mortgaged everything on this novel, figuring on the book publication royalties. If Mame doesn't turn up, we're sunk.)