The Film Daily (1931)

a 4 Timely Topics A Digest of Current Opinion €) Screen Has Its Trick Stuff TF THERE are tricks in all trades, the motion picture industry is no exception and, in fact, has more than its share. By tricks one does not imply they are employed for the purpose of deceiving or cheating, but as means of accomplishing in a quicker and more economical manner what might take much more work to perform in an orthodox way. The business of acting has its tricks as well, and every skillful performer has methods of doing things that are effective to an audience, although the initiated can detect the artificiality of the performance at once. All great actors had their "tricks," but the fact that they made use of them on occasion did not detract from the artistry. In fact, these unorthodox methods added to the effectiveness and smoothness of the performance. Similarly there are tricks in scene painting, stage carpentry and lighting effects which enable the production to assume size, beauty or brilliance which would not be given it by ordinary methods. The more tricks the theatrical man knows, the more valuable he is around a studio, lot. Many stage productions have won renown because of the success of some novel trick which was introduced to lend a startling or weird effect. — Leo McCarey A xi*? PC FILM FACT Or-***! A DAY Total value of American film exports in 1930 exceeded $8,100,000. -. &&*\ PAIUY Monday, March 23, 1931 • • • THINGS WE Never Thought Worth Mentioning Till Now that Harold Hendee, the research specialist who builds atmosphere into Radio pix like "Cimarron," made a bum outa that historical painting of Washington crossing the Delaware, by proving that the American flag in the rowboat was incorrect that the famous picture shows the Betsy Ross flag with the stars in a circle, which was not made by Betsy till seven months AFTER Washington paddled across the Delaware that the Colonial troops were using the flag with the stars in the form of the Cross of St. George, if you must know that Mayor Jimmy Walter vacationing at Palm Springs took a sun bath in a bedsheet and was PHOTOGRAPHED that way that now we believe all the Cali fornians say about their climate being "balmy" that the Irving Thalbergs (Norma Shearer) are said to be expecting another li'l ray of sunshine in their home this Fall that Esther Ralston, Laura La Plante and Patsy Ruth Miller, playing together in RKO Pathe's "Lonely Wives," are all graduates of the rough-and-tumble school of Westerns that Pathe News claims the first pictures of ill-fated "Viking," blown up in the Arctic, are shown in their current release that eating onions is the secret of health, but you can't keep the secret that E. J. Sparks of the Sparks circuit has arranged a fishing trip off the Florida coast and has barred all cameras on the trip, so that the guests can get away with their "big fish" stories that this is a Great Break for Claude C. Ezell who is on the trip, for Claude is a loudzee fisherman that Warren Nolan must be recuperating rapidly from his illness, for he has sent us a souvenir that he claims was given to him by Mordaunt Hall's Great Dane, which is the berries that synchronization and score for "Tabu" was arranged through Abe Myers' Synchronizing Service that the trade paper notice photographically enlarged which stands outside the 55th Street Playhouse has been there for over two months, which is the heighth of something or nothing that if you try to guess who wrote it you will make us blush terrifically that in RKO Pathe's "Born to Love" there is a christening scene of a baby, and the Swedish parents liked the film name given the kid so well that the Swede bambino will go through life officially as Wilfred James Edwin that Lent has knocked most of the Broadway stage shows for the proverbial loop, and the cast of all the musicals have had to take a cut, with one exception that before the advent of the auto, gasoline was merely a by-product of kerosene and regarded as a dangerous waste, and so was carried out to sea and dumped that autoists are still paying for the dumped gasoline that Truman H. Talley, of Fox Movietone, has leased a large apartment at 50 East Ninetieth Street that the only reason we mention it is by way of a hint that a housewarming would be in order that Tommy Reilly, an amateur boxer in the Arkayo vaude booking dep't, wanted to put the company triangle on his bathrobe, and his boss said "No." that Tommy went out to a Jamaica ring and knocked a gink cold in three rounds that were a whiz, and then the boss sez "Yes." that Dave Bader and Jack Ross are having a very tough time stopping with Carl Laemmle at the ritzy mineral hot springs at Murietta, Cal that they get PAID for it, the dirty soan'-sos that Count Herman Keyser ling, authority on sex, sez that everyone is by nature polygamous and women MORE SO than men that this won't be news to a lotta you gents that the new song, "Southern Moon," is rumored to be a new development in the song racket, being an industrial sponsored song for the Southern moonshine industry EXPLOITETTES A Clearing House for Tabloid Exploitation Ideas € « « « » » » Personal Diary For "My Past" A PARTICULARLY effective exploitation stunt gotten out by the Warner staff at the Strand in Albany, N. Y., and used in connection with the showings of "My Past," was the getting out of a pocket diary. The little book had written across it the name Dora Macey and was marked "Personal." The inner pages contained a number of addresses and then in a feminine hand was a daily record of events in the life of the heroine of "My Past" This very "personal" diary was extremely well written and appeared genuine. The little books were dropped all over Albany to be picked up by the inquisitive. — Strand, Albany Special Headline On Local Newspaper WfHEN inhabitants of the town of Menominee, Michigan, set up their morning newspapers on the breakfast table, they were electrified by the eightcolumn headliners: "Police Hunt Costello Slayer!" But further reading proved the story to be a swell publicity stunt on the part of Manager M. Rosenblatt of Lloyd's theater, for "Costello Case." Manager Rosenblatt had made a deal with the local Herald-Leader to run off a measurable number of copies, with the headline in question, and early in the morning he had a flock of boys deliver them at the doors of the most crowded residential district. With the excepion of the headline, the paper was an exact duplicate of the regular edition issued that day. — Lloyd's, Menominee, Mich. MANY HAPPY RETURNS Best wishes and congratulations are extended by THE FILM DAILY to the following members of the industry, who are celebrating their birthdays : March 23 Joan Crawford Robert Ames Emma Hill