Harrison's Reports (1931)

64 HARRISON’S REPORTS SAM KATZ’S OPINION OF MR. LASKY’S JUDGMENT Sam Katz, head of the Theatre department of the Paramount-Publix organization, does not seem to have a high opinion of Mr. Lasky’s judgment, if we are to judge by the treatment he has given to Mr. Lasky’s pet, “Rango.” As you no doubt know, Mr. Lasky proclaimed “Rango” the best picture he has ever seen ; but Mr. Katz used it only as a double feature in the Capitol Theatre, a Paramount De Luxe first-run house, in Montreal, Canada, using the RKO feature, “Beau Ideal,” as the leading feature. By the way, I was told by an authoritative source the other day that the reason why Sam Katz has adopted the double-feature policy in some of his theatres is his desire to kill the double-feature evil. I nearly burst my sides with laughter when my friend told me this and made me wonder how simple-minded the Paramount-Publix board of directors must be to accept such a statement as the true motive. If Mr. Katz considers double featuring an evil, and if he feels that it must be killed, then it must be hurting him. If so, it is an admission by him that the independent exhibitors, who are the ones that use double-features, are giving him, to use a popular saying, “a run for his money,” a fact which is the best proof of his incompetence, for if a man in his position, with all the choice features of every producer at his command, cannot compete with independent exhibitors who use pictures after being run either in Publix or in other producer-controlled theatres, then there is something wrong with his system. The true motive for his double-feature policy is, in the opinion of Harrison’s Reports, his desire to kill the few remaining first-run pictures. Because of the Cosgrave and the Thacher decrees, Sam Katz knows that to buy more pictures than he needs so as to keep them away from his competitors, independent theatre owners, might lead into difficulties the seriousness of which he well understands ; but with a double feature policy, he attains his object without any risk. For your information, the Paramount Theatre at Atlanta. Georgia, is selling two features for thirty-five cents, so as to meet the competition from the Fox Theatre, which admits two persons with one ticket, in accordance with a certain coupon policy it has instituted. And since we are talking about cut-throat competition among producer-circuits, I might just as well mention the case of San Pedro, California, where the Fox Theatre dropped its prices from fifty cents to twenty-five cents shortly before the Warner Theatre opened. The Warner Theatre started charging forty cents admission, but after the slashing of the prices done by the Fox Theatre it cut them down to fifteen cents. In view of this unfair competition on the part of the pillars of the motion picture industry, you owe it to yourself to think carefully what prices you should pay for product next season. Remember that the next one that may be hit by this cut-throat competition among the producer-circuits may be you. MR. NICHOLAS M. SCHENCK. OF MGM, JOINING THIS PAPER’S ANTIADVERTISING CAMPAIGN Mr. Nicholas M. Schenck, of Metro-Goldwyn-Maver, has sent me the following letter, dated April 9: “Upon my return from California I find your letter of March 5th relative to concealed commercial advertising. “I am sure you are aware of our attitude in this matter. We are opposed to using the screen for any purpose other than entertainment. “I am making every effort to restrain all producers from going into this field, urging them with all the arguments at my command. Naturally, we have no intention of entering the field. It is remotely possible that if other producers do not abandon the idea, we may be forced into it — but it will be against our will. “It is my belief that in a very short time there will be a showdown on this whole matter. I am hopeful that we can change the minds of those who believe that screen advertising is an intelligent thing for the industry to go into. I am sure that you personally, and as a spokesman for your subscribers, have the same point of view I have on the matter ; and may I express my appreciation of your efforts to withhold the avalanche of opinion that may possibly visit us ?” April 18, 1931 Thus Mr. Nicholas Schenck joins Mr. Laemmle in condemning the Paramount and the Warner practice in vigorous terms. The producers that have joined this paper’s crusade against screen advertising are now the following : Universal, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Radio Pictures, Educational, Goodwyn, Columbia, Tiffany, Sono Art, RKO, and (with some reservations) RKO Pathe. This list includes practically every producer with the exception of Paramount-Publix, Warner Bros, and of the Warner Bros, subsidiary, First National. It is regrettable that Mr. Zukor should have allowed any one to persuade him to enter the advertising field in competition with the newspapers, which have rendered him and his company so much service. The impression he has created not only in the motion picture industry but also outside it was that he is a leader. But leaders do not allow themselves to be led, particularly into adopting erroneous policies, unless, of course, Sam Katz is so powerful within the Paramount organization by virtue of banker backing he may have that Mr. Zukor cannot overrule him; or unless he is tired and has lost his grip. But whichever the case, the responsibility' is only his, for it is he that is looked upon as the determiner of the policies of the Paramount-Publix organization. The only way by which he will be able to escape the moral responsibility is for him to withdraw from such a business at once. Let him follow the example of Messrs. Laemmle, Schenck, Clark, Hammons, Cohen, Snitzer, Goldwyn, and Cook, and speak his mind freely. Unless he makes his position clear, this paper will take it for granted that he is in agreement with the policy of Mr. Katz, and will so advise the newspapers of the nation. THE NEED OF ECONOMY The independent exhibitors, warned by this paper, will be careful as to what prices they will pay for pictures this season ; the prevailing depression is not expected to turn into a prosperity' so soon and they will not be able to pay the prices they were in the habit of paying, even if they wanted to. Under such circumstances, it is necessary for the producers to eliminate all waste. One of the practices that have been wasteful is to hand out advertising to the trade papers without regard to the value of each paper as an advertising medium. This season they should not only demand of a trade paper a statement of its circulation, verified by a reliable auditing bureau, but also investigate the circulation itself, through their exchanges, or by a questionnaire to the exhibitors directly, to find out whether it is “quality” circulation or not. A paper may show a large circulation, but the only effective part of it is that which reaches the buyers of film. One thousand copies bought by a circuit that owns one thousand theatres is a circulation of only one copy, for the buying is done by one person, at the Home Office of the company ; the other copies do not influence the buying. It is circulation among the buying units that counts. One class of trade journals the producers may depend upon to deliver quality circulation is the regionals; but heretofore these journals were neglected by the responsible persons in the Home Offices for many different reasons, one of which often was the publicity directors’ vanity. The national trade papers print stories about some of them, aggrandizing them, and they felt under an obligation to these papers, because they satisfied their vanity. But such a policy does not serve the interests of the companies, even though it satisfied their vanity; to get results, they must place their advertising in mediums that are read by the buyers of film, and independent theatre owners. And such buyers can be reached much more easily and surely through the regional trade papers. As I have said in Harrison’s Reports before, the regional trade paper is the independent exhibitor’s chum, for he is interested to learn how his exhibitor neighbors, whom he knows personally, are faring, whereas he does not care so much what happens to the exhibitor whom he has never heard about. Regionals are read by the exhibitors from cover to cover, whereas the nationals often are not even unwrapped. The publicity directors cannot afford to neglect the trade journals this year, unless, of course, they want to keep on wasting their companies’ money. If they want to make every dollar appropriated for advertising count, they must spend at least half of it in the regionals.