Harrison's Reports (1932)

88 HARRISON’S REPORTS AGAIN ABOUT THE LICHTMAN PLAN The night before the day Mr. A1 Lichtman made his new distribution plan known officially at the Motion Picture Club luncheon, I met him and we had a friendly discussion about the plan. I asked him how he expected for people to go to a theatre far away from their homes to see a “plan” picture. He told me that people will ride twenty miles to see a good picture. Occasionally people do ride twenty miles to see a good picture; but the money an exhibitor could make from such people can be loaded on a rooster and the rooster will not know whether he has anything on his back or not. The proof that people will not, as a rule, ride twenty miles to see a good picture may be evidenced by the fact that no theatre can take in, with a first-rate star, in a first-rate picture, as much money on a Monday and Tuesday, or on any other two ordinary days of the week, as it can on the two best days of the week— Saturday and Sunday. Why don’t people ride twenty miles to see such a picture? A plan that does not provide for the safeguarding of the interests of the public cannot be successful. Under such a plan people act like a horse who refuses to be led to water. For this reason, I see no justification for excitement. If United Artists, or any other producing-distributing company, for that matter, has made up its mind to put such a plan over, no exhibitor protests will prevent it from carrying out its decision, unless, of course, the enforcing of such a plan runs afoul of the Sherman or the Clayton Act. In such an event, it will be a matter of waiting for the disintegration of the plan ; there can be no other outcome. The trouble with the whole industry is that we know it is sick, but no producer-distributor has yet been able to find the cure. Everyone is trying to adopt a quack remedy and then watch it to sec if it will have the hoped for effect. The real trouble is lack of good pictures. Produce good pictures and the industry will set itself right, provided the producers at the same time divest themselves of their theatres and let theatre men run them. .'Kny other remedy is destined to fail. GIVE THEM THE LAUGH! According to an Atlanta dispatch to the rilm Daily. Paramount-Publi.x and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, in order to stamp out the ten-cent admission price, which is making great inroads in the Southern States, are refusing to sell their films to any exhibitor who charges a smaller price than fifteen cents. The action of these two companies reminds me of the sinner who scolds other people for sinning. In a recent issue of Harrison’s Reports, I reported the fact that Paramount, in their State Theatre, at Lexington. Kentucky, charged ten cents in the afternoon and fifteen cents at night for a five-dollar show — twelve amateur acts, five professional acts, consisting anywhere from two to nine actors, and a Paramount picture. In one of their theatres in Minneapolis the admission price has been ten cents. The Loew and the RKO theatres in this city charge ten cents from eleven o’clock in the morning to one o’clock in the afternoon. I could probably obtain hundreds of other cases in other parts of the country where they charge a ten-cent admission price, and yet Paramount-Publix and Metro-GoldwynMayer have the audacity to tell you that it is bad for you to charge ten cents for admission to your theatre. Some people have, what we commonly call, gall. In this instance, it is not gall ; it is stupidity, for if they should continue the present policy they will ruin not only you, but also themselves — themselves first. How can the Paramount organization, for e.xample, continue giving the public the show values it has been giving lately for the regular admission price? They cannot do it. The result will be that they make the public expect more, for less. And not only this, but they are forcing the others to do the same. If any film salesman from this or from any other company should try to convince you how bad for the business it is for you to charge ten cents, laugh at them. IS THE MOVING PICTURE INDUSTRY BECOMING SANE? Harold B. Franklin, head of the RKO theatres, sent to his theatre inanagers a letter informing them that they have full authority to delete any line or spoken dialogue from stage or screen, or any portion of the stage business that may prove, in their opinion, offensive to their patrons. “We do not want to go to the extremes, nor do we want to assume the role of reformers or prudes * * * ; but we must stamp out filth,” he said. May 28, 1932 “A real artist,” added Mr. Franklin, “never depends on crude, uncouth humor. Its use is a reflection against the artist, as well as the theatre.” Mr. Franklin pointed out to the decline of the Broadway theatre and suggested that this should be a lesson to picture theatre managers. The same week, Martin Quigley came out with a strong editorial against filthy pictures. The attitude of Mr. Franklin in this matter, and of Martin Quigley, is of particular gratification to me who has been fighting single-handed against filth ever since I founded this paper; I saw the industry headed for destruction and could not do anything to stop it. I fear it is too late for some film companies to reform now. They have to go, their place to be taken by new blood, with new ideas. THE HOLLYWOOD FADISTS It seems as if William K. Howard, one of the most sensible directors that are making pictures, has, like Tay Garnet, producer of “Prestige,” succumbed to the fad of having the camera shift to follow the important characters in the scene, while su h a scene is photographed. It would be a calamity if this fad were adopted by all directors ; it would mean that more picture-patrons would be driven away from the theatres, for a shifting scene, particularly when it .shifts rapidly, is more than annoving ; the retina of the eye is not given a chance to adjust itself with the result that most people get a violent headache. FEDERAL JURISDICTION ESTABLISHED In their efforts to prevent the Department of Markets of the State of Wisconsin from probing arbitrary and unreasonable protection enforced in that state by the producerdistrihutors in violation of th.e state law. the producers have applied to the Federal courts for an injunction on the ground that only the Federal Government has jurisdiction over the Commerce and the Copyright Causes of the Crnstitution. Armed with su"h an admission on their part, you should be better equipped in your efforts to convince your Congressmen that they should support the Brookhart Resolution .S. 170. for the investigation of the unethical practices in the motion picture industry, and the Brookhart Bill S. 37/0 outlawing block-booking, blind-booking and arbitrary allocation of product. I can hardly conceive a situation where an independent exhibitor who believes in the beneficiary effects of these two mca'ures as having neglected to write to his Congressmen soliciting their support for them; but if there is even one of you who for some reason has failed to do so. he should send a letter or a telegram at once urging him to give these two measures his whole-hearted attention. ALLIED STATES OPPOSES PERCENTAGE CONTRACTS “The Allied Board of Dire'"tors calls on all independent thca*re owners to resist to the utmost the efforts of the distributors during the coming selling season to put over extortionate percentage contracts. The only general prosperity ever enjoyed by the exhibitors w'as during a period when they bought their pictures on a flat rental basis, paying only what their business judgment told them they could afford. When a good picture came alon<r thev reaped the fruits of their business acumen and profited by the added returns. Under the percentage system the exhibitors, assuming responsibility for the entire overhead of their theatres, contract for pictures on percentages which generallv exceed the average of fair film rentals, and then take in the distributors as participants in the profits. There are several varieties of partnership known to the law but this is the onlv one where one partner stands all the losses and the other shares only in the profits. “The unfair nature of these arrangements is all the more manifest in cases where the stipulated ncr'-entage ohtn’’”s up to a designated gross figure, after which it automatically increases to fiftv per cent or more of the gross. This gives sole credit to the feature picture for the drawing power of the house, puts aside as of no value the efforts, advertising and showmanship of the exhibitor, and assigns to the distributor the benefits of enlarged patronage which rightly should go to the man who bears the hazards of the enterprise. Care in the buving and skill in the exhibition of pictures are set at naught by a system which transfers all the benefits of the same to the exchanges.” — Allied Bulletin, May 5.