Hollywood Studio Magazine (September 1972)

TAKE IT FROM THE TOP By Zelda Cini When Silents Were Golden Movie books and books on onetime movie greats seem to be having a vogue out of all proportion to their value as industry history books, but occasionally there’s a different approach. One recent Opus is Evelyn F. Scott’s “Hollywood When Silents Were Golden,” a 222-pager with photos of the people and things that represented Hollywood from 1916, when she first arrived with her mother, Beulah Marie Dix, to visit a friend, Beatrice DeMille, mother of Cecil B. and William. Here’s a warm and intimate “inside story” completely lacking in shock-value, but loaded with color, nonetheless. Under the aegis of the DeMilles, Mrs. Dix became a well-known screenwriter, “plugging away,” according to her daughter’s account, “on a film called ‘The Spanish Dancer’ for an actress named Pola Negri who had been imported from Germany to be Gloria Swanson’s only real rival as a femme fatale.” And all this time we thought Theda Bara was the “fatale-ist” femme of that era. Oh, well. Nobody wins ’em all. TV and old pix fall out The production sharpies who started the trend toward features-for-tv have had a lot to do with the downtrend in major film sales to the boob-tube. At least that’s the opinion of 20th-Fox TV-pres William Seif, and he should know. He’s not offering any of his studio’s product, on the one hand. On the other, however, the studio sold “Patton” to ABC-TV on a one-run basis. CBS bought 20th’s “Planet of the Apes” and “Valley of the Dolls” and ABC took “Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid,” for future airings. But the nets turned down M.A.S.H. on the basis of profanity and irreverence (they didn’t like “The Last Supper” scene). So 20th came back around to CBS and sold the network a video-version of the film as a comedy series for the upcoming season. There’s logic for you, Hollywood style. Scholarships for directors! Right in the middle of everybody crying about how overcrowded the film business is and how overpriced the unions are, the Directors Guild is upping its scholarship fund to stimulate more students to try to be directors. The Guild’s scholarship fund, which had been limited to $1500 each for applicants from UCLA and USC only, will be raised to a total of $5000 and be opened to postgraduate students in any American university with accredited film-making departments. Applications will be judged on the basis of the screening of a finished film by the Student, future film projects, including budget breakdowns, and faculty evaluation of the student’s potential, as well as his present work. However, just in case you thought the Guild was being very generous, actually the $5000 will be divided up among “not more than 8 students” per year and no Student is entitled to more than $2500. Assuming one student wins the maximum, $2500, a possible seven students should be able to count on approximately $357.14 each. At an average of $2 per screening per person in a second-run house, a determined graduate student with a windfall like that could afford to take a date to one movie a week for a whole year. Now if BIG MAN, BIG STAR, BIG HEART .. . that’s George Kennedy, now working in “Lost Horizon,” shown at one of the Saturday games as stand-in player in the shuffleboard tournament at the Motion Picture/Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills. Lew Mansfield, left, Consolidated Film Laboratories, was his opposing stand-in. Two teams, the Woodpeckers and the Robins, made up of patients and residents, competed with the Woodpeckers winning. Those who could play did; those who could not had stand-in playeis. he’ll just keep that in mind while he budgets the movies he plans to direct... Pomography retumed Did you see the story on the 13,000 reels of sex films confiscated in San Fernando Valley and West Los Angeles raids early this year? Seems that early last month Superior Court Judge L. Thaxton Hanson changed his mind about keeping them impounded and, reluctantly, one might suppose, ordered them returned to their rightful owners. The reluctance reputedly stemmed from a U.S. Supreme Court ruling which he could not, in good conscience, defy. The defendants had been acquitted at a trial in which it was ruled that the seizures were unconstitutional because they were made without prior determination that the films were obscene. And all this time they’ve been “illegally” held by such sterling law enforcement officials as Sheriff Peter Pitchess, Police Chief Davis, District Attorney Joseph Busch, County Clerk William Sharp and Deputy City Attorney David Schacter. It was Schacter, on instructions, who took the matter to the U.S. Supreme Court. Meanwhile, what a ball they could have had at a stag party! Off with their heads It’s no news to anyone that the whole world seems to have gone crazy, but who would expect the general director of a big theater to ban critics from his shows? It’s enough to test the credulity of the most naive, but it’s true. James A. Doolittle, general director of the Greek Theatre Association took the time to accuse staff reviewers on both the L.A. dailies (the Times and the Herald-Examiner) of “doing a disservice to the community” because they were “negative” in their critiques of a couple of his shows. In a punishing blow, he refused to invite Martin Bernheimer (Times) and Karen Monson (Examiner) to any Doolittle presentations, at the Greek or elsewhere. So, being the good reporters they are, they bought Jäckets and went anyway, at least to “Barber of Seville.” It wasn’t a very good show, Turn to Page 10 5