Hollywood Spectator (Apr-May 1939)

A WORD WITH EXHIBITORS HEN block booking is abolished and production and exhibition divorced, the exhibitor is going to be the biggest man in filmdom. He will be in a position to buy only the pictures he feels will please his patrons, will buy them only after they are made, and to get those he wants he no Icnqer will have to buy others he does not want and which he knows will not pay their way when shown in his theatre. The effect of the new order of things will be to put an end to the mass making of pictures which are sold before they are made. Each will be an individual production which will be sold on its own merits, and the people who will be the most successful in meeting the market requirements are the present associate producers and producer-directors. No longer will an exhibitor buy a picture solely because it is made by Metro or Fox. He can buy in an open market, and in making his selections he will be influenced only by their entertainment qualities and not by the trademarks they bare. Should Place Reliance on Names But the exhibitor will face one difficulty — that of being unable to see every picture made before determining which ones he wishes to show in his house. Eventually, in making his selections he will have to depend to a large extent on names of individual producers. For instance, if he buys a picture made by David Selznick — a picture he sees before he buys it and was influenced in purchasing solely by the picture's merits and without regard for the name of the maker — and if such picture makes money for him, he may feel reasonably safe in buying another Selznick production sight-unseen, and in keeping on buying them as long as they prove profitable attractions for his house. It seems to me it would be a wise thing for exhibitors to begin now to note the names of those who make the pictures at present showing and those which will be shown before the new order is ushered in. When a picture does a big business for an exhibitor he should make a record of the names of the individual producer, the director, the writer. Perhaps he attributes the success of the picture to the popularity of its star or stars, but he must take into account that if its producer, director and writer had fallen down on their jobs, the star names in themselves would not prove strong enough to account for the profitable showing. No player makes himself a star. Back of him must be picture brains. A company trademark cannot make a star. Metro's lion has no picture brains. His reputation was made by people on the studio payroll, by producers, directors, writers, technicians who provide the player with the vehicles which carry him to stardom and keep him there. The names of these people are the ones exhibitors should remember. They, not the stars, can make or break an exhibitor. In the d ays when traveling companies provided the dramatic entertainment in cities which get it now only in motion pictures, the fact that it was a Frohman production or that the play was by Booth Tarkington was sufficient to bring money to the box-office, when no famous star name headed the cast. Film theatre owners can derive as much assurance from the names of Hollywood producers, directors and writers if they acquaint themselves with the names on the credit lists of the pictures which make money for them. Exhibitors Should Note the Names Exhibitors, should keep in mind the fact that no player ever made himself or herself a star, nor has his or her box-office pull been retained solely by the star. Only good pictures make stars and only more good pictures sustain stardom. For instance, Gary Cooper's name will draw paying audiences to film theatres, but if he appeared in two poor pictures in a row, he no longer would be the box-office magnet he is now. Gary is a great star, first, because he knows nothing about acting; and, secondly, because he has a personality of practically universal appeal. He has maintained his star status because he has been fortunate in being starred in pictures made by producers intelligent enough to realize both his possibilities and his limitations, and to employ writers and directors who can develope his possibilities and keep him within his limits. It is important, therefore, that an exhibitor who makes money with a Cooper picture or a picture with any other star, should keep a record of the names of the individual producer, the writer and the director, and if the three names appear in the list of credits of another picture, he may be sure it will please his patrons even though there be no outstanding star names in the cast. Each of the three names will convey a certain amount of assurance even when appearing with two others with which the exhibitor is not familiar. But if the exhibitor keeps a carefully composed list of the producers, directors and writers HOLLYWOOD SPECTATOR, published bi-weekly at Los Angeles. Calif., by Hollywood Spectator Co., 6513 Hollywood Blvd.; phone GLadstone 5213. Subscription price, $5 the year; two years, $8' foreign, $6. Single copies 20 cents. Entered as Second Class matter, September 23. 1938, at the Post Office at Los Angeles, Calif., under the act of Congress of March 3, 1879. PAGE TWO HOLLYWOOD SPECTATOR