Independent Exhibitors Film Bulletin (1947)

Chaplin Will Sell If and When ? 1 i ^ i i ^^»| 1 1 1 P 1 1 ■ Charlie Chaplin, who is one of our favorite funny men, certainly seems to be doing his best at the moment to make a joke of UA. Quietly biding his time in Hollywood while his partner, Mary Pickford, was negotiating for the sale of her 50 percent interest in the company to the Si Fabian syndicate, Chaplin suddenly popped up with an announcement that he would not sell his interest under any circumstances. Since the Fabian deal was contingent on Chaplin's 50 percent also being available, Miss Pickford broke off negotiations and headed for Hollywood to have it out with her partner. However, Charlie took to his yacht and, at last weekend, he was intentionally absent. It's our guess that Chaplin, despite his apparent determination not to sell, will do so when the right offer comes along. He's a tough trader and has felt all along that the offers for UA were much less than reasonable. ROCKY MOUNTAIN UNABRIDGED: Allied Rocky Mountain Independent Theatres conies up with this version of the industry Webster: FLAT RENTAL — Seldom used term heard only in conjunction with "Falcon" series. EXPLOITATION PICTURE— Poorly produced action picture with nobody in it. When you die with it, you are told that "you didn't sell it properly." HOUSE EXFENSii— Insignificant odd change. AVAILi^iBILITV — A date on the calendar during which time all the prints are on loan to other exchanges. PERCENTAGE PICTURE — General term used to describe the rental of a motion picture. ADJUSTMENT — Small portion of your loss which is sometimes paid to you. SPEiCIAL — Sup?r grosser on which "everybody made lots of money except YOU." "WE'LL TAKE CARE OF YOU"— In more ways than one! ODDS 'N ENDS. . .Louisiana's Governor Jimmie Davis and his "Sunshine Boys" was a unique musical feature of the Oklahoma City world premiere last Wednesday (16) of "Black Gold" which preceded the Allied Artists and Monogram national convention in the same city. Davis accepted president Steve Broidy's invitation to attend the confab and hurried over with his musical contingent directly from the annual Governors' conference last week in Salt Lake City... Speaking of governors, there'll be a batch of 'em at Warners' ' Life With Father" /orld preem at Skowhegan Aug. 14. Heads of several New Er.-Tlur;d states, led by Hon. Horace Hildreth of Maine, will be on h.'.nd for the big event, and will appear on the Ci;3 national "Winner Take All" airshow, which originates from Skowhegan as a tribute to the "Father" showing. . .PRC's new Philly quarters werj unveiled most graciously last Monday (14) by newly appointed branch manager Harry Berman and sales manager Stanley Kositsky . .Diane Rita Kalmenson, daughter of Warner sales chief, Ben Kalmenson, became the bride of Burton Saul Levine of Mt. Vernon on July 8... Bob Schwartz, production mgr. of E-L ad dept., and his bride are back from their Canadian honeymoon. They were married on the 4th of July. Congrats. it -jV THE TRAVELERS: Paramount's Curtis Mitchell, Sid Mesibov and William Danziger returned last week from Pittsburgh where they spent Monday in conference with critics and newsmen re the world preem of DeMiDe's "Unconquered," ske-dded for Smokytown opening in early Fall . . . SRO's eastern ad-pub chief Bob Giilham is back in NY after a week in Mexico City setting up the campaign for multiple-run opening of "Duel in the Sun" in the Mexican capital next Sept. . . . Laudy Lawrence, Selznick's v. p. for foreign sales, planed for Paris Friday (11th), thence to London on the 15th for biz confabs. . .Jimmy Grainger is visiting the Republic studios to double-o recently completed product. He's due back in the East on the 23rd. . .Asst. sales chief Edward L. Walton is swinging through the midwest with stops in Indianapolis, Chi and Milwaukee. . .Monogram's W. Ray Johnston, concluding a three-month European trip, arrived in New York aboard the Queen Elizabeth last Tuesday (15th) . U. S. Pix prexy Milt<»n Sperl;ng Constellation d from the Coast for home ottivA huddles last wck Rudy lierger, M-G-M southern dlv. sales head, shifted his head<|uarters last week from New Orleans to New York, where he vvill be the third of Bill Rodgers' field execs to spend a month In the home olftce. TICKER TAPPINGS... WB's two-reel Technicolor documentary, "The Power Behind the Nation," will get its release through no less august an outlet than the Motion Picture Association. Jack L. Warner and Eric Johnston last week penned the pact which makes the MPA a distributor, and Johnston himself appears in a special prolog. Release is planned around September 15...Dovv'n to his last 100 bucks, author Ross Lockridge, Jr. finds himself the Cinderella man of the month. His first novel "Raintree County," was selected by M-G-M for their semi-annual Novel Award, carrying with it a minimum of $150,000, plus a potential quarter mil'ion simoleons contingent upon sales, and an additional $25,000 should the book cop the Pulitzer Prize, which Metro claims It has a darn good chance of doing ..The gal with the golden curls seems to have a heart to match. Mary Pickford gets the lirst "Humanitarian Award" ever presented by the Epsilon Iota chapter of the national Delta Theta Tau Philanthropic Sorority She was selected as "the most deserving person in the motion picture colony "to receive the award for her active interest in charitaole organizations. . .With Technicolor's profit for the first SIX months of 1947 double that of the corresponding six month, last year, prexy Herbert T. Kalmus promptly reveals that Technicolor 35 mm. film will be reduced a half-cent per foot retroactive to April 10. The latter feature means that producer consumers will get about $285,000 in refunds alone. it it I P AND ABOUT. Tom Waller, UA publicity mgr. since 1945 leaves the company Aug. 4 to be< ome chief of the MPAA information dept., succeeding Glen AlUine. who resigned the Johnston Omce to go into production with the new Medallion Pictures Corn \\a lers spot at UA will be taken over by Al Tamarin, NY Theatre Guild publicity director . .The company's ten Golden Circle salesmen for 1947-48, hatching grounds for future UA execs, were announced by sales chief J. J. Unger as: Harold C. Rose, Washington; Forest F. Nine, Dallas; Edward J. Stoller, Minneapolis; Carl H , if^'^^'o Cooper, Detroit; Leonard Mintz, Phila delphia; Sam Rifkin. N. V.; William C. Hames, Atlanta; Al Iscove Toronto, and W. W. McKendrick, Salt Lake City SRO prexy Neil Agnew announced the upping of Charles M. Weiner from Minneapolis branch mgr. to Canadian Division Sales ManagerAl Hertzenberg to South Africa dist. mgr., and Fred S. Gulbransen to Far Eastern rep for SRO. vriuur^u ALLIED CONVENTION DEC. 1-3 The National Allied meeting in Milwaukee will be held Dec. 1-3, Jack Kirsch, Allied prexy, announced last week. Dates were switched due to a hotel room shortage during November when the convention was originally planned. THE FRONT PAGE CHARLES M. REAGAN Vice-President, General Manager of Distribution, Paramount Pictures "Lp from the ranks" is one of the most satisfying phrases m the lexicon of American industry, for it tvpifies the ver> be*t m our economic system. For both Paramount and the man who now occupies the ofiFiee of Vice-President and General Manager in charge of Distribution for the United States and Canada, that phrase must be particularly significant and gratifying. The first job Indiana-bom Charles M. Reagan ever had was with Paramount a little more than one-quarter of a century ago. He had just graduated from Notre Dame University in 1920 and was on the verge of entering his father's hotel business when Fred Streif. Paramount's Cincinnati branch manager, offered him a salesman's job. He was assigned the rough-and-tumble m.n.ng districts of Kentucky and young Reagan did lots of his film peddling from the back of a mule in that mountainous country. Although he likes to recall that he didn't even know how to fill out the contract for the first deal he ever closed. Reagan proved to be a born film salesman. Within a year-and-a-half he was branch sales manager and in 1923 Paramount named him manager of the Indianapolis branch. 1927 saw him appointed district manager of three offices. Five years later, he went to Chicago as district manager and. in 1934. became western division manager with headquarters at the home office. In 1941. he was made assistant sales manager under Neil Agnew and, when the latter resigned in 1944, Reagan took over the post of general sales manager and was elected a vice-president of the company. In announcing his appointment, president Barney Balaban said: "The executives of this company are proud to announce the promotion of Charles M. Reagan and we are equally proud of a company that can produce men of his calibre." 6 FILM BULLETIN