Inside facts of stage and screen (September 6, 1930)

ESTABLISHED 1924 EDITED BY JACK JOSEPHS Vol. XII Entered as Second Class Matter, April 29, 1927, at Post- office, Los Angeles, Calif., under Act of March 3, 1879. Saturday, September 6, 1930 Published Every Saturday at 800-801 Warner Bros. Down- « T town Building, 401 West Seventh St., Los Angeles, Calif. INO, 10 AUSTRALIA CONDITIONS NOT SO HOT Frank Lanterman, solo or- ganist for 16 months at the State, Melbourne, Australia, has returned to this country. At the request of “Inside Facts,” he has prepared this in- teresting report on conditions in Australia, as viewed by the artist from the United States. BY FRANK LANTERMAN As a result of intensive com- petitive building, Australia’s five major cities, Sydney, Mel- bourne, Adelaide, Brisbane and Perth, were well supplied with de luxe houses. This construc- tion activity was at its height when the “Jazz Singer” ap- peared and the Australian pub- lic went completely talkie, a little over a year ago. Imagine a program of two talkie features, an orchestral overture, organ specialty, and a stage presentation. The public soon became satiated with the undue length of the programs and the banal “Hollywoodese” masquerading as English. Economic depression made its in- roads, and audiences dwindled. People shopped for their entertain- ment, and the better grade specials did the business, while the ordinary program features only served to talk patrons out of the weekly change houses. Operating expenses in the great bone with only “Union Theatres” retaining orchestras. The Melbourne State seemed to weather the talkie reaction more successfully than any of the other big houses. Call ’Em Yanks With only two de luxe perform- de luxe palaces were cut to the ances a day, the turn-over is limited and as operation on Sunday is prohibited, the week’s gross is na- turally not particularly healthy. However, salaries are not on the same level as those in the United States, and it is possible to operate successfully under normal condi- tions. Americans are known as “Yanks,” and because we could demand good salaries, it didn’t tend to make relations with our “Aussie” co-workers any too pleasant. To put it bluntly, the situation within the ranks was at times badly strained. Friction is always a personal grievance, and must be considered only as such. On the whole, the “Aussies” are good scouts, and I had some fine friends in Melbourne, (Continued on Page 3) Dorothy Goff “Miss Universe” Appearing this week at Loews State. Los Angeles in Fanchon and Marco’s AMERICAN BEAUTY IDEA NEWSPAPER GOLF STAND ON THE PAN ..SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 4,- Dailv newspapers of San Francisco that devote large publicity space and promote contests among baby golf links are headed for a decided run-in with the local space-buying theatres. Managers claim they are per- haps the most consistent buyers of space in newspapers, and they pay the largest rate by far of any business classification, that they are permanent insti- tutions, who advertise in good weather and bad, good seasons and tough, and will be so op- erating when this microbe golf bacteria is all healed and as dead as ping-pong and mah jong. At the present time, the golf bug is cutting heavily into box office re- ceipts, and in the mass taking thou- sands of potential dollars away from the theatre coffers. It has become so serious that pro- duction may be cut as a conse- quence. Its influence is being felt by the workers throughout the the- atrical profession f rom the ushers in the thatres, many of whom have been turned loose, to the stars, who are withholding their pictures until better times. In spite of the business depres- sion, newspaper advertising of the theatres has been maintained, but now that the papers are boosting the “enemy” of the theatres, the theatres feel the papers should be made to feel the jolt as well by the withdrawal of their advertising sup- port. SMALL ADS The golf courses are small adver- tisers, and they are not entitled to the amount of free publicity they are receiving, say the northern man- agers, and in sheer self-defense, if the papers do not advance a policy of theatrical support, the theatres will, in a body, find other mediums of announcing their shows. One San Francisco paper, the Scripps-Howard Daily News, is particularly a ggravtaing the San Francisco showmen by promoting a tournament on about a dozen pony courses and is giving a lot of publicity to the gag. It looks like the Daily News will be the first paper to feel the weight of theatre displeasure by laying of an ultimatum of the theatre opera- tors of “Golf or Theatre Advertis- ing—Choose.” In Los Angeles, while the con- dition between the papers and the- atres is not so acute, it is due in a measure to the fact that the the- atres and former theatrical men are largely interested in the new (Continued on Page 2) -YOU’LL SEE IT IN FACTS • . ■. . . ••• ’ ; r -a 1 . v ;: ; v