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FOREIGN RELATIONS 523
ful in seeing that the newspapers were kept advised of progress in negotiations, which was quite as good for the Italians as for us. Then on Wednesday, November 25, we finished up and, accompanied by Harold Smith, took the noon train for Paris.
It was good to reach Paris on Thanksgiving morning, for we seemed a long step nearer home. It was our wedding anniversary. We got settled at the Hotel Crillon and then went to a genuine Thanksgiving service at the American Church, of which Dr. Beekman was rector. We had lunch with some film men, and I spent the afternoon working with them. But in the evening Mrs. Hays and I had our Thanksgiving and anniversary dinner, all in one, at La Rue's.
On Friday I again met with our Paris film men, discussing their problems, some of which were similar to those in Italy, and trying to anticipate points of possible danger. Mrs. Hays had lunch with Michel Clemenceau, son of "The Tiger," whom we had known previously. On Saturday we happened to run into Admiral Cary Grayson and another top man in the Red Cross, whom we were to see again as we came back on the Normandie together.
Leaving for London the night of the twenty-eighth, we arrived there the next day, stopping at the Savoy and having luncheon with James Beck. We kept running into old friends, like Zazu Pitts and H. B. Warner; and Mrs. Hays had lunch with Claire Hampton, widow of Ben Hampton, who had played a big part in the development of motion pictures.
Monday noon I was the guest, as president of the MPPDA, at a luncheon given by the Cinematograph Exhibitors' Association of Great Britain and Ireland, at the Trocadero Restaurant. It greatly interested me to hear the president of this association say of themselves, in referring to the recent report of the Lord Moyne Committee, that he "wondered whether we required a state commission or, to give it its proper name, a cinema control board to solve the trade's many problems." He felt, as he had always felt and always advocated, that they "should solve their problems within the trade." To this idea, on the basis of our experience in America, I could add a hearty "Amen." And in replying to the president's greeting, I once more voiced my unchanging belief that co-operation was the one essential for the final success of an industry so complicated as that of the cinema.
On Tuesday, the last day of our brief stay, I was given a formal dinner by the Film Group of the Federation of British Industries. The guests were chiefly heads of British production units belonging to the Film Group and managing directors of renting companies with American affiliations. The friendly discussion of our common problems— from Mickey Mouse, Shirley Temple, and George Arliss to film rentals and the threat of censorship if film producers became careless— made the