Motion Picture Daily (Jan-Mar 1934)

MOTION PICTURE DAILY Tuesday, March 13, 19 MOTION PICTURE DAILY (Registered U. S. Patent Office) Vol. 35 March 13, 1934 No. 59 Martin Quigley Editor-in-Chief and Publisher MAURICE KANN Editor JAMES A. CRON Advertising Manager Published daily except Sunday and holidays by Motion Picture Daily, Inc., subsidiary of Quigley Publications, Inc., Martin Quigley, President; Colvin Brown, Vice-President and Treasurer. Publication Office: 1790 Broadway, New York. Telephone Circle 7-3100. Cable address "Quigpubco, New York." All contents copyrighted 1934 by Motion Picture Daily, Inc. Address all correspondence to the New York Office. Other Quigley publications: MOTION PICTURE HERALD, BETTER THEATRES, THE MOTION PICTURE ALMANAC and THE CHICAGOAN. Hollywood Bureau: Postal Union Life Building, Vine and Yucca Streets, Victor M. Shapiro, Manager; Chicago Bureau: 407 South Dearborn Street, Edwin S. Clifford, manager; London Bureau: 6 Brookland Close, Hampstead Garden Suburb, Bernard Charman, Representative; Berlin Bureau: Berlin-Tempelhof, Kaiserin-Augustastrasse 28, Joachim K. Rutenberg, Representative; Paris Bureau: 19, Rue de la Cour-des-Noues, Pierre Autre, Representative; Rome Bureau: Viale Gorizia, Vittorio Malpassuti, Representative: Sydney Bureau: 102 Sussex Street, Cliff Holt, Representative; Mexico City Bureau: Apartado 269, James Lockhart, Representative; Glasgow Bureau: 86 Dundrennan Road, G. Holmes, Representative; Budapest Bureau: 11 Olaaz Fasor 17, Endre Hevesi, Representative. Entered as second class matter January 4. 1926 at the Post Office at New York City, N. Y., under Act of March 3,_ 1879. Subscription rates per year: $6 in the Americas, except Canada $15 and foreign $12. Single copies: 10 cents. Film Daily's Year Book Out for 1934 The 16th edition of the Film Daily's Year Book appeared yesterday, bound in dark green imitation leather and containing 1,056 pages of detailed information about all branches of the business. A new feature this year is a section devoted to "Birthdays and Birthplaces." Code information is brought up to date. The code is printed in full, and in a section on legal decisions compiled by Herbert T. Silverberg, Buffalo attorney, some recent code angles are included. Title lists up to date include 13,905 names of features from 1915 through 1933. The accomplishments of various talent divisions include directors, writers, adaptors, dialogue writers, editors, cameramen, recording engineers, dance directors and song writers. There is a mass of information on the new setup of theatre circuits, lists of publications, a section devoted to the 10 best pictures, information on the S.M.P.E., other organizations and the legitimate stage; important 1933 exploitation stunts, financial setups, lists of equipment dealers, and information about the foreign market. Considerable color work has been used for some departments. — J. M. J. Off A LL things being relative, national circuit operators sit comfortably on their haunches patting their paunches these March days. For, just one year from date, the nation was passing through the unique experience of endeavoring to conduct its normal life with every bank in the country padlocked. What happened to theatre business is something nobody likes to look back on. It becomes pleasant to report, therefore, that between last week, this week and next, these men whose daily reports tell them what's going on in box-offices declare business is up almost 40 per cent. You understand what this is : Forty per cent ahead of the same days of 1933. How much as compared with those misty days of 1929 might be a fair question. Only it is not because those who look for a return of that mad era for some time to come are few ; also far between. Viewed nationally, all grosses are up somewhere between 12 and 15 per cent today by comparison with the identical period of last year. Those receipts have some distance yet to go before "the good old days" are to be mentioned with the days under the New Deal. The fact that there is an increase at all, however, is not to be thrown over the shoulder. You'd be surprised at the number, and the importance as well, of important film executives who are humble now and thankful for small favors. W, HAT is solid opinion throughout the country talking about ? Here in New York and certainly in Hollywood there is apt to be too much self-complacency, too much self-satisfaction in affairs celluloid and much too little concern over what important factors in molding public opinion reflect and talk about. In the last couple of months, for example, the hue and cry within the industry against what ought to constitute inoffensive entertainment without going Pollyanna seems to have died away. Not so throughout the land, however. Confined to no particular creed, churchmen of many denominations are urging their constituents to watch the types of pictures which play their local theatres. In some instances, and enough of them to indicate all is not well with the current status of business, the public is being admonished not to go at all. It's the old story, not even in new dress, but enough momentum, backed by enough reason, has been given the movement to make it frightfully dangerous if notes are ever matched and a joint course of procedure ever determined upon. The inescapable fact that ties in with all of this is that many of the potshots taken at films strike home because the bullets are manufactured from truths. Hollywood, gallivanting along in its sublime serenity, cut off from the rest of the land by its own provincialism, persists in turning out what it thinks the rest of the country ought to see. The theory may be all right, but about it there is only one faulty line of reasoning. The rest of the country doesn't happen to agree. KANN 12th WEEK ON BROADWAY 'FordotteiJ JEWEL PRODUCTIONS. 723-7th Ave.. N. Y. C. Eastman Up iy2 on Big Board Net High Low Close Change Consolidated Film Industries 4$A 4$i 4$$ — M Consolidated Film Industries, pfd 16H 15% \5% — T4 Eastman Kodak 90M 90 90V2 +VA Eastman Kodak, pfd 131 131 131 +1 Fox Film "A" 15'/$ 15 1554 + Loew's, Inc 32^ 31% 32^ + % Loew's. Inc.. pfd 89 89 89 —1 M-G-M, pfd 24 23% 24 +1 Paramount, cts 554 *% $Vt + 54 Pathe Exchange 3% 354 354 — % Pathe Exchange "A" 19% 19a£ \9% + % RKO 3% VA 354 —Vs. L^niversal Pictures, pfd 32 32 32 Warner Bros 7 6$i 7 + % Technicolor Off Vs on Curb Net High Low Close Change Sentry Safety Control % % Technicolor 9V% 9 95^ — % Trans Lux 254 2% &A RKO Bonds Climb 3 Points Net High Low Close Change General Theatre Equipment 6s '40 954 9% 9V% + li Loew's 6s Ml. ww deb rights 9654 55" 9654 + 'A Paramount F. L. 6s '47 45 4454 4454 — 54 Paramount Publix 5*As '50 46 44i4 46 + 54 RKO 6s '41. pp 41 40 41 +3 Warner Bros. 6s '39, wd 5654 55 56 + 54 Sales 400 900 1.400 1.000 700 8.400 100 200 7.500 1,600 1.400 2.600 5.000 5,393 Sales 300 200 200 Sales 14 15 12 6 3 45 4 Purely Personal CHARLIE JONES stepped off t deep end last week, it becar known yesterday, and took unto hii self a bride. She is Evelyn L Koch. They worked together at M jestic and are continuing the bushr: arrangement unGer the marital aegis well. Jimmy (Schnozzle) Durak and Polly Moran are on their v here from Hollywood for personal a pearances at the Capitol beginni Friday. Richard Arlen and his wife, Job n'a Ralston, and their nine-month-c son will reach town tomorrow frc the coast. They're on their way Europe for a vacation. Eugene Zukor, Howard DieGeorge Weltner and Mitchell M.' Jr., among the diners yesterday no at the Motion Picture Club. Frank Morgan has been made vice-president of Angostura-YYupp' mann Corp. His mother, Mrs. Jo; phine Wuppermann, is president Bob Gillham is back from m Orleans. The last four nights v spent on Pullmans. Bob no like. William D. Shapiro of Maj tic returned yesterday from a Bos | business trip. Ernest Truex has signed a t\ year contract with Educational produce shorts. Neil Agnew and Milt Kusell turn from their vacation early tot week. Herman Robbins, president of I* tional Screen Service, reurned yest day from Miami shores. George Jacobs, formerly U. branch manager in Charlotte, is town meeting old friends. S. R. Rent is back at his I desk following a Florida vacation. Jack Cohn hied off to Mis, Beach yesterday for a brief rest. George Schaefer is back from Fl ida, tanned and looking well. Aline MacMahon arrives fr the coast in about 10 days. Jean Duvivier, French director' due in today on the Paris. MOTIOI PICTUR ALMANA 1934-35 NOW /A/ PA£MAA T/ON WHERE THE WORLD LOOKS FOR MOTION PICTURE PRICE .5, S3 fact*