Motion Picture Daily (Apr-Jun 1934)

MOTION PICTURE DAILY Saturday, April 28, 1934 MOTION PICTURE DAILY (Registered U. S. Patent Office) Vol. April 28, 1934 No. 99 Martin Quigley Editor-in-Chief and Publisher MAURICE KANN M_ Editor "trS JAMES A. CRON A dvertising 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 CIcle 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-desNoues, 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. Sued Over Hitler Film Chicago, April 27. — Suit for $250,000 damages has been filed by Samuel Cummins in U. S. District Court here against Dr. Rolfe L. Jaeger, German consul general, charging the latter slandered and libeled "Hitler's Reign of Terror" by attacking its authenticity. Cummins is sponsoring the film. Newspaper copy emphasizes the picture was made in Austria and Germany by Cornelius Vanderbilt "at the risk of his life." Cohen West Wednesday Emanuel Cohen, production head of Paramount, leaves for the coast Wednesday after several weeks of conferences here. Adolph Zukor, president, plans to leave for the west later. Golden Leaves on May IS Edward Golden, general sales manager for Monogram, leaves for Salt Lake City on May 16 to prepare for the first of the three regional sales meetings set for that city May 26. U. A. Party Back Monday Joseph M. Schenck, Al Lichtman, Harpo Marx and Sam Harris return from a short vacation in Bermuda on Monday. Chester Hale to M-G-M M-G-M has signed Chester Hale, dance director. He leaves for Hollywood on Thursday. "Glamour" Roxy May 11 ''Glamour" has been dated into the Roxy starting May 11. Insiders' Outlook Hollywood, April 27 *T*HE history behind "The Sign of the Cross," as expounded by C. B. De Mille before the recent M. P. T. O. A. conclave, set forth that the director, hat in hand, traveled up and down studio row, was laughed out of court and found only Manny Cohen at Paramount who could be interested. Those who are in the know and are certain about it tell a different story. They hurtle their memoirs back to the time in 1931 when Paramount officials journeyed out of the East and the West to meet in Kansas City on a production powwow. Among those present from the East were Adolph Zukor, Sidney R. Kent, Ralph Kohn, Walter Wanger and Cohen. From the West, Jesse L. Lasky and B. P. Schulberg. . . . T Schulberg, goes the account, had virtually made a deal with De Mille for the spectacle backgrounded in Biblical splendor, but, like Lasky, knew his confreres weren't so hot for De Mille. This time, however, the deal was right. De Mille had agreed to slash his salary and the picture was to be made at a set figure under studio control at all times. The proposition, therefore, was sprung at Kansas City, Zukor objected and so did some others, including Cohen. Schulberg argued for it and, in the light of his enthusiasm, Zukor is understand later to have consented to the deal. . . . T A true story typical of the Hollywood manner. It deals with Cary Grant, which is the celluloid moniker for that tall, goodlooking player whose name is something else. Clark Gable was going great guns. So, too, Gary Cooper, but he had gone to Italy to fraternize with nobility and to Africa to shoot lions. Paramount figured it was about to lose him. Came some alphabet mixing on the part of a certain agent, something like this : "Clark Gable, Gary Cooper. C. G., G. C, C. G., G. C. We'll call him Cary Grant." The agent did and told the actor, but the first time agent yelled latter's name across the lot, the actor kept on walking. He didn't know he was being paged. . . . T A supervisor, trained in the mercantile field and dropped by lucky chance into an important studio berth here may be backward in learning the intricacies of dramatic construction and production lore, but persistently does he cling to the tenets of his earlier business. Beset by a time problem on a recent picture, he called in the writer. "We've got so much cloth," he said, "and we gotta fit the picture to the pattern." Answered the scribe: "I'll tell you what I'll do. Let me take it in by the belt, and I'll deliver the job to you by Friday." . . . T Radio is understood to have had "Rip Van Winkle" under consideration for next season. The supervisor who had it in hand dillied and also dallied to discover later Paramount had beaten him to the punch. In other words, the wrong man went to sleep. . . . Startling new invention in sound reported on the way. More about it later. ... A quaint place, this Hollywood. There couldn't be two like it in all of this world's broad acres. . . . KANN Eastman Up iy2 on Big Board High Columbia Pictures, vtc 29 Consolidated Film Industries 4 Consolidated Film Industries, pfd 163-6 Eastman Kodak 9$y2 Eastman Kodak, pfd 136 Fox Film "A" 17^ Loew's, Inc 33J4 Paramount, cts 454 Pathe Exchange 2% Pathe Exchange "A" 22 RKO y/2 Universal Pictures, pfd 44 Warner Bros 7J4 Trans-Lux Gains % on Curb Net High Low Close Change Technicolor 9V2 % 9J4 Trans-Lux 2% 2% ZVt. — l/t G. T. E. Bonds in Sharp Rise Net Low Close Change Sales 29 29 — n 600 4 4 a 400 USA 163* + 3* 100 94% 95/2 +v/2 300 135 136 5.000 163* 1634 — 5* 12,800 32% 323* 54 Vt 6,100 434 434 400 234 M 1.200 2\y2 zm 1,900 3Vt Vs 1.600 44 44 2.000 7Vs 7J4 + 5* 6,000 Sales 400 100 General Theatre Equipment 6s '40. General Theatre Equipment 6s '40, Loew's 6s '41, ww deb rights Paramount F. L. 6s '47 Paramount Publix 5J^s '50 Warner Bros. 6s '39, wd Net High Low Close Change Sales 1134 1134 +134 140 1034 954 1034 +13* 80 101 101 101 1 50 50 50 16 5034 503* 503* — v» 9 6434 64 6434 + y* 38 4 Purely Personal ► LARK GABLE and Myrna Loy **** will broadcast scenes tomorrow from M-G-M's "Manhattan Melodrama" on the Hall of Fame program, received in New York over WEAF at 10 :30 P. M., D. S. T. On the same program the following Sunday will be heard Joan Crawford and Franchot Tone in scenes from "Sadie McKee." Rudolph Mate, European cameraman, has arrived in New York on his way to Hollywood, where he will spend three weeks studying American camera technique. He flies west this week-end. Mate plans to return to Europe June 2. Margaret Sullavan, Baron Veltnin Mandelstamm, French film writer; Miss Winna Winfried, Danish director, and the four Mills brothers, are among the passengers on the Paris which sails today. Armand Denis and Mrs. Denis, who is Leila Roosevelt, were guests this week at the White House. They are expected in New York in a few days. Denis directed "White Cargo." George W. Booth has been appointed special representative for Gaumont-British of America by Arthur A. Lee, and will have the Connecticut and western Massachusetts territory. Emanuel B. Tishman, manager of Paramount Publix trustees' legal department, leaves today for a week^ end of golf near Lake Mohansic as the guest of B. A. Drucker. Joe Rivkin led the Ritz brothers into the Roxy yesterday to see if they laughed at themselves in their first short, "Hotel Anchovy." Katherine Brown, Radio's eastern story editor, is back from the coast after two weeks of studio conferences with Pandro Berman. Madeleine Carroll will arrive in New York next week on her way to England. She will sail on the Empress of Britain. Archie Mayo, who has been vacationing here and also looking for talent and stories, returns this week to the coast. Alexander Hall, Paramount director, has left by plane for Hollywood after a short vacation herei his first visit in' six years. Charles Rosenzweig, general sales manager for First Division Exchanges, left last night on a business trip to Washington. Budd Rogers, general sales manager of Liberty Pictures, is on a tour of middle western exchanges. Dorothy Mackaill left for Hollywood this week, where she will report to M-G-M. Frank Scully has joined Fox and has sailed for London to take up his new duties. Spencer Tracy is on his way back to the Coast after a vacation here. Et hel Merman is making personal appearances at the Paramount. Eckman Due Next Week Sam Eckman, in charge of M-G-M activities in Great Britain, arrives from London next week.