Motion Picture Daily (Jan-Mar 1937)

Tuesday, February 16, 1937 MOTION PICTURE DAILY RADIO 15 Warners on Air as KFW Bis Dedicated Hollywood, Feb. 15.— Official dedication ceremonies of KFWB, Warner Bros, station, were held here today with Dick Powell, Warren William and Al Jolson alternating a masters of ceremonies. The program featured a parade of station talent from 6:00 to 8:00 P. M., after which studio talent went on the air from 8:00 to 10:00 P. M. Jack Warner made a dedicatory address and introduced Hal Wallis, Mervyn LeRoy and Sid Grauman. George Jessel, Eddie Cantor and Walter Winchell contributed a comedy skit with Ben Bernie brought in by remote control from the Ambassador. Impromptu appearances were made by Joan Blondell, Ruby Keeler, Eleanor Powell, Sid Silvers, Lila Lee, Jean Madden, Errol Flynn, Olivia De Havilland, Rosalind Marquis, Patricia Ellis and Sybil Jason. Harry Warner extended greetings from a theatre screen and his voice was rebroadcast to the air audience. MacQuarrie Sued On Actor Air Show Hollywood, Feb. IS. — Haven MacQuarrie today was sued for $500,000 damages by George D. Lyons, who also seeks an injunction restraining MacQuarries' production of his actor air show, and a division of profits. Lyons claims that he collaborated with MacQuarrie on the original show years ago. A hearing was set for Superior Court by Judge Wilson, for Feb. 22. Leon Rosebrook Gets KEHE Musical Post Hollywood, Feb. 15. — Leon Rosebrook, formerly musical director of the Radio City Music Hall and the Roxy and executive assistant to Erno Rapee, has been named musical director of KEHE, Hearst station, effective Feb. 22. He succeeds Salvatore Santaella, resigned. The demand for a full-time executive in the station's musical post led to the appointment of Rosebrook. Neat Promotion WMBG, CBS affiliate in Richmond, Va., did a neat promotional job on the premier broadcast of the Philip Morris show last Saturday when it gathered together some 75 tobacco jobbers in the studio to hear the initial offering and immediately following transcribed the opinions of the Richmond tobacconists as to their reaction to the programs. The records are now in the hands of the radio staff of the Biow Agency, New York, which handles the account. Cardinet Co. Renews The Cardinet Candy Co., sponsors of the NBC-Red Pacific network series, has renewed the program for 13 weeks beginning March 7. The program is aired Sundays at 9:15 P. M., P.S.T. over stations KPO, KFI, KGW, KOMO, and KHQ. To Paramount and NBC Sign a Weekly Show (Continued from page 1) and stock players will be used. The production will be under the direction of Boris Morros. Paramount writers will prepare the scripts which will be subject to the approval of the company's publicity department. A 30-piece studio orchestra will augment the program which is slated to start early next month and will be heard in the mornings commencing at 9 :00 A.M., P.S.T. The negotiations which were consummated today were started some time ago in New York. Plenty of Jrs. Indianapolis, Feb. 15.— WIRE's staff is topheavy with Jrs. They are Norman Perry, Jr., whose father owns the Indianapolis Indians ball club ; Albert J. Beveridge, Jr., whose father, now dead, was U. S. Senator, and Eugene S. Pulliam, whose father, Eugene C. Pulliam, owns the station. New Shows on the Air "Brewster's Millions" Jack Benny and Mary Livingstone went into their first so-called dramatic program last night as the stars of "Brewster's Millions" for Lux Radio Theatre, nationally broadcast over CBS and heard in New York over WABC 9 to 10 P. M., E.S.T. It was a pleasing program, but it was also a disappointing program. Disappointing because of the promise held forth in an unusual combination of the air's leading film and dramatic program, which is the Lux hour, and the airwaves' leading comedy team as voted in Motion Picture Daily's recent nation-wide ballot of the nation's radio editors. The play, of course, was the stage adaptation of the original novel by George Barr McCutcheon, tricked up to allow for Benny and Livingston antics which came along at intervals rather too infrequent to keep the fun constantly aloft. Benny on ,his regular 30-minute Jello program needs no analysis at this late date. But there, with his combination technique of gags and music and less formal plugs for the sponsor's product, he seems to be more at home than at any efforts to essay the rudiments of dramatic acting which the Brewster part occasionally required. The quarterly interruptions for advertising spiels on behalf of Lux were of no help. They cut seriously into the continuity of the abbreviated play, although by the same token they tied new dialers into the proceedings and kept the sponsor's message going. The dragging in of two Los Angeles winners of a $50,000 sweepstakes prize with their concluding boost for the product was entirely pointless and got exactly nowhere. The play itself, with station breaks and sales talks, ran 50 minutes and was followed by banter between De Mille and the stars to conclude with the usual announcement of next Monday's broadcast which will be "Captain Blood." This reviewer, agog with anticipa tion, found himself only moderately amused. However, he may have expected too much. "The Lone Ranger" "The Lone Ranger" is a wild and woolly western script aimed at juveniles and, if we remember our own kid days, the youngsters will swallow the con-carne concoction whole. The script deals with a mysterious masked individual (The Lone Ranger), a western Sir Galahad who rides the range meting out punishment to lawbreakers and helping deserving people who may be in distress. Last night's episode concerned a broncho-busting cowpuncher named Jack Baker who suffers from a persecution complex because some years before his father had been hung as a horse thief. Baker falls in love with the daughter of a wealthy rancher and agrees to represent her father in a forthcoming rodeo. However, he can't stand the fancied jeers of the other cowpunchers and shortly before the start of the rodeo he announces that he is "pulling stakes." It is here that the Lone Ranger enters the script. Hearing of the unhappy situation he prevails upon Baker to postpone his departure until after the rodeo. The Lone Ranger then enters himself as a contestant and "licks the pants off" Baker, on whom the entire town has bet. When Baker observes how the townsfolk stick by him loyally, even after his defeat, his complex is cured. Sponsored by Silver Cup Bread, "The Lone Ranger" is presented on the Mutual network, 7:30 to 8:00 P. M., E.S.T. "The Romancers" With the Sunday airwaves cluttered with raucous comedians, Adelaide French conceived the idea of piecing together a smooth little "class" musical program in the belief that many listeners might turn to it, even if only for temporary respite from the noisy gagsters. Miss French has picked a winner in "The Romancers," which bowed in on the WOR wave length Sunday evening from 9:45 to 10 P. M., E.S.T., and sponsored by the Weston Biscuit Co. The program offers individual vocals and duets by Willard Amison, tenor ; Adelaide Norton, lyric soprano ; incidental organ music by Louise Wilcher, and poetry readings by Erik Wolf. We heartily commend the artists for a thoroughly enjoyable little period. And to the sponsor we predict a bright future for "The Romancers." "1937 Radio Revue" Sunday night we tuned in again on the Feenamint-sponsored "1937 Radio Revue," of which we said some weeks ago that one could take it or leave it without making much difference either way. Our original verdict after the half-hour re-acquaintance with the show, still stands. Save for Arnold Johnson's band spots and Ray Knight's "Firing Squad" bit, the period as a whole lacks variety and spontaneity. The fact is, the program's obviously labored movement is its greatest fault. Without benefit of television, one can almost visualize the pre-broadcast birth pangs that marked the script with the result that the listener becomes an arm-chair jockey and "rides" the sequences, with uncomfortable results. Knight had two skits with basically good comedy elements, but neither quite succeeded in getting over, due to the obvious manner in which each was treated. One was based on an income tax investigation; the other, a burlesque on the romance of Capt. John Smith and Pocahontas. With a bit of imagination both might have achieved hilarity. As it was, the laughter was shuttered because the listener almost always was able to guess the lines before they came floating through the loudspeaker. Johnson's band numbers, including "I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm" from the picture "On the Avenue," and "Plenty of Money and You" were excellent. The "Firing Squad," designed to do away with pests, dealt with the extinction of the wife who won't permit her husband to read the evening newspaper in peace and also was excellent. A dramatized commercial in which a mystic, named Ben Ali, looked into the crystal ball and saw 17,000,000 people made happy by the benefits of the sponsor's product, Feenamint, was laughable. "1937 Radio Revue,"renewed Sunday for an additional period, is heard each week at 6 P. M., E.S.T. on the coast-to-coast Mutual network. "Johnnie Presents" Saturday's big inaugural was the Philip Morris program on the CBS network, featuring the music of Russ Morgan, vocals and chorals by Phil Duey, the Swing 14, the Six Diminuettes, Frances Adair, Glenn Cross, the Philip Morris Ensemble, and the dramatized re-enactments authored by Charles Martin taken from actual court records entitled "It Might Have Happened to You." And as extra measure for the opening broadcast, guest appearances by Ferde Grofe, Don Bestor, Walter O'Keefe, and the district attorney of New York County, William Copeland Dodge. "Johnnie Presents," which is the program's title, is a gay hodge podge of melody and mellerdrama, and should rapidly win for itself an enthusiastic audience. It's main forte is variety and the sponsor dishes it out in copious quantities. The main claims to distinction are the factual, dramatized court records. These are prepared by Charles Martin, who is also one of the executives at the Biow Co., agency which handles the Philip Morris account. The details are carefully worked out and entertainingly presented. District Attorney Dodge was on hand to assure the listeners of the authenticity of the re-enactments. The series is presented each Saturday at 8:30 P. M., E.S.T., on the CBS in the interests of Philip Morris cigarettes. Banner