Motion Picture Daily (Jan-Mar 1944)

18 Motion Picture Daily Friday, March 24, 1944 Theatre Changes • • • Star 8 to Air Plea To Register, Vote Hollywood, March 23.— Walter Huston, Martha Scott, Dinah Shore, William Bendix, Victor Moore, Joan Bennett and Maureen 0?Hara will participate in a broadcast over NBC tomorrow from 12:05 to 12:30 A.M. (EWT), titled "Let's Ring Doorbells," asking a 100 per cent registration and vote this election year. Spencer Tracy is tentatively scheduled to appear. The stars, who have formed a citizen's committee to stage a house-to-house campaign to urge all to register, will ask other communities to follow suit. Ten Years Without Doubles for 160 Interstate Houses (Continued from page 1) It started as a one-woman department, with Mrs. Short charged with screening, classifying, booking and publicizing short subjects. She sold the Circuit's managers on the importance of proper balancing of programs and the need to advertise shorts as an integral part of every film bill. The "crusade" was successful and Interstate did not require double features. Staff of Six Now, ten years after inauguration, the department has a six-person staff and is a complete organization within itself. It has its own magazine which is a weekly digest of shorts, sales ideas and commendation of managers' successful selling of shorts. It also contains The Doghouse, which has housed Circuit personalities from managers to top executives who ran afoul of established rules for short product. The department has art and advertising departments and a screening room for previewing all shorts, serials and newsreels.. Booking 160 theatres in 35 cities, the staff handles from 1,200 to 1,400 subjects and changes of program weekly. Now nearly all major circuits use the circuit's magazine material on shorts. The manpower shortage has made the department an all-woman affair. Five assistants are: Mildred Fulenwider, Gertrude Jackson, Virginia Lyne, Anna Mae Handlin, assistants in booking, and Nell Tridge, editor of the magazine. Fox Gives Warning On Television Plan (Continued from page 1) clinic" yesterday, Trammell in a closed session today, reduced their scope to homes. He repeated his impression that television and films can cooperate and expressed the hope that producers might create special departments to explore possibilities, perhaps leading to production of special television films for home consumption. Trammell also voiced the opinion that such production might establish a testing ground for new personalities for use in regular production and indicated that incompleted plans are under discussion for a two to three hour show on the stage of the Radio City Music Hall at an undetermined date to diagnose audience reactions. It was reported that Trammell's switchin emghasis from television for theatres as well as homes yesterday to television Jn homes today is traceable to the fact that the best sized image NBC has been able to develop so far is 16 inches only. CBS Promotes Frankel Mortimer Frankel, with United Artists for six years before he joined Columbia Broadcasting last August as a staff writer, has been appointed associate editor in the CBS script writing division, to replace Elwood Hoffman, who is now editor of the division under Robert J. Landry. Interstate Changes San Antonio, March 23. — Interstate Circuit personnel changes have been announced as follows : Esther Anderson has been named assistant treasurer at the State ; A. J. Reynolds has been promoted to the managership of the Uptown ; Tommy Powers, exchief of service at the Majestic, has been named student manager at the Palace. Strand Building Sold Cincinnati, March 23. — The Strand Building, housing the Strand-Telenews Theatre and owned by the 531 Walnut St. Corp., headed by Alex Schreiber, president of Associated Theatres in Detroit, has been acquired by a local realty company. Concurrently with the transfer, Associated took a 10-year lease on the StrandTelenews, which plays double features. Woman Manages Village Toronto, March 23. — Evelyn Lilly, former assistant at the Eglinton, succeeds Howard Knevels as manager of the Village here. Miss Lilly is Toronto's first woman manager. Irene Storey takes over Miss Lilly's post at the Eglinton. Munson to Atlanta Atlanta, March 23. — Ted Munson, with Lucas and Jenkins Theatres in Macon, has been transferred here to manage L. and J.'s Roxy, succeeding Sam Hammond who has moved to Columbus. To Close $9,500,000 RKO Loan Today (Continued from page 1) been made to retire all remaining preferred stock of Keith-Albee-Orpheum Corp., of which there is about $1,360,000 outstanding. The new $9,500,000 loan undertaken by the First National Bank of Boston has been privately placed, Kingsberg disclosed, with no public issue of securities contemplated. The purpose of the refinancing, which will result in a saving of approximately $1,250,000 in interest or about $100,000 a year to KAO, is the consolidation of existing obligations under a single issue, Kingsberg previously disclosed. First disclosure that RKO was contemplating the refinancing was made in Motion Picture Daily last Dec. 2, and additional details were disclosed Feb. 18. Says RKO Wrongly Charged by Prefect New Haven, March 23. — Malcolm Kingsberg took the stand here today in the trial of the Prefect anti-trust suit against the majors and testified that the Radio-Keith-Orpheum Corp., of which he is vice-president and treasurer, had no part in pooling arrangements to which the plaintiffs are objecting. From 1934 until 1941, Kingsberg stated, Keith-Albee-Orpheum theatres were operated and managed separately from other RKO houses ; and it was the former, he explained, that took part in the pooling in question. RKO has been named as a defendant in the suit, but KAO has not. Elder to Kansas City Indianapolis, March 23. — William Elder, manager of Loew's Indianapolis, has . become manager of Loew's Midland in Kansas City, Mo. Boyd Sparrow succeeds Elder at the Indianapolis. Yassenoff Gets Another . Ada, O., March 23.— The Odeon Theatre here has been sold by W. R. Rhodes to Leo Yassenoff who operates a circuit in Columbus. Yassenoff also owns the local Ada. Leahey Manages Studio San Francisco, March 23. — John Leahey has been named manager of the Robert L. Lippert circuit's Studio Theatre, formerly the Egyptian, on Market St. Barhydt to Strand Springfield, Mass., March 23. — Don Barhydt, formerly of the Court Square Theatre here, has been named manager of the Strand in Gloucester. Rose Sells House Cleveland, March 23. — Ralph Rose, recently sold the Ridge Theatre to Sam Goldfarb, a newcomer to the industry. Nixon Changes Hands Akron, O., March 23.— M. A. Mooney, and F. H. Hathaway have sold the Nixon Theatre here to Joseph Coles. Readying 100 Films For Free Europe (Continued from page 1) Also represented will be war propaganda films, recording fictionally the war effort of the U. S. and that of the European underground, and which constituted about one-fourth of the 40 films earmarked last year. A breakdown by companies indicates that Universal has 20 features in preparation, United Artists eight, and a minimum of 10 each from M-G-M, 20th Century-Fox, Paramount, Warners, RKO and Columbia. Although several foreign managers are said to agree that business abroad will be prosperous, they forsee, however, that a great deal will depend on the dollar exchange, quotas and other restrictions erected in the various countries. $4,650,751 Drop In Tax Receipts (Continued from page 1) however, were at an all-time high. Receipts in February, 1943, were $11,317,101. For the first eight months of the 1943-44 fiscal year, the bureau announced, collections totaled $120,630,825, compared with $103,557,840 for the corresponding period one year ago. Approximately 45 percent of the loss in February from January was concentrated in the third New York (Broadway) district, where collections dropped from $3,290,906 to $1,113,539 and showed a decline of $900,000 from the $2,093,948 recorded in February, 1943. Box-office collections on the Broadway front dropped from $3,033,552 in January to $906,493 last month. s Myron Selznick Is Dead; Agent Was 45 (Continued from page 1) was the son of Lewis J. Selznick, industry pioneer, and served in all branches of exhibition, distribution and production. He was formerly general manager of Norma Talmadge Film Corp. for Joseph M. Schenck. Later, with Selznick Pictures Corp., he became a producer. At one time he was producing 52 features yearly, operating three studios in Fort Lee, N. J., one in the Bronx and one in Hollywood. He also became vice-president of the old Select Pictures Corp. Sought to Rebuild Fortune When the fortunes of Selznick's enterprises changed with the depression of the 20's, he attempted to rebuild his fortune in the Florida boom. Returning to Hollywood, he started Myron Selznick and Co., talent agency. He was one of the founders of Selznick-International. Funeral services will be held Friday afternoon at the Temple Israel here, with Rabbi Max Nussbaum officiating. Additional services will be held in Pierce Brothers Beverly Hill Chapel, with William Powell delivering a eulogy. Pallbearers will be Powell, Gene Fowler, Walter Wanger, Major Frank Lloyd, Pat O'Brien and Edward Sutherland; and honorary pallbearers, Walter Lang, William A. Wellman, Lewis Milestone, Edgar J. Mannix, Adolph Menjpu, Harry Rapf, Ernst Lubitsch, Joseph Nolan, Harry D'Arrast, Siegfried Marcus, Lester Roth, Ben Hecht and Harry Sokoloff. Temporary interment will be'.in Hollywood Cemetery. Film Backing Sought For the City Center Seeking an arrangement that would "serve to close the gap between motion pictures and the legitimate theatre," Newbold Morris, board chairman of the City Center of Music and Drama here, is negotiating with two film concerns to give the Center's plays the same kind of sponsorship its musical performances receive from National Broadcasting Co., Morris said yesterday. NBC has subscribed $6,000 to date. Morris indicated that a financial statement to be issued next month would show a small loss for the Center, which keeps its admission prices down to $1.65 and 55 cents.