Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1944)

2 Motion Picture Daily Monday, October 9, 1944 Personal Mention HY DAAB, Vanguard Coast publicist, who has been in New York for the past week following the Atlanta opening of "Since You Went Away," will leave for Hollywood Wednesday. Jack Cohn and Abe Schneider of Columbia left Hollywood for New York Friday on the Superchief. A. Montague and Nate Spingold are continuing their visit on the Coast. • C. J. Latta, Albany zone manager for Warner Theatres, and Max Friedman, buyer and booker for that territory, were weekend visitors in New York. • H. J. Yates, Sr., Republic board chairman, is expected in New York today from Hollywood. James R. Grainger, president, arrived at the weekend from Toronto. • R. J. O'Donnell will arrive in New York this morning from Dallas. He is accompanied by Ray Beall of Interstate Circuit. • John Balaban, head of Balaban and Katz Theatres, is due back in Chicago today following a three-day fishing trip. • Walter Branson, RKO Western division sales manager, returned to New York from Chicago at the weekend. • Mike Fish, art editor of Warners studio publicity department, arrived in Chicago late last week on a tour of key cities. • Carl Leserman, United Artists general sales manager, is scheduled to arrive today from Hollywood. • Charles Schwartz, film attorney, will take the Superchief out of Hollywood for New York tomorrow. MGM 'Romance' Plug Ready for Pay-Off M-G-M is going all out on its national magazine advertising campaign for "An American Romance," which will have a 132-city world premiere in the states of Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky and West Virginia on Columbus Day. This premiere will be supplemented Oct. 26-27 by the 48 state capitals and Washington, D. C, showings. Advertising on the Technicolor picture during October, November and December will appear in 22 magazines with a combined circulation of approximately 30,000,000. The event will be climaxed by a special banquet to be held Oct. 11 at the Netherlands Plaza Hotel, Cincinnati, when King Vidor and a number of stars, home office executives, local dignitaries and officials of WLW will attend. Tradewise . . . By SHERWIN KANE C INCE having pointed out in ^ this space last week that Allied States and PCCITO must have the answers that other exhibitors are still seeking to several obvious questions concerning the Government's proposed amendments to the consent decree, a number of which appear to be undesirable, if not dangerous, to all exhibition, there has been brought to our attention a bulletin recently issued to members of the I. T. O. of Ohio. That organization is affiliated with Allied and several of its officers were present at the Bretton Woods, N. H., meeting last month which endorsed the Government's decree proposals after a question-and-answer period with Assistant U. S. Attorney General Robert L. Wright, which trade press representatives were not permitted to attend. That, presumably, was the time, place and source of whatever answers Allied and PCCITO may have obtained to silence their qualms about the new decree proposals, leaving them free to approve the Government's action. • One of the questions concerning the new decree proposals raised by the Southeastern Theatre Owners Association, as reported here last week, was the extent to which independent circuits might be affected by the Government's avowed policy of making little ones out of big ones. Addressing itself to this question (which, incidentally, it refers to as a "propaganda rumor circulated by affiliated interests"), the I. T, O. of Ohio bulletin declares : there "is no power anywhere to dissolve a circuit or to compel an exhibitor to dispose of theatres, except for violation of the Sherman Act. ... It is no violation of that Act for an exhibitor to have more than one theatre, or even all the theatres in a town of any size." The bulletin goes on to say the "abuse of great buying power .. . determines whether the law has been violated and, consequently, whether a circuit should be dissolved." It concludes : "If you have not violated the law, nothing can harm you." If that is the best Wright has to offer independents who question his new decree proposals, it should be pointed out that there is no statement quoted herewith or contained in the I.T.O. of Ohio bulletin which does not apply equally to affliated circuits. . Every whit of consolation that an independent exhibitor, particularly a circuit operator, can skim from those pronouncements is available therein to the affiliated circuits also. Certainly, it cannot be said that "if you (the independent) have not violated the law, nothing can harm you," but on the other hand "if you (the affiliated) have not violated the law, you can be harmed." And how much assurance for either independent or affiliated exhibitor is there in those words? Is it safe for any independent exhibitor to assume that his operations are legal, per se, but that the same or similar operations of an affiliated are illegal, or vice versa? Whether or not some of the fundamental practices within exhibition and distribution constitute violations of the antitrust laws is not known. That is true for the independent as well as for the affiliated company. The courts have not fully examined nor ruled upon many basic practices common to all in the industry. The situation is reminiscent of the observation, common a few years back, that the Constitution is not what it appears to be but what the Supreme Court says it is. That is equally true of the anti-trust laws in their application to industry practices, with the additional uncertainty at this time that what one Attorney General may charge is a violation of the anti-trust laws may not be so regarded by his successor. • • An independent exhibitor who regards the proposed decree amendments as something applicable only to large distributors and their affiliated theatres is not using his noodle. An independent exhibitor who consoles himself by saying "I am 'not violating the law. Nothing can harm me," is leaning on a reed. He, no more than the affiliated exhibitor, knows whether what he is doing or may be accused of doing is in violation of the anti-trust laws. Attorney General Biddle has proclaimed his policy for this industry. It is: "No discrimination will be shown." As pointed out before, the Government Coast * Flashes Hollywood, Oct. 8 NICHOLAS M. S C H E N C K, president of Loew's, Inc., postponed his scheduled departure for the East because of the studio strike situ John W. Considine, Jr., resigned at the weekend from M-G-M, where he has been a producer for a number of years. Clark Is Welcomed To Toronto Post Toronto, Oct. 8.— Ralph H. Clark, newly appointed general manager for Warners in the Dominion, received a formal welcome to Canada Friday night in a reception attended by many industry executives at the King Edward Hotel here. Among Warners' home office representatives were Ben Kalmenson, general sales manager ; Norman H. Moray, short subjects sales manager; Mort Blumenstock, publicity director, and Wolfe Cohen, who was promoted to the home office foreign distribution department after serving for many years as head of Warners in Canada. Kuykendall Draws St. L. Series Pass St. Louis, Oct. 8. — World Series competition proved too strong for a scheduled weekend meeting of local theatre owners with Ed Kuykendall, MPTOA president. After conferring with Fred Wehrenberg, MPTOA chairman, Kuykendall left for his home in Mississippi and plans to return to St. Louis at a time to be set later. is on record in the Griffith case as taking the position that a monopoly in any community, however small, affects interstate trade in motion pictures. No consenting distributor and no affiliated theatre operator concedes or believes that his operations are in violation of the anti-trust laws. The companies made their disavowal of any violation of the law in the opening section of the consent decree of Nov. 20, 1940, a document to which the Government was a party. But observe what the Government is asking of them, four years later. "If you are not violating the law" is an empty phrase while much of the law remains unwritten, uncharted and undecided, for the independent as well as the affiliated. The wise exhibitor will examine the Government's decree proposals minutely and in this light before giving them his endorsement. MOTION PICTURE DAILY, Martin Quigley, President and Editor-in-Chief; Colvin Brown, Publisher; Sherwin Kane, Executive Editor. Published daily except Saturday, Sunday and holidays by Quigley Publishing Company, Inc., 1270 Sixth Avenue, Rockefeller Center, New York, 20, N. Y. Telephone Circle 7-3100. Cable address, "Quigpubco, New York." Martin Quigley, President; Colvin Brown, Vice-President; Red Kann, Vice-President; T. J. Sullivan, Secretary; Sherwin Kane, Executive Editor; James P. Cunningham, News Editor; Herbert V. Fecke, Advertising Manager; Chicago Bureau, 624 South Michigan Ave.; Hollywood Bureau, Postal Union Life Bldg., William R. Weaver, Editor; London Bureau, 4 Golden Sq., London Wl, Hope Burnup, Manager; Peter Burnup, Editor; cable address, "Quigpubco, London." All contents copyrighted 1944 by Quigley Publishing. Co., Inc. Other Quigley Publications: Motion Picture Herald, Better Theatres, International Motion Picture Almanac, Fame. Entered as second class matter, Sept. 23, 1938. at the post office at N?w York, N. Y., under the apt of March 3, 1879. Subscription rates per year, $6 in the Americas and $12 foreign; single copies, 10c.