Motion Picture Daily (Jan-Jun 1949)

Motion Picture Daily Tuesday, January 18, 1949 Para. Sells 3rd Film Away from Saenger New Orleans, Jan. 17. — "The Paleface" opens at Loew's State on Friday for a week's run, making the third Paramount feature which has played at other than a Paramount-Richards house since the recent sellaway. Both "A Foreign Affair" and "Sorry, Wrong Number" played Loew's State earlier. Paramount is selling away from its partner because of its inability to arrive at rental terms with the circuit. To Stage Play for Purple Heart Men Hollywood, Jan. 17. — With Gregory Peck, John Wayne, Maureen O'Hara and Pat O'Brien as stars, director John Ford is presenting a stage production of 'What Price Glory" with all proceeds going to the military order of the Purple Heart. The production will play Los Angeles, Hollywood, San Francisco, Long Beach and possibly other cities, starting on the eve of George Washington's birthday, Feb. 22, and continuing through mid-March. Other stars in the cast include Robert Armstrong, Wallace Ford, George O'Brien, Ward Bond, Harey Carey, Jr., Forrest Tucker, Luis Alberni, Allan Hale, Oliver Hardy and Herbert Rawlinson. It will be staged by Ralph Murphy and produced by Harry Joe Brown. Laurence Stallings, coauthor of "What Price Glory," will be associated with the production. Others in the cast include Charles Kemper, Jimmy Lydon, G. Pat Collins, Fred Graham, Henry O'Neill, James R. Dugan, Larry Blake and Pat Summers III. Everyone connected with the production is contributing his services without pay. Gilbert L. Becker Gilbert L. Becker, office manager for M-G-M in Detroit since 1930, died over the weekend following a protracted illness. He joined the old Goldwyn company in 1922, in the booking department at Albany and in 1930 was transferred to the New York branch as cashier. Surviving are the widow and two daughters. One of the daughters, Ruth, is head contract clerk in the Detroit M-G-M office. PCA's Al Block, 51 Hollywood, Jan. 17. — Private funeral services were held for Al Block, 51,. former scenarist and for the past 14 years M-G-M liaison with the Production Code Administration, who died Friday morning of pneumonia. The widow, a son, and a brother survive. A. S. Guckenheimer, 82 Savannah, Ga., Jan. 17. — Abe Simon Guckenheimer, 82 years old and builder of the first house here in the silent days, died at his home Jan. 14. Personal Mention Y FRANK FREEMAN and Ed• win Weisl, Paramount executives, have left here for Miami to attend the Motion Picture Association meeting. They will return at the end of the week. • Charles A. Bailey, assistant to Norman Morey, Warner short subject sales manager, was in Boston yesterday for conference, with George W. Horan, Northeastern district sales manager, and Al Daytz, Boston branch manager. • Frank J. Durkee, owner of Durkee Theatres in Maryland, has left Baltimore to spend two months in Florida. • Gael Sullivan, executive director of Theatre Owners of America, was in Buffalo yesterday from New York. • Gene Autry will attend the inaugural ceremonies in Washington on Thursday. • Jules K. Chapman, assistant general sales manager of Film Classics, is on a tour of Midwest exchanges. • Keki Modi, producer-director in India, is here on a visit. DAT CASEY left here last night *■ for the inaugural ceremonies in Washington. • Josef Somlo, J. Arthur Rank production executive, is in New York from London for conferences with Universal and Eagle-Lion officials. • Bob Pinson and Max Holder of Astor Pictures, have returned to Charlotte after a business trip to Atlanta. • Moe Kerman, Favorite Films president, has returned here after a threeweek vacation in Palm Beach. • William Brandt, New York circuit executive, and Mrs. Brandt are vacationing in Miami. • Alan F. Cummings, M-G-M exchange operations chief, has left here for Cincinnati and Indianapolis. • Robert Vogel, M-G-M studio foreign department publicist, will fly from the Coast to New York on Friday. Joe Bishop of Kay Films in Charlotte, is in Charleston on business this week. Irene Dunne To Head Heart Drive Division Irene Dunne, film actress, has been named chairman of the women's committee in the forthcoming $5,000,000 drive of the American Heart Association, it was announced here yesterday by Harold E. Stassen, chairman of the 1949 Heart Campaign. The campaign will be conducted from Feb. 7 to 28 by the American Heart Association and local affiliates throughout the country to support a program of research, education and community service. Milstein to DuArt As Young's Partner J. J. Milstein arrived in New "York from Hollywood yesterday to assume sales supervision for Du-Art Film Laboratories, under a partnership arrangement with Al Young. _ For a decade, Milstein was associated with M-G-M as Los Angeles branch manager and district manager for the West Coast. Later he was vice-president of Republic in charge of distribution and thereafter New York representative for Edward Small Productions. Prior to his new affiliation with Du-Art he was in production. Frank Smithson, 88 Frank Smithson, pioneer producerdirector of films for Edison and Mack Sennett, died here Saturday at the age of 88. A life member of The Lambs, Smithson had been in retirement for 15 years. Two sons survive, Percy Michael of Hollywood, and Edwin of New Rochelle, N. Y. Approach Decision in Ad Films Trust Suit Washington, Jan. 17.— The Federal Trade Commission today wound up hearings in its anti-trust case against four producers of advertising films. The Commission has been taking testimony for over a year-and-ahalf in a score of cities. Next step will be for the trial examiner Earl J. Kolb, who heard the case, to recommend a decision to the full Commission. Defendants are: Ray Bell Films, St. Paul; Alexander Film Co., Colorado Springs; United Film Ad Service, Kansas City, and Motion Picture Advertising Service, New Orleans. The complaint, filed two years ago, charges that these firms used unfair methods of competition tending to restrain trade and create a monopoly in the sale of advertising films. Arnall, Depinet, Hays At Disney Citation Indianapolis, Jan. 17.— Ellis Arnall, president of the Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers; Ned E. Depinet, RKO Radio president ; Will H. Hays ; Nat Levy, RKO Eastern division sales manager; novelist Sterling North, and a number of players in Walt Disney's "So Dear to My Heart" attended the world premiers of the picture at Purdue University's Hall of Music at nearby Lafayette on Saturday night. Disney was cited at the premiere by the University as "artist, producer, director, creator, but above all a welder of the arts of painting, music and drama in a new unity that has made a world public sensitive to the values inherent in motion pictures." Jersey Owners Meet On Tax Program Trenton, N. J., Jan. 17.— Allied Theatre Owners of New Jersey held a membership meeting at the StacyTrent Hotel here today to formulate a program for defeating admission tax and film censorship bills which may be introduced in the 1949 New Jersey legislature. Organization president Edward Lachman presided. NEW YORK THEATRES — RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL j Rockefeller Center "WORDS AND MUSIC" jJUNE ALLYSON . PERRY COMO JUDY GARLAND . LENA HORNE GENE KELLY . MICKEY ROONEY i ANN SOTHERN j Color by TECHNICOLOR i A Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Picture ! THE GREAT HOLIDAY STAGE SHOW ffltms ROBERT YOUNG CUMMINGS h HALWALLIS' production t y*L,7" m Samuel Goldwyn presents ENCHANTMENT it Starring DAVID NIVEN TERESA WRIGHT EVELYN KEYES FARLEY GRANGER Released by RKO Radio Pictures, Inc. ASTOR THEATER Broadway & 45th Street J. Arthur Rank presents "THE RED SHOES" Color by Technicolor BIJOU THEATER. ^f'^Zd^ay All Seats Reserved, Mail Orders Twice Daily Extra Matinees Saturday and Sunday Lata Show Saturday Evening 11:30 An EAGLE LION FILM Release r OLIVIA de HAYILLAND I the Sxiake Pit ■ Directed by Produced by ANATOLE LITVAK • AHATOLE LITVAK i ROBERT BUSIER Kivoli 2&I JOAN of ARC starring INGRID BERGMAN A VICTOR FLEMING PRODUCTION COLOR BY TECHNICOLOR • CAST OF THOUSANDS with JOSE FERRER ■ FRANCIS L SULLIVAN ■ J CARROL NAISH • WARD BOND 3 SHEPPERD STRUDWICK • HURO HATFIELD • GENE LOCKHARI ■ JOHN EMERY S GEORGE COULOURIS • JOHN IRELAND and CECIL KELLAWAY 4 based upon the stage play 'Joan ol Lorraine1 by MAXWELL ANDERSON tcrtrn play by MAXWELL ANDERSON and ANDREW SOU ■ art direction by RICHARD DAY ■ director of photography JOSEPH VALENTINE, A.S.C. Produced by WALTER WANGER Directed by VICTOR FLEMING enled by SIERRA PICTURES. Inc. . relealed by RKO RADIO PICTURES /^week!. James P. Cunningham, News Editor; Herbert V. Fecke, Advertising Manager; Gus H. Fausel, Production Manager; Hollywood Bureau, Yucca-Vine Building, William R. Weaver, Editor; Chicago Bureau, 120 South La Salle Street, Editorial and Advertising. Urben Farley. Advertising Representative; Jimmy Ascher, Editorial Representative. Washington, J. A. Otten, National Press Club, Washington, D. C. London Bureau, 4 Golden Sq., London Wl. Hope Burnup, Manager, Peter Burnup, Editor; cable address, "Quigpubco, London." Other Quigley Publications: Motion Picture Herald; Better Theatres and Theatre Sales, each published every fourth week as a section of Motion Picture Herald; International Motion Picture Almanac, Fame. Entered as second class matter, Sept. 23, 1938, at the post office at New York. N. Y., under the act of March 3, 1879. Subscription rates per year, $6 in the Americas and $13 foreign; single copies, 10c.