Motion Picture Daily (Apr-Jun 1950)

irsday. April 20. 1950 Motion Picture Daily 5 Name Alger, Putnam RKO 'Met' Trustees In addition to deciding on more divorcement time for RKO yesterday, the U. S. Statutory Court named George W. Alger and Albert V. . P-v^nam, both of the Appeal Bo U the American Arbi ai.—r/ Association as trustees to take over the company's 20 per cent stock interest in Metropolitan Playhouses here, with a 2 '/2 -year limit on disposition of the securities. RKO had asked for the trusteeship, but by one of several banks and for a period of five years. The government asked for a one-year limit. V 'War' Give RKO To 1951 (Continued from page 1) (Continued from page 1) leeting of the SAG board on londay in Hollywood. Ln SAG statement yesterday deed that the Four-A's board action 111 injure gravely and possibly irirably the efficiency and the very icture of all actors' unions and [e possibly will doom the continued uence of our AFL International, Four-A's." In addition to SAG SEG, Four-A's includes Actors lity, Chorus Equity, American eration of Radio Artists, AmeriGuild of Variety Artists and erican Guild of Musical Artists. Says Rights Violated .abeling the Four-A's board action an attempted violation of the legal tits of motion picture actors and -a players, and a deliberate declara. of jurisdictional war against the film guilds, the SAG board yestay told the Four-A's in a formal ement that "you cannot alter or >ct in any way the Guild's status er its basic contracts as the coldve bargaining representative for i ion picture actors." SAG added : 'le people directly concerned — ac| in motion pictures, however exited— have chosen the SAG to Resent them in collective bargaining n employers. We know and you iw that in any conflict, they will i^rm that choice. Nothing that you e Four-A's) may do can alter that t was learned yesterday that prior :he Four-A's board meeting a petii was filed with Actors Equity by ,ne 500 of that union's 1,200 mem 's. warning that a split with SAG r the issue would be "fratricidal y" and urged the Equity Council "do everything" to maintain peace. SAG Delegates Walk Out 5-AG's delegates at the Four-A's rd meeting walked out of the sesjn. as soon as the votes were count declining to wait for official ad rnment. They were: Ronald igan, William Holden, Edward Ar d and Florence Marston. They said t insofar as the Four-A's board i ion purports to give Television Au rity jurisdiction over actors in moi pictures, however exhibited, "it is -complete legal nullility and the fid will ignore it." 'he _ Four-A's resolution giving evision Authority jurisdictional unforseeable" setbacks in past months and consequently lacked the financial stability necessary to divide the corporation into two separate companies on a sound basis at an early date. He said further that divorcement now would pit the new RKO picture company against the three remaining defendants which are in a far stronger economic position. He said the purpose of the consent decree which RKO had entered, calling for divorcement by May 8, was to create competition but complying with it now would have the opposite effect. Government attorney Phillip Marcus offered numerous objections but his proposal for the appointment of a trustee to supervise divorcement met with an immediate judicial frown. Judge Augustus N. Hand, senior of the three jurists on the bench, denied the move immediately on the ground that "It's altogether too summary." Marcus said that RKO, in seeking the long extension, was attempting to enjoy the benefits of its own consent decree along with those of the court decree against the other majors but wanted to avoid the burdens of any of the orders. By entering the consent judgment, he explained, the company avoided the possibility of being ordered to divest itself of a large number of theatres and is in a better position concerning freedom on acquisition of new theatres, among other advantages. Hughes' Attorney Present Marcus was joined by a minority stockholder in the argument that Howard Hughes, controlling stockholder, was out to serve his own interests in the request for more time. Hughes had his own attorney, Thomas A. Slack of Dallas, on hand to answer any possible charges and he asserted that Hughes' only consideration has been the benefits of all stockholders. Two other minority holders questioned the idea of continuing the existence of the parent corporation after they had been notified it would be dissolved. They said their investments would be impaired, that the theatre company would still be able to "carry" the picture company so long as they are integrated. Slack and Roy MacDonald, also for RKO, said they thought the complainants might have purchased "when-issued" shares in the new RKO theatre company. Upon questioning by Judge Hand, Slack told the court that Hughes will discharge his commitment to "make an election" in which one of the two new companies he will continue his 24 per cent stock ownership by May 8. Elaborating on his statement of RKO losses, Donovan said that the picture company had losses of $5,000,000 in 1948, $3,600,000 in 1949 and was $1,000,000 in the red for the first quarter of 1950. Sees Position Endangered He said that the parent has a revolving credit with three banks for $10,000,000, that loans made under this totalling $7,500,000 would be called, and consequently the new picture company, upon divorcement, would be forced into a hazardous position. At the conclusion of the hearing, Judge Hand asked Marcus for some relaxation of his stand on the extended time. When the government lawyer appeared to give no ground, Judge Hand fixed the new deadline at Dec. 31, with his associates on the bench, Judges Alfred C. Coxe and Henry W. Goddard, concurring. Under the original RKO consent decree, divorcement was called for by Nov. 8, 1949, but with the government's approval, this was put off to May 8. Claims Higher TV Theatre Definition Projection of theatre-size television images of much higher definition than those available from any present program source will be possible with RCA's new model PT-100 theatre television projector, it was disclosed here yesterday by RCA. The first unit of the new equipment will be delivered next month to Fabian's Fox Theatre in Brooklyn, N. Y. "Although the equipment now in production are set to operate with the 525-line broadcast programs now available to theatres, they can be adapted to make use of a substantially greater number of scanning lines which might be employed in future closed-circuit programming for theatres," the company stated. Four-A's which prefer war to peace, chaos to order," adding that the FourA's "adamant, selfish course of action will result in hurting actors rather than in helping." UK TheatresWeigh Levy to Finance Showmanship Plan London, April 19.— A pro rata levy on all British theatres for the maintenance of a national showmanship campaign after the pattern suggested by 20th Century-Fox is receiving wide support in the trade here. Treasury authorities are said to look with favor on industry proposals that the proposed levy for the campaign should be made before deduction of entertainment tax. No expensive institutional advertising campaign in national newspapers is likely to be undertaken, however. It is felt that a planning committee of publicists and trade press editors should be able to devise a more effective approach to the potential patron. Trade press editors already have suggested that BBC use a 20-minute trailer on films in general release on its television program weekly. Canada Group Hits National Film Board Toronto, April 19. — In a brief presented to the Massey Commission on Arts at Ottawa today the Association of Motion Picture Producers and Laboratories of Canada charged that the government's National Film Board is trying to establish a monopoly. The association, headed by J. J. Chisholm of Associated Screen News, and representing Canada's private film industry, described the NFB as a very serious threat to the country's commercial interests and to new Canadian and foreign investments in the field. The brief asked for a sharp limitation of NFB expansion and recommended that a portion of the government's film requirements be carried out on a freely competitive basis. The Massey Commission is carrying out a government investigation on the encouragement of art and culture, but the probe has developed a conflict between private and public interests in films, radio broadcasting and television. GREATEST STORY OF ALL MAGNIFICENT! power asserted that the other constituent branches "have repeatedly requested SAG and SEG to agree to mediation of all matters that are in dispute," but the two Hollywood guilds "haveconsistently refused to mediate all issues in dispute." SAG declared that its Four-A's charter vests in it complete jurisdiction in the motion picture field. The Guild condemned "those factions in the 11 POWERFUL! A POWERFUL AND REVERENT PICTURE ■ M. C. Torres presents "THE SINNER OF MAGDALA (The Story of Christ and Mary Maqdalena) with Medea de Novara and cast of thousands Two Tears in the Making The Story of a Devotion Unparalleled in the History of Human Experience. HISPANO CONTINENTAL FILMS, INC. 25 West 45th Street, New York 19, N. Y. Luxemburg 2-1700