Motion Picture Daily (Jan-Mar 1955)

Motion Picture Daily Tuesday, March 15, 1955 Toll-TV Committee To Meet on Merging Of Outside Support Plans to coordinate the activities of outside industry groups interested in keeping television free may be announced following a meeting of the Committee Against PayAsYouSee TV in Washington or in New York later this week, it was announced yesterday by Robert S. Taplinger and Associates, public relations counsel for the committee. The exhibitor group, jointly headed by Alfred Starr and Trueman Rembusch, is also expected to announce the retention of a consultant on engineering advice and services shortly. The exact time and place of the meeting this week is expected to be announced here today, Taplinger said. Committee Is Active The group, in preparation for filing a brief with the Federal Communications Commission by May 9 opposing subscription television as an "interested party," has actively begun its program in gathering information and support for the campaign. The program, as announced by Starr in late January following a Hotel Sheraton Astor meeting of the committee here, was the retention of public relations counsel to combat the propaganda of the protagonists of toll-TV ; the commissioning of legal counsel to represent the committee pending the proceedings before the FCC; the engagement of expert engineering services and advice and the establishment of a Washington office in case the matters become a legislature future. Thus far, the joint committee opposing subscription television has retanied Taplinger as its public relations counsel, Marcus Cohn of Cohn & Marks, Washington law firm, as legal counsel, and Dr. Dallas Smythe as economist to study the impact and implications of subscription television. Budget of $150,000 Set To finance the committee's work, exhibitor groups and independent theatremen throughout the United States are being asked for contributions equal to the sum which they contributed to COMPO in the form of dues last year. The committee has set a tentative budget of $150,000 to combat toll-TV. Goldbeck Elected Charities President HOLLYWOOD, March 14.— Willis Goldbeck, representing the Screen Directors Guild, was elected president for 1955-56 of the Motion Picture Charities Committee, succeeding Ralph Clare, whose term will expire on June 30. Other officers elected are : Lawrence A. Weingarten to the vicepresidency vacated by Goldbeck, and serving additional terms are treasurer F. E. Witt and secretary Carl Cooper. Televisinn--Radio By RUDY VALLEE {Guest Colunmist for Pinky Herman, who is on '■vacation) PINKY, you flatter me when you ask me to "guest" for you. The muse doesn't visit me too often and this may be very dull to your readers, but maybe some of them might be interested in a comparison of TV, radio and entertainment abroad and here in our own U. S. My happy chance to make this comparison came because a United Artists exec agreed that I was still very well preserved. (Whatever that means !) So without any sleep I found myself flying over to Paris for a part in "Gentlemen Marry Brunettes" with luscious Russell and Crain. Our eight weeks in Paris only confirmed what others have said . . . that Paris was no place for Americans in pictures, or just Americans for that matter. Besides the cold rooms in the best hotels, the one cake of soap unless you begged for more, there was the self-absorption of the average Parisian. Nobody seems to care about the visitor. Rudeness is the rule. Bad phone service Rudy Vallee incredibly bad New York. crazy drivers and a pace of life faster than in ft ft ft Of course there were excellent restaurants, but not low priced . . . with one exception! This was The Royal St. Germain on the Left Bank. Eight courses of exquisitely delicious food, plus an aperitif and all of three magnums of three different wines that you cam, drink, and refilled as fast as emptied, for $3.20 and the tip only 12 per cent. Out of this world! Preston Sturges went into raves about it and we didn't see an American there. It's the best. ft ft ft The Lido show outdoes anything that Ziegfeld, Carroll, White, the Copa or Lou Walters ever attempted. It's thrilling the way they roll out four grand pianos all playing in perfect synchronization and really playing like four Liberaces. At the Versailles Halls of Mirrors, the girls were breathtaking in their physiques. The floor shows which have two and three-year runs defy anything I've see for staging, lighting and musical background. We found the Follies not too interesting. The Medrano (Circus) was fair with my old harmonica swallower Frank Cook topping the bill in a SAWDUST ring! The most successful vaudeville house is long, hot and badly ventilated. ft ft ft Tried to have a yachting jacket made in (of all places) a FRENCH shop called OLD ENGLAND. All the shops close from noon until 2:00 P.M. In this shop, nobody came near to wait on us for an hour. Scott Brady and I became enraged at the rank impudence of some of the clerks. And only one man spoke English. It was murderous ! TV is nothing in Paris. I don't think they have 10,000 sets in all of France. Radio is still very popular in this backward city which you can have with my compliments. ft ft ft We were glad to get to London where the rooms are just as cold and the soap almost as scarce, but the people are warm and friendly on the whole. Don't believe reports : There is plenty of good food and it's not black market in London. Although the picture unions gave our producers a bad time, they were friendly otherwise and except for some old sound equipment, which broke down easily, we fared well in our picture work. TV and radio have a captive audience— 40,000,000 listeners to an ordinary Saturday night band show or a variety show is routine. The adulation of the English for their recording personalities is fanatical. TV really keeps millions at home and yet the theatres are packed, especially the legit successes. ft ft ft Our two weeks in Wiesbaden entertaining the Air Force were the happiest. Two days in Berlin for more shows. A tour into the East Zone was sheer suicide even though we had an army car and telephonic communication with headquarters. ft ft ft Back home on the glorious S.S. "America." Don't let anyone tell you the cuisine on American ships isn't superb. I've traveled on all of them. The "America." is tops. And our own homeland has so many fabulous things that even Berle can't spoil it. I have no desire to go back over again — ever. This land is IT ! Lichtman (Continued from page 1) "are doing themselves as well as our pictures a great disservice by selling CinemaScope to the public in other than its optimum form. It is impossible to present the panorama and sweep of CinemaScope in other than its full-scale proportions, and in reducing the magnitude of the medium by using the so-called 2-D trailers the impact of Cinema-Scope cannot help but be vitiated," he noted. "Why should exhibitors whose theatres are equipped for CinemaScope limit themselves and their selling with 2-D trailers when exciting and wonderful CinemaScope trailers are available on each picture?" "This situation can and should be rectified immediately. Projectionists can easily change lenses during a program of standard films. While they are showing a regular picture on one of their two projection machines, they can set up the CinemaScope trailer on the other one. "Showmanship in theatre programming all the way down the line should be standard operating procedure. An exhibitor should be as concerned with the type and quality of trailers he throws on his screen as the feature pictures themselves. Points to Public Acceptance "The public is quick to appreciate quality. Their acceptance and patronage of CinemaScope pictures has written a dramatic page in our industry's history during the past 18 months. The greatly increased theatre business resulting from the introduction and merchandising of CinemaScope pictures must not be permitted to go by the boards. There is too much at stake. "Constant vigilance must be maintained to see that the level of theatre entertainment be the highest of all entertainment media. To accomplish this, every and all techniques of showmanship must be utilized. It was showmanship that made the movies great. It can become even greater if we do not forget this truth," he concludes. Settle Electric, Other K.C. Suits KANSAS CITY, Kan., March 14. — The Electric Theatre anti-trust suit and nine other anti-trust suits in this area have been settled under a "package" arrangement, it was learned here. The amount involved was not disclosed, but the settlement makes Kansas City, Kan., a first-run city. The agreement provides that the product of all major companies will be available on a day and date basis with theatres in Kansas City, Mo. W. D. Fulton, a partner in the Brookside Theatre, Kansas City, Mo., which won a $1,333,607 verdict about four years ago in an anti-trust case, started six of the suits. All of the majors were defendants in each of the 10 suits, although Universal and 20th Century-Fox had made a settlement with the Electric Theatre Co. before the first of the suits went to trial. Other suits included in the settlement were those brought by George Baker Enterprises, which operated the Electric Theatre from 1935 to 1938; Dr. Nathan Zoglin, owner of the Ritz Theatre, Kansas City, Mo., and Gilbert Carter of Liberty Theatre, Sedalia, Mo.