Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1955)

hursday. December 8, 1955 Motion Picture Daily 11 bets h TENT TALK Variety Club News REVIEW: WASHINGTON.— Steve Allen, host NBC-TV's "Tonight," was named inner of the seventh annual "Pernality of the Year" award by the ariety Club of Washington. Allen as presented the award by Nathan . Golden, for his "creative and lique form of entertainment, for the gh standard maintained in its esentation, and for the patriotic id humanitarian causes which you sive sponsored. A MINNEAPOLIS. -Sim Heller of .inneapolis, owner of the Heller in;pendent circuit in northern Minsota, was elected chief barker of ?nt No. 12, Variety Club of the ^e orthwest, succeeding LeRoy Miller, Universal branch manager. Serving joia i ft 1 1 lie i tesa i iSr, itli Heller are Charles Winchell, st assistant; Joe Podoloff, second sistant; Saul Malisow, dough guy, id Tom Burke, property man. A 'e*f SAN FRANCISCO.— Tent No. 32, ariety Club of Northern California, ected Nate Blumenfeld, chief barker the 1956 crew, and Stan Lefcourt, J f(l D'st assistant; Frank Harris, second ,;sistant; Leslie Jacobs, dough guy, id Jack Marpole, property master. rBa rraham Kislingbury, Charles Maestri, lead Marshall Naify, Henry Nasser, y r oward Schultz, and Ed Sonney :ib i ake up the rest of the crew. A 5 (J, CLEVELAND.— About 150 atnded the Variety Club dinner dance fro ;ld here in the Hollenden Hotel to .Jen £iy hail and farewell to the club's J ^coming and outgoing chief barkers, i.ek Silverthorne, who has served two rears as top executive and in whose hgime the club sponsored the Cerebral Palsy Foundation School of leveland, was presented with a set : golf clubs as a token of apreciation. [1 i : A CINCINNATI.— Tent No. 3 of ariety Clubs International recently ected its 1956 officers. They are: obert C. McNabb, chief barker; m McDonald, first assistant; Abe (aius, second assistant; Saul M. reenberg, property master, and 'illiam Onie, dough guy. A LAS VEGAS.-Recently elected )56 officers of Tent No. 39 of ariety Clubs International are, Fred )lby, chief barker; Harry Farnow, •st assistant; Eugene K. Murphy, cond assistant; Harry A. White, •operty master, and Robert O. Can>n, dough guy. Hell's Horizon Columbia The climactic portion of the Korean war— the Yalu River period— also forms the climactic portion of "Hell's Horizon," as American soldiers in a B-29 are assigned to bomb a bridge over the river which separates Manchuria from the controversial peninsula. With production reins in the hands of Wray Davis, the film provides some moments of real suspense, others where some excitement might be more than welcome. Good performances are turned in by John Ireland, Bill Williams, Maria English and Hugh Beaumont. That trip to the Yalu, which consumes about two-thirds of the film's running time, is nothing if not eventful and perilous. Foul weather, under cover of which the airmen had hoped to escape detection, gives way to fair— followed by deadly enemy attacks. One American is killed, another is wounded, and a gas tank is hit. Even when the heroes reach their target and demolish it, their troubles are not over. A violent storm comes up during the trip back, and one man commits suicide by jumping from the plane. Finally the airmen make it back to their home base but not before they have been forced to make a crash landing and escape from the burning plane in the nick of time. The events catalogued above are only a part of the ceaseless activity which Tom Gries, as writer, has invented for the actors in this film and then, functioning also as director, had them play at a frenzied pace. Or at least things are active when the heroes are in the air; for the first third of the running time, unfortunately, they are grounded— and so is the film. While the actors sit around playing cards and making small talk, their boredom is likely to infect the audience. Even a brief romance, between Miss English as an Okinawan half-caste and Larry Pennell as one of the airmen, with Ireland acting as a rival for her hand, doesn't help to alleviate the early tedium. Once off the ground, however, this picture is okay. Running time, 80 minutes. General classification. For December release. NcO. Variety Plans TNT Launching Big 'Heart' Telethon Closed-Circuit Slate NEW ORLEANS, Dec. 7.-Variety Tent 45 will present an 18-hour telethon here on Dec. 17-18, to raise funds by selling shares in health for its "Heart Project" and the United Cerebral Palsy Association of Louisiana, Henry G. Plitt, the New Orleans club's dough guy announced. The telethon will originate from the Municipal Auditorium on WJMRTV, channel 20. Film star Charles Heston will be master of ceremonies, with the possibility that Claudette Colbert may be the mistress of ceremonies, said Plitt. Also definitely scheduled will be Broadway star, Carol Ohmart, recently signed by Paramount for the lead role in the film "The Scarlet Hour." All Services Donated Plitt said everyone participating, including the star, are donating their services free. One fourth of the telethon collections, Plitt added, will go to Tulane and Louisiana State University medical schools for research. The rest will go toward a state cerebral palsy project to provide treatment for children and adults in small towns without facilities for treatment and to establish a new rehabilitation workshop here for those handicapped. Theatre Network Television has announced that it is launching "the heaviest schedule of telecasts in the history of the closed-circuit industry." Contracts have been signed for 10 multi-city telecasts between Dec. 22 and April 21, with several more expected during the first quarter of 1956, it was said. Sales for the period closed in the last few weeks have already gone over a $1,250,000, according to Nathan L. Halpern, T.N.T. president. Four of the shows have been ordered on a one-a-month basis by the Upjohn Co. as a public relations project directed to physicians. Two have been scheduled by the General Electric Co., while one is planned as the fifth in a series for Smith, Kline & French Laboratories. Two other major firms are expected to announce their programs in the near future. Persaud Named WB Trinidad Manager Albert R. Persaud, formerly acting manager of the Warner Bros, office in Trinidad, has been appointed manager of that office, according to Wolfe Cohen, president of Warner International. H. H. Greenblatt Excuse Us, Herb! It was a case of the "right church but the wrong pew" yesterday when Motion Picture Daily a n nounced that Herbert H. Greenblatt had been named Western sales manager of RKO Radio, with Nat Levy heading up the Eastern d i v i sion. In this case, however, it was the right name but the wrong photo. Inadvertently, a cut of Arthur Greenblatt was printed with the story instead of that of Herbert H. Under the new setup, Greenblatt and Levy will be responsible for every phase of sales and distribution in their respective divisions. 'Dolls' to Hartford Independent House Special to THE DAILY HARTFORD, Dec. 7.-MGM has disclosed first Connecticut booking of "Guys and Dolls." The Samuel Goldwyn musical will open at the Parsons, 1,200-seat downtown Hartford independent, on Dec. 23, with price scale not set as yet by theatre partners Bernie Menschell and John Calvocoressci. The house recently booked another Metro release, "Svengali." In recent years, MGM releases have been more or less confined to Loew's downtown theatres here. CARE to Sponsor 'Conqueror' in B.C. The Washington premiere of Howard Hughes' "The Conqueror," which will debut also in the other capitals of the world in late January, will be sponsored by CARE, one ol the leading international charities, it was announced yesterday by Walter Branson, RKO's vice president in charge of distribution. The picture is scheduled to open at the Keith Theatre. Mrs. Raymond Clapper, widow of the political newspaper columnist and a prominent figure in the capital, will direct the activities of the charity promotion. IN A HURRY FOR SPECIAL TRAILERS? Let Filmack make them! You'll be glad you did! We'll give you fast service and the finest quality! bh FILMACK m