Motion Picture Daily (Oct-Dec 1957)

12 MOTION PICTURE DAILY, December 27, 1957 Music HalVs President and Managing Director RUSSELL V. DOWNING has been president and managing director of Radio City Music Hall since March, 1952. He had been associated with the Music Hall in executive capacities for almost 20 years prior to that, having joined it as treasurer in 1933. Downing's long experience with the "showplace of the Nation" brought him to its topmost position thoroughly schooled in the policies and practices which earned the theatre its eminent place in showbusiness and made him fully aware of the unceasing labor, care and planning required to keep it there. His administration not only has maintained the exceptionally high standards set by his predecessors for high-quality entertainment on stage and screen, for exemplary service, and for the best in furnishings and equipment, but has as well utilized every opportunity which presented itself to expand and improve upon them. Born in Yonkers, N. Y., August 11, 1900, Downing had little hint in his early school and business life that his career was to lie in showbusiness, either as head of the world's largest theatre, or in any other capacity in the glamorous world of entertainment. On completing high school, Downing chose the world of business and finance and enrolled at the Wharton School of Commerce, University of Pennsylvania. During World War I he was in Officers Training School at Camp Zachary Taylor, Following the Armistice he completed his education at Columbia University. Downing's first position was with the Tidewater Oil Company, for whom he became supervisor of U. S. warehouses, being responsible for their location and stocks, and for sales analyses. He was made assistant to the president and accompanied him, five years later, into a newly formed company engaged in developing electric razors, where he served as assistant treasurer. Thereafter he became assistant treasurer of an electric refrigerator company, and still later treasurer of the Prudence Company, a large financial organization. In the latter capacity it became his duty to assist, during the Depression years, in the foreclosure of theatre properties. Shortly after the opening of Radio City Music Hall in 1932, Downing was offered and accepted the position of treasurer of the corporation, a post he filled until 1942, when he was named vice-president. In 1948 he became executive vice-president, and in 1952 president and managing director. In those years he was an officer also of the Center theatre, which operated in Rockefeller Center until a few years ago. Downing was elected to the board of directors of Rockefeller Center, Inc., in 1952. (Continued from page 8) theatre-going. Moreover, it is a policy that has done as much to assure it of volume patronage for the future as it has to sell today's shows. In its working, its pictures are selected with the utmost care, measured to uncompromising quality standards for as diverse a patronage as any theatre anywhere can boast of, which is, at the same time, predominantly a family audience. To assure a selection of the best that the studios have to offer, Russell V. Downing, president and managing director of the Music Hall, journeys to Hollywood at regular intervals to check on productions in work, or planned, which promise to measure up to Music Halll standards when completed. In addition, he spends many hours with his associates in the two screening rooms within the Music Hall,,| viewing pictures of many companies. Lavish stage productions are a basic part of the policy. The shows; are produced under the direction of Leon Leonidoff, senior producer, and Russell Markert, producer. They include such famed holiday pageants, repeated annually, as "The Nativity" at Christmas time, and "The Glory of Easter." The two, modernized and including innovations made over the years, have been repeated for 25 years. A more recent! production, a choral and instrumental version of "Kol Nidrei," has been presented for the past six years at the time of the Jewish high holiday period in the autumn. This also promises to become one of the traditional annual productions Another major part of the policy of entertainment of the highest standard is the group of 46 Music Hall Rockettes, whose precision dancing, devised by Markert and Emilia Sherman, associate director, has made them familiar not only to millions at home, but also has won them invitations to appear on some of the leading stages of Europe. The very finest in music is provided the theatre's patrons by the Music Hall Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Raymond Paige, while the Music Hall Corps de Ballet, a company of 40 ballerinas, frequently augmented by outstanding guest soloists, brings the classic art to the Music Hall's vast audiences. Margaret Sande is director of the ballet. Other important parts of the theatre's noted musical offerings are (Continued on page 14) Rockefeller Cente The Music Hall has made Radio City a civic, even a geographical fact to many people. It is, of course, a component of Rockefeller Center, that soaring, expanding galaxy of buildings occupying more than six blocks of midManhattan, a capital of commerce operated by Rockefeller Center, Inc., a city within a city. in John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Founder G. S. Eyssell President