The Exhibitor (1955)

16 MOTION PICTURE EXHIBITOR UNIT gross of $116.66. The former should reflect a ten-unit week of $2,333.33, while the latter should reflect a ten-unit week of $1,166.66. The PLAYING TIME UNIT can prob¬ ably be considered as the heart of the SLIDING SCALE method, pust as it is probably the most important single aid to the analyzing of any percentage engage¬ ment. To prove that it is currently ac¬ cepted by producer-distributors in evalu¬ ating any playdate, we again refer the reader to the final lines on Paramount’s We have devoted so much space to AL¬ LOWABLE OVERHEAD and to PLAY¬ ING TIME UNITS because both are key points in the SLIDING SCALE Method of arriving at a Fair Film Pricing Formula. A thorough knowledge of what they are, and how they operate is important. Explained simply, the SLIDING SCALE Method of arriving at a Fair Film Pricing Formula is nothing more or less than an unfixed price that moves up and down in direct relationship to the grossing ability of a particular picture at a particular boxoffice; and without any influence from what the same picture did at any other boxoffice. Under it, the negotiations be¬ tween buyer and seller should concern themselves completely with the estab¬ lishment of the scale or “slide” that will price their future business “partnership”; but they can’t concern themselves with specific prices becaiise each picture is going to price itself with its own specific earnings. The picture that draws a large partonage and earns a big gross is going to get a top price. The picture that “falls on its face” and draws a small patronage, with a resultant loss to everybody con¬ cerned, is going to get a bottom price. No extraneous outside influences, such as a scanty of playable film, competition with neighboring theatres, opposition to a theatre circuit able to crack the whip, or an “eager beaver” exchange employe try¬ ing to impress his boss with his ruthless ness, can convert a fairly set up SLIDING SCALE into a “squeeze” that can gradu¬ ally drain away all capital resources from long established theatres and force their closing, to the detriment of their owners and of the patrons they served. But higher and higher percentage demands, such as straight 50%-and-no-review (or, “we want 50c right from the first buck, and we don’t even care if you don’t recoup your overhead”), and 90-10% after-overhead-with-the-advertising “off the top” (or, “we want 10% of the advertising out of your 10c”), are very often based today on nothing more intrinsic than just such extraneous outside influences. Under SLIDING SCALE, fairly established and fairly operated, features are priced ex¬ actly at what they earn, no more, and no less! And no extraneous outside influence, such as “controlled situations,” “gentle¬ men’s agreements” among competitive theatres, membership in a theatre circuit able to crack the whip, or a “buddie,” either social or financial, among exchange employes, (while none of these are very common after so many years of a “sellers” market), can enable a theatre to pay too little under a fairly set up SLIDING SCALE. We again repeat, under SLID¬ ING SCALE, fairly established and fairly operated, features are priced exactly at what they earn, no more, and no less! Expense Voucher on “THE DEPERATE HOURS” that was mentioned earlier and to a similar United Artists voucher on “NOT AS A STRANGER.” A direct quo¬ tation is as follows: “The weekly operat¬ ing expenses shall he jairly prorated m the usual manner in computing license fees for fractions of a week, i. e. on the basis of — for Saturday, for Sunday and — for each other day.” It should not be necessary to further justify the usefulness and rightness of PLAYING TIME UNITS in this business. To be completely fair to both “partners” SLIDING SCALE should have no top and no bottom to the “slide.” In other words, it should be possible for the producerdistributor to move all the way up if his picture can make it, but it should also be possible to move all the way down if it fails to even recoup the overhead. How¬ ever, theatremen long ago, and even be¬ fore the current “sellers” market, con¬ cluded that all features capable of carry¬ ing a show and therefore worth playing at percentage were worth at least 20% (in some territories as low as 15%). And so few features, in any period of years, ever get into the really top income gross, that the normal SLIDING SCALE con¬ cerns itself only with the “slide” between 20% and 50%, with the latter acting as a “split figure” over which all gross is divided 50-50. Men make motion pictures, and all men are only mortals who can make mistakes. The top producers in Hollywood, or any¬ where else, are those who, over a period of years, have made the least “mistakes.” And by “mistakes” we mean either dull, unimaginative, badly directed, badly acted, or badly conceived features, that have the one thing in common that the paying patron doesn’t want to see them. When these “mistakes” come along, producers and distributors seem to be in agreement that theatremen should pay for them, even if the paying patrons won’t. To a certain extent, it was the dumping of a number of such “mistakes,” produced during the War years, but held up for cutting and re-editing, that put this busi¬ ness into a tail spin in 1947. We don’t think anyone ever starts out to make such pictures, but they are a by¬ product or production and when they turn up they should be paid for by pro¬ duction and not by the theatre side that had nothing to do with their existence, and is not considered to have any esthetic taste. SLIDING SCALE, keyed to the patron dollars only, rather than to pro¬ duction costs, star salaries, or whether the director is married to somebody’s sister, is the great equalizer of production mistakes. It can help the top producer, who makes few “mistakes,” and turns out a high percentage of boxoffice pictures, to be even bigger than he is today. And it can expose the inept or incompetent by subjecting his “mistakes” to the full spot¬ light of the public’s ticket buying, withoutcushioning the blow by having the¬ atres dig into their reserves in order to minimize production loss. Under today’s production system, with top producers, directors, authors and stars participating on a percentage basis in the profits from their pictures, this latter point should make SLIDING SCALE selling formulas attractive to production. One great advantage of SLIDING SCALE is I that each picture must stand on its own I feet. A film salesman can’t ask a theatre } to overpay on some “turkey” in order to i make its National Gross look good, and f adjust the loss against a flat buy of some honest picture that is worth more. Under SLIDING SCALE selling formulas an honest picture must get an honest return < for all of its owners from its honest gross. Another desirable attribute of SLID ^ ING SCALE selling formulas, is their v adaptability to peaceful arbitration of differences by men who know the vagaries of this very unique business, rather than ; litigation directed by lawyers who know very little about it, before judges who seem to know even less. Should there ; be some point dealing with ALLOWABLE OVERHEAD, distribution of the 10 weekly PLAYING TIME UNITS, CLEARANCE, etc., it will apply to that one theatre, and all of its dealings for a year or more, so that any time given to the resolving of the differences will be of a semi-perma¬ nent nature and worth the effort. There can be no differences of opinion having any relation to price, and there can be no need for seeking “adjustments,” hat-in¬ hand or otherwise, for each picture prices itself, and to the percentage point fixes its own financial success or failure. / If the constant haggling over price, with J the distributor overpricing and creating i new and tougher sales policies and de 1 mands with each new picture, and with j the theatreman retaliating with every ^ dodge and device at his command, can be ( eliminated from this business, at least • from that big segment that follows the 3,500 or 4,000 key runs, there would seem ; to be a very real chance for a more peace 1 ful business, and the time for a very real j effort by all to exploit and sell a greater 1 share of the public than is now regularly partonizing motion pictures. The average ! theatreman today spends so much time fighting film salesmen, and ferreting out j the “gimmicks” in ever changing but al * ways tough sales policies, that he has little ' time for the promotional work and indi¬ vidual picture exploitation, that would • increase film revenues by increasing the national gross that the public spends. Peace would give him this time, and would result in a healthier business. ^ SLIDING SCALE selling formulas ' would also have a particular attraction j for the operators of the nation’s 4,400 drive-in theatres. By their very roofless nature such theatres are subject to all ; adverse weather conditions such as | thunder and lightning, heavy rains, sleet, snow, etc. They also have only a limited ’ peak season so that the loss of only a few ^ summer nights can mean the difference between an entire season’s profit or loss, Heavy rains ruining attendance on a night i when an important high percentage pic i ture is being shown on straight percent i' : age could force an owner to dig into his f i own pocket to defray the loss. Under « , SLIDING SCALE selling formulas lack of i paying patrons, for any reason, would re | fleet itself in the eventual film price. : We repeat: You will never “steal” a pic | i ture under SLIDING SCALE; but you | will never get “hurt” either! ^ } TO BE CONTINUED The concluding section of this Survey will appear in the next issue, Nov. 16. It will deal in great detail with three differ¬ ent SLIDING SCALES, and with the way to construct them for ANY theatre, ^ Theory and Objective of SLIDING SCALE . . . Adaptability to Arbitration