The Exhibitor (1965)

at 1632 Central Parkway. . . . Variety Tent Three had an installation dinner-dance Jan. 15 at Lookout House. . . . Tri-State Theatre Services is booking and buying for the following: Village Cinema, Erlanger, Ky., owned by Ben Cohen, Holiday Amusement Co.; the Palace and Super-52 Drive-In, both at Huntington, W. Va., for operators Jack and Ed Hyman, and the drive-in at Richmond, Ky., for owners Bud Hughes and Glen Peters. . . . E. C. Nagel Booking Services is booking and buying for the suburban Monte Vista for owner Elmer Shard. COLUMBUS, O. Glenn Woods, assistant manager of Loew’s Ohio, has enlisted in the U. S. Air Force and will leave early in February to take basic training at Lackland Air Force Base, near San Antonio. . . . Charles Van Fossen has returned to his post as assistant manager of the Grand Cinerama, following army serv¬ ice. . . . RKO Palace and Neth-Academy State will show Laurence Olivier’s “Othello” Feb. 2 and 3. . . . Charles Sugarman is open¬ ing the Doris Day feature, “Do Not Disturb,” Jan. 19 at Cinema East. . . . The Grand Cinerama will open “Battle of the Bulge” on Jan. 25. . . . “Th underball,” starting a second month at Loew’s Ohio, is the biggest boxoffice attraction in the near 38-year history of the theatre. It is running far ahead of “Goldfinger,” which played 15 weeks at the Ohio a year ago. . . . Danny Deeds, operator of the legitimate Hartman, is the only local show business personality to win a place in the list of 10 outstanding Columbus men of 1965, picked by the Columbus Citi¬ zen-Journal. Deeds was praised for his suc¬ cessful efforts to bring live shows back to the Hartman. DALLAS “Thunderball” has already set a new house record in its first week at the Majestic and is heading for a second week gross of near that high. The film broke the record which had been set last year by “Goldfinger,” also a James Bond thriller starring Sean Connery as British agent 007. . . . Maureen O’Hara, Juliet Mills, and Don Galloway will arrive in Dallas Feb. 3 for the premiere of the new film, “The Rare Breed,” opening at Cinema I at North Park on Feb. 4. James Stewart is also expected to attend the premiere activities but his visit has not been confirmed. The stars of the film are coming to Texas as a part of a four city world premiere of the film in the state. . . . MGM is sending the $250,000 wardrobe designed by Helen Rose for “Made in Paris” to Dallas on Feb. 4 for a fashion show. ... Walt Disney’s “That Dam Cat” is doing perhaps the best business any Walt Disney production has done in Dallas with the exception of “Mary Poppins.” ... A novel contest is to be conducted on WFAA-TV’s Ron Chapman “Away We Go Show.” It is a search for a Phylis Diller “look-alike.” Con¬ testants are asked to send in photographs to be judged. The five finalists will meet with Miss Diller on Feb. 23 when she comes here for a personal appearance and when the final selection will be made by Miss Diller. The winner will win a trip to Hollywood, where she will be guest of the comedienne during her night club act, besides making a tour of Hollywood and the film studios. ... It appears that the proposed roadshow engagement of “The Agony and the Ecstasy” at the Tower will have an indefinite delay due to the out¬ standing attendance at the current attraction, “The Great Race,” now in its 13th week. Forrest Thompson, manager of the Tower, revealed that there would be a two day break in the run of “The Great Race” to present four performances on Feb. 2 and 3 of “Othello,” starring Laurence Olivier, in the Warner Bros, film presentation of the Shake¬ speare tragedy. . . . “The Sound of Music” is now in its 42nd week at the Inwood, and the end of its road show engagement is no where in sight. . . . Virgil Miers, Dallas Times Herald, has named the 10 best films of Dallas of 1965, not in order but listed as they arrived in the city. Miers list includes “The Sound of Music,” “Zorba, the Greek,” “The Collector,” “Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines,” “Darling,” “The Pawnbroker,” “Ship of Fools,” “The Tenth Victim,” “The Spy Who Came In From the Cold,” and “That Darn Cat.” Most of the films were shown at the Fine Arts. Miers also listed eight run¬ ners-up, and they included “Seance on a Wet Afternoon,” “The Rounders,” “Young Cas¬ sidy,” “Women of the Dunes,” “The Ipcress File,” “King Rat,” “Thunderball,” and “The Hill.” ... A marathon presentation of “An Evening with Batman and Robin” has been booked for the Festival to open on Feb. 16. DENVER The area’s newest theatre, the Continental, is scheduled to open Jan. 26 with a benefit performance for the Metropolitan Association for Retarded Children. Film will be “The Agony and the Ecstacy,” Reserved seat policy with prices ranging from $1.65 week day matinees to $2.50 Friday and Saturday nites will be in effect for the regular per¬ formances starting Jan. 28. . . . Several prominent stars are expected to be on hand for Rocky Mountain-Midwest Show-A-Rama in Denver March 1-3. Charlton Heston, AnnMargret, Dick Van Dyke, Red Buttons, and Honor Blackman are the present announced visitors from Hollywood. . . . The Pastime, Pinebluff, Wyo., has closed. Mrs. Orlene Mills was manager. . . . J. Earle Peterson, who has been with United Artists for the past 15 years, is going to be associated with American International Pictures local office. . . . Sec¬ ond place in the Pueblo, Colo., Christmas lighting contest was won by exhibitor Mitchell Kelloff of the Uptown. DES MOINES Des Moines will get its first new indoor theatre in 26 years when the new Plaza is opened by Tri-States Theatre Corporation. The new 810-seater will open in the Merle Hay Plaza shopping center, located in north¬ west Des Moines. At the same time, Tri-States will be closing its Des Moines theatre at 517 Grand avenue in the loop area. . . . The Des Moines theatre is one of the city’s oldest — a 1,600 seat house built in 1918. The action by Tri-States, which is necessary under a court order limiting the circuit theatres, will leave only two theatres in the loop area. Manager of the new Plaza theatre will be Paul Hollemback, who has been managing the Des Moines theatre. . . . Dwight Hanson, owner of theatres at Rockwell City, la., has purchased the Sac, Sac City, from the Arrow Theatre Corp. and plans to remodel the house. The Lux, Massena, la., has closed until spring. DETROIT In view of what is happening elsewhere, the Detroit account of “Thunderball” is monotonous. However monotonous, it’s mighty sweet music to the ears of the operators of nine theatres where that bottled-in Bond is cavorting. Eight of the nine have broken all first week house records. The reason the downtown Palms didn’t do as the others may be found in a single entry in a yellowing ledger dated 1943. That was when the long held back, controversial “The Outlaw” pre¬ sented Jane Russell and her conical metal bras. What with the legs on which “Thunderball” is running, the total for the entire engagement may well top “Outlaw.” To get on with the monotony: “Goldfinger” scored $95,000 in four houses first week; “Thunderball” $244,000 in nine. The second week added $233,000. Lucky establishments involved in this donnybrook of dollars are the Calvin, Gateway, Macomb, Mercury, Palms, Terrace, Universal City, Woods, and WyandotteAnnex. . . . Film stars Gregory Peck and Elizabeth Ashley appeared in Edward Albee’s “Tiny Alice,” sponsored by the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich., for The Ameri¬ can Conservatory Theatre. In town with them was also Roger L. Stevens, head of the National Culture Center recently estab¬ lished by the Congress. The actor and actress, members of the Council’s board of directors, and Stevens also participated in a seminar on the National Council on Arts at Lydia Mendelsohn Theatre on campus. HOUSTON Virgil Fruth was presented with a $100 cash award for guessing the temperature within .016 of a degree at 12 noon Christmas Day in front of the Majestic. The contest was conducted in conjunction with the show¬ ing of “The Spy Who Came In From the Cold” and sponsored by Interstate Theatres and the Houston Post. Ross Vallone, Majestic manager, checked the temperature and placed it in a sealed envelope for opening by the contest judges. Sawyer J. Fowler, Jr., and O. J. O’Neil tied for second place and received 10 tickets each, and 96 others were presented with tickets to see the film which is now in its third week. . . . Charlton Heston is scheduled to pay a visit to Houston and visit with Ginny Pace, KPRC-TV, star of her own show. . . . Gina Lollobrigida may pay a visit to this city in February. . . . Hollywood singer Gordon MacRae is scheduled to make a personal ap¬ pearance for two weeks starting Jan. 27 at the Cork Club. . . . “The Sound of Music,” which has been at the Alabama since May, 1965, went into its 43rd week, becoming the longest running film in Houston thea¬ tre history. The old record of 42 weeks even was set by “My Fair Lady” yast year at the Tower. . . . Two of the three theatres playing “My Fair Lady” in its return engage¬ ment since it left the Tower last summer re¬ ported surprisingly poor business. The film opened at the Gaylynn, Village, and Garden Oaks, which dropped the film after the first week. The Village ended its run at the second week, and the film continues its run at the Gaylynn, being shown in the original 70mm version in stereophonic sound. . . . Loew’s State is breaking records daily with four abreast lines waiting to see “Thunderball,” starring James Bond as agent 007. ... Jeff Millar has selected his 10 best films of 1965 and these are listed alphabetically. They in¬ clude “Cat Ballou,” “Darling,” “King Rat,” “The Knack,” “Nothing But A Man,” “The Pawnbroker,” “Repulsion,” “Seance On A Wet Afternoon,” “The Sound of Music,” and “The Spy Who Came In From The Cold.” The Houston Chronicle motion picture writer be¬ lieves that 1966 will be a better year filmwise 16 MOTION PICTURE EXHIBITOR January 26, 1966