Motion Picture Herald (Dec 1932 - Mar 1933)

February* 4, 1933 MOTION PICTURE HERALD 27 RKOand Orpheum Receiver Is Named BIG-AND NOT SO BIG Meeban Places '^State Fair" Among Season's Best; and Others Current Have Their Moments by LEO MEEHAN Hollywood Staff Correspondent (Continued from preceding page) "after deduction of substantial amortization on released pictures." Total current assets, as of November 30, 1932, were : $26,534,774, including cash in bank, $122,106 ; . subscriptions to debentures and stock, $3,240,165 ; notes due from affiliated companies, $23,157,960, and investments (securities, notes of and advances to associated and other companies), $52,032,941. Liabilities on November 30 were $4,749,833, and funded debt and other liabilities amounted to $14,722,549. Total reserves were $26,598,914, and total capital stock and surplus, $34,500,884. National gross receipts of RKO theatres on Monday were off 22.25 per cent, with operating expenses 29.70 per cent lower. Admission prices were down 11.95 per cent, and attendance was off 13.22. These figures are for the first three weeks of 1933, compared with the same period in 1932. The parent corporation is currently grossing about $17,000,000 a year, at which figure the books are reputed ^to balance. Representing Irving Trust Company is A. H. McCausland, who will supervise administration of both the RKO and the Orpheum receiverships. Mr. McCausland established headquarters Wednesday at Radio City. Col. William Donovan was appointed attorney for Irving Trust. Mr. Donovan, of the law firm of Donovan and Raichle, of 90 Broadway, represents the Broadway Twentieth Corporation, which has a receivership petition pending against Paramount. In the Orpheum petition, Harold Franklin said that RKO "is willing to surrender all Orpheum properties for the benefit of its creditors." Preceding the receivership action, RKO officials, headed by Martin Beck, had been conferring with Speyer and Company and with J. and W. Seligman and Company, with a view to determining what action might be taken in splitting up the RKO holdings in the Orpheum group. This plan is being held in abeyance pending action of the receivers. Westinghouse to Distribute Half Its RCA Stock Holding The Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company on February 20 will distribute to its preferred and common stockholders approximately half of the 2,842,950 shares of Radio Corporation of America common stock held by it, conforming to the terms of the consent decree issued by the United States district court at Wilmington, Del., on November 22. The distribution will be in the ratio of one-half share of Radio for each one share of Westinghouse preferred or common recorded on January 23. Decision of the stock dividend was decided at a special meeting of the board of directors held at Pittsburgh last week. Preferred stockholders have the option of receiving $3.50 in cash in exchange for the half share of Radio common. Milwaukee Film Board Elects Charles W. Trampe, Mid West Film Co., has been re-elected president of the Milwaukee Film Board of Trade. Arthur N. Schmitz, RKO, has been renamed vicepresident; Sam Shurman, MGM, secretarytreasurer, and Alfred Davis, Fox, sergeantat-arms. Ben Koenig has been renamed executive secretary and counsel. Count "State Fair" among the big ones of the season. It has everything, including the two most potent names on the Fox payroll, Janet Gaynor and Will Rogers. Figuring "Cavalcade" as the roast beef of the Fox program, "State Fair" is the mashed potatoes. No company has put out a pair of prettier ones this past production season. For once Will is an actor playing a role, not a personality playing himself. That doesn't mean he is not ideally cast, because the role might very well have been written exclusively for him. As an expert hog breeder, with nothing on his mind so much as winning the Hampshire championship, Will has a part right down his alley. He eats it up. The same may be said for Janet Gaynor in the role of his daughter, who goes to the State Fair and finds romance. Simple, girlish, wholesome — Janet fits into the picture like a new glove. So you might call it a perfect Will Rogers picture and a perfect Janet Gaynor picture combined into one, which it is. But it is more than that : it is the expert telling of a story that is bigger than either of these outstanding personalities, a human, lovable story about real people, about their little trials and triumphs, about their intimate thoughts and doings. Possibly you cannot imagine an incident of a farm woman's winning the State Fair prize for the best mincemeat and pickles being gripping drama and hilarious comedy, but it is just that in this picture. And Louise Dresser enacts magnificently what is by far the best characterization that has fallen to her lot in many moons. An All-Star Affair Just to make this an all-star affair, Fox has tossed in Sally Filers, Lew Ayres, Norman Foster and Frank Craven, which certainly gives the show one of the biggest name casts of the year, or any year. Incidentally, a big Hampshire boar named "Blue Boy" does one of the screen's classic animal performances. You've never seen anything funnier than the way the old boy comes out of his laziness when a prizewinning sow is brought into the pen next to him. It is a riot. Henry King's direction, and the work of the entire production staff, is splendid. Fox also previewed "Dangerously Yours" during the week. It presents Warner Baxter in a "Raffles" role, and as usual he performs with distinction. Good support, too, from Miriam Jordan, Herbert Mundin, Florence Roberts and several others. The story is not as good as it might be, getting somewhat wobbly in spots, but there are moments of strong drama and some sequences with effective comedy. The photography is unusually beautiful in the moonlight seascapes. "Blondie Johnson" will wow Joan Blondell's fans, and no doubt will make her a lot of new ones. By stirring up a lot of smart witticisms, injecting clever and un usual situations, Warners has succeeded in proving that gangster themes still can be entertaining. Here you have Blondell in a role of a feminine Al Capone, torn between being in love with a gangster pal, played by Chester Morris, and the business of plying her unique rackets for plenty of cash. The story is so developed, and initially planted, that you sympathize a lot with Joan even when she is relieving her victims of their money. It is a typical fast-moving Zanucktype picture, snappily directed by Ray Enright. Ten of the world's foremost authors are supposed to have concocted the plot of Paramount's "The Woman Accused," taken from a story currently serialized in Liberty magazine. The list includes Rupert Hughes, Vicki Baum, Zane Grey, Vina Delmar, Irvin Cobb, Gertrude Atherton, J. P. McEvoy, Ursula Parrott, Polen Banks, Sophie Kerr. This no doubt gives the production the greatest all-star writing cast ever presented, particularly when you add that of Bayard Veillier renowned plajrwright, as author of the screen play. Well, it is quite an idea, but it never will rank among the best works of any of the authors mentioned. It is just a fair murder melodrama, with some pretty improbable doings that might have been more interesting had some of the actors involved put a little more conviction into their performances. Nancy Carroll goes on a three-day cruise to nowhere with her lover, Cary Grant, immediately after killing an old flame, Louis Calhern, because he tried to force her to resume extra-marital relations with him after a lapse of six months. A friend of Calhern, John Halliday, follows her on board the ship, stages a mock trial in an effort to make her confess to the killing. The new boy friend, also a lawyer, defends her. For novelty, this trial scene is staged around a ship's swimming pool, with the judge in a bathing suit. Big Horsewhipping Scene Biggest scene in the picture is the horsewhipping of a gangster. Jack La Rue, by Cary Grant, to make him tell the truth. It evoked two big bursts of applause from the preview audience. We await with pleasurable anticipation the day when someone will hand this lad La Rue a real big part. Yes, Irving Pichel plays his one hundred and steenth district attorney. Just for variation, we'd like to see some one like Jack Oakie do a district attorney, or Jimmy Durante. J. G. Bachman's latest for RKO release is currently titled "A Successful Blunder." Good performances by Junior Durkin, who is featured, Arthur Vinton and Richard Carle, succeed under Irving Cumming's careful direction in overcoming the blunders of the story as well as could be expected. But the yarn is only mildly interesting. However, there is a lot in it that may please the youngsters and some of the family trade. Mrs. Wallace Reid, whom we have not seen for some time, also appears.