Motion Picture Herald (Jan-Mar 1956)

FOR FAST RELIEF... Replace worn seats! . V % Give your patrons fast relief from worn, uncomfortable seats and watch your attendance go up, up, UP! We are specialists in theatre seating. We’ll make recommendations within your budget . . . give a low, low, estimate, do the work while your show proceeds. Just shoot through your inquiry . . . leave the rest to us! seruite co. WRITE. WIRE or PHONE ALPINE 5-8459 MANUFACTURERS Foam Rubber & Spring Cushions, hack and seat ( overs. DISTRIBUTORS Upholstery fabrics and general seating supplies. 160 Hermitage Avenue Nashville, Tennessee tljVE^CREEjij LuJ 1674 SUMMIT LAKE BLVD.. AKRON, O. Orlglnaton of All-Plaitle & Seamle«« Pla»tie S«re»ai bring about recognition and encouragement of youngsters for whom theatre patrons vote. It would be unfair to these youngsters, however, to expect them to carry a feature picture merely because they have won such notice from the public. Rather than building them up, that could have the very unfortunate effect of killing them off prematurely. GLAMORIZING PLAYERS To be a motion picture star is to enjoy certain very special advantages of fame and fortune, and you pay a price for them. You lose privacy. What you do or say is grist for the mills of public communication. Many people wouldn’t like to lose their privilege of privacy. \ ou make your choice. Publicity — the good kind — is of course proteins and vitamins for this business of ours. \Vhere has gone the star idolatry of yesteryear? Exhibition misses it. It traded on it for several generations. The glamor of it all ! Some of the gloss given the movie stars brushed off on the little theatre in Tanktown. Leading players were huilt up as real-life personalities. In various proportions, it w'as malarkey, but the public doesn’t mind a bit of romancing for sake of its cherished illusions. Could be the public misses the old glamor of the movie w'orld just as much as theatre exhibitors find they do. Another price which the principal players should expect to pay for their eminence is personal appearances. These can go far to restore the lively personal interest of the public in the medium as well as its theatre. Personal appearances are tiring, naturally. Fatigue is known in the work-aday world, too. The fruits of personal appearances would seem to be worth the brief strain on the nervous system, in build-up both for the current attraction and for the star name itself. Newspapers and radio and television stations usually go all-out on local visits of a screen star. And that has yet another happy effect : it helps to win around those organs of publicity to the point of view of theatre management. SHOWMANSHIP TIMING One of the most familiar complaints among theatre owners and managers is that publicity for a feature picture gets under way when no press material and accessories are available concurrent with release of the picture. It is difficult to understand that a production should be released prior to proper makeup of press books, advertising accessories and national tieups. A mere exhibitor might think that the producer himself would be interested in such preparation. Into the preparation of this material should also go some fresh thinking. Attraction advertising has become so stereotyped that while it may conspicuously identify the studio, the copy should apply to a hundred pictures. Perhaps one way to get rid of this monotony is to employ outside consultants. Their ideas might not be superior as to art and form, but their point of view might be different from those who have been considering film merchandising for a long time from within the business. They would not approach the sales values of the production hidebound by company “policy.” The individual production, rather than the producer or studio, would probably be regarded as the thing to sell, and that point of view would most certainly represent progress. Another aspect of attraction advertising which needs reconsideration is the number of credits which must appear in newspaper copy. Theatre people know about those contractual stipulations of names to go into billing, in what order and what relative size of type, but they naturally measure the need of this in the light of newspaper space rates. A mere exhibitor is therefore likely to think that if a name doesn’t sell tickets, it shouldn’t be in the ad. Give all those solely “legalistic” credits on lithograph paper, but don’t clutter up the theatre’s space in newspapers, where every line must count. PUBLIC RELATIONS These are some of the areas of the business which deserve renewed and energetic attention after three years of preoccupation with “new techniques.” Better technical methods should be pursued, but it is time, we submit, to put them in their place as manufacturing machinery, not the merchandise itself. And in addition to the merchandising of each production for what it is in story and cast, there is an industry-wide task of public relations that cries for more thought and energy than it has ever before received. It is logical to consider Compo as the agency to direct such a program. In it the industry has at last a ready-made instrument for the purpose. Some faltering steps have already been taken along these lines. The recent action of Leonard Goldenson, president of AB-Paramount Theatres, in suggesting that Compo develop an appeal for the patronage of women, was a more substantial move in this very' important direction. Such thinking about public relations, emphasis on picture content with realistic appraisal of popular interests, development and exploitation of screen personalities in the old-time fan-producing manner — these now reclaim their due share of the energy' of the business. In 1956 let’s give the theatre Glamorscope! 16 MOTION PICTURE HERALD. JANUARY 7. 1956