Motion Picture Herald (Oct-Dec 1956)

this week m ^Jdo((itwood ^Scene PRODUCTION ° . . . Started — 5 Columbia — Hellcats of the Navy (Morningside Prod.). Independent — The Beginning of the End (Am-Par Pic.); Valerie (Hal R. Makelim Prods.). 20th Century-Fox — The She Devil (Regal Films). United Artists — Mark of the Vampire (Gramercy Pics.). . . . Completed — 5 Allied Artists — Love in the Afternoon. Columbia — Garment Center. Paramount — The Tin Star. Universal-International — Joe Dakota (Color). Warner Bros. — Shoot-out at Medicine Bend. . . . Shooting — 27 Allied Artists — Attack of the Crab Monster (Roger Corman Prod.). Columbia — 3:10 To Yuma; The Brothers Rico (William Goetz Prod.); The Haunted; The Bridge on the River Kwai (Horizon-American); The Admirable Crichton (London Films); The Golden Virgin (Valiant Films). Independent — Johnny Trouble (Motion Pictures by Clarion); II Crido (Robert Alexander Prod.). Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer — Action of the Tiger (BlauMeyer Prods.); This Could be the Night; The Seventh Vow (CinemaScope); Gun Glory (CinemaScope, Metrocolor); Silk Stockings (CinemaScope, Metrocolor). Paramount — The Joker (VistaVision). RKO Radio — Escapade in Japan (Color). 20th Century-Fox — The River's Edge (CinemaScope, DeLuxe Color); Island in the Sun (Zanuck, CinemaScope, DeLuxe Color); Boy on a Dolphin (55mm, CinemaScope, Color); Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (CinemaScope, DeLuxe Color). United Artists — Last Gun in Durango (Peerless Prod.); The Sweet Smell of Success (Hecht-HillLancaster Prod.). Universal-International — The Man of a Thousand Foces (CinemaScope). Warner Bros. — The Pajama Game (WarnerColor); The Black Scorpion (Melford-Dietz); The Story of Mankind; Lafayette Escadrille. Christopher Awards to " Commandments " Makers The Christophers last week presented special awards to Cecil B. DeMille and five others who “are primarily responsible” for the production of Mr. DeMille’s “The Ten Commandments.” Mr. DeMille, Henry Wilcoxon, associate producer, and script writers Jesse L. Lasky, Jr., Aeneas MacKenzie, Jack Gariss and Fredric M. Frank were given the special citation “because of the picture’s unique significance in relating eternal truths to modern problems.” Coast Agencies Merge HOLLYWOOD: Famous Artists Corporation and the Jaffe Agency have merged into a single company to be known as Famous Artists Associates, it has been announced. Sam Jaffe will be president of the new organization, and Charles K. Feldman has been named chairman. HOLLYWOOD BUREAU Production of feature pictures maintained its level, at 32 in shooting stage, on the strength of five beginnings offset by five completions. Among the new undertakings of the week “Valerie” is a standout on several counts. It is the second feature to be produced by Hal R. Makelim, whose Makelim Plan was front-page exhibitor news for more than two years and will have an important place in the industry history of the mid-1950 period, and whose first feature, “The Peacemaker,” produced for Makelim Plan purposes, is currently in United Artists release. For his second production, also to be distributed by U.A., Mr. Makelim has selected a quite different subject and a much more exploitable cast. Sterling Hayden, Anita Ekberg and Anthony Steele are his top players, and Robert Fellows is co-producer. Gerd Oswald, directs. Special importance attaches to “The Beginning of the End,” the first production by Am-Par Pictures Corporation, the company set up by American Broadcasting-Paramount Theatres. Bert L. Gordon is producer-director of the picture, which has Peter Graves, Peggie Castle, Morris Ankrum and Richard Benedict in leading roles. Production is at Republic. Ronald Reagan, more active in television than in theatrical films recently, returns to the scene of his original acclaim in “Hellcats of the Navy,” a Morningside production for Columbia release, in which he’s to be seen with Nancy Davis, Arthur Franz, William Leslie and others. The producer is Charles Schneer, and the director is Nathan Juran. “Mark of the Vampire” is a Gramercy Pictures production for U.A. release, with John Deal, Ken Tobey, Herb Vigran and Dabbs Greer. Jules Levy and Arthur Gardner are the producers, Paul Landres the director. “The She Devil” is a Regal Films production, for 20th-Fox release, with Kurt Neumann as producer-director and with Mari Blanchard, Jack Kelly and John Dekker as principals. Charles Schnee to Launch Four Features at MGM HOLLYWOOD: Charles Schnee will launch four special top-budget features for MGM early next year for coming season releases. First on Mr. Schnee’s newlyrevised shooting schedule will be MGM’s long-projected prison melodrama, “House of Numbers,” starring Jack Palance in a dual role. Others planned are “The Company of Cowards,” set to roll in January; “Until They Sail,” to start in February, and “The Moment of Truth.” Clarion Starts First of 15 Films Planned “Johnny Trouble,” first film under the production banner of Motion Pictures by Clarion, a division of Clarion Enterprises, has gone into production at the Paramount Sunset Studio. Financed independently, the film is the first in a program of 15 productions to be turned out by the independent producing company set up three weeks ago by actor John Carroll. The film stars Ethel Barrymore and newcomers Stuart Whitman and Carolyn Jones. Producing and directing the comedy-drama is John H. Auer, who is also vice-president of the film. The film is based on a Ben Ames Williams story. Mr. Whitman is the first of a group of eight players to be signed to term contracts according to long-range plans which call for all of them to tour the country on behalf of the pictures in which they appear. Mr. Carroll’s plan is “to make the product that the man with a dollar to spend for a picture wants to see.” These are times, he feels, when the people who see the pictures and the people who make them benefit mutually from contact. Writers, producers and directors likewise will travel the country in the interests of exhibitors playing the product. Calls It Blunder Mr. Carroll gave it as his opinion that one of Hollywood’s gravest blunders to date has been its ignoring of exhibitor advice. He says, “The man with the dollar in his hand to pay for a picture is the man whose likes and dislikes count. Your Hollywood producer, with his mind on artistic awards and professional opinion, doesn’t get to know that man — but the exhibitor does. The exhibitor sees him come into the theatre, watches him as he watches the screen, and talks to him, or listens to him, as he leaves. Nobody is so well qualified as the exhibitor to know what the man with the dollar wants. The Carroll company states that it has not made or sought a distribution deal. With abundant funds on hand to proceed with, the company is in no hurry to talk terms with distributing companies. The 15 pictures on the company’s initial list of undertakings are to be made from properties acquired by actor Carroll in the course of 14 years at MGM and five at Republic. Mr. Carroll feels that the market for good -pictures was never brighter than today. \ MOTION PICTURE HERALD, DECEMBER 15, 1956 25