The Moving Picture World (Apr-Jun 1913)

THE MOVING PICTURE WORLD 255 THB PIL-M INDEX EXHIBITORS eUTDE J. P. Chalmers, Founder. Published Weekly by the CHALMERS PUBLISHING COMPANY 17 MADISON AVENUE, NEW YORK CITY. (Telephone, 3510 Madison Square.) J. P. Chalmers, Sr President E. J. Chalmers Secretary and Treasurer John Wylie Vice-President and General Manager The office of the company is the address of the officers. Western Office — 169 West Washington Street (Post Building), Chicago, 111. Telephone, Main 3145. SUBSCRIPTION RATES. United States, Mexico, Hawaii, Porto Rico and Philippine Islands $3.00 per year Canada 3.50 per year Foreign Countries (postpaid) 4.00 per year ADVERTISING RATES. Display Advertising Rates made known on application. Classified Advertising — no display — three cents per word; minimum charge, 50c. NOTE.— Address all correspondence, remittances and subscriptions to Moving Picture World, P. O. Box 226, Madison Square Station, New York, and not tb individuals. The Index for this issue will be found on page 318. Entered at the General Post Office. New York City, as Second Class Matter. Saturday, April 19, 1913 Facts and Comments WE have never joined in the prejudice with which theatrical journals seem to regard all new-comers in their field. Such prejudice is probably born of conceit and egotism. Experience has shown time and again that men on the borderland of middle age have done great things in the theatrical . field without much previous theatrical experience. The same holds good of the motion picture. Both the art of producing and the profession of exhibiting may be learned by anybody with the proper talents in him. Some practical experience, however, is indispensable. We have seen grocers, plumbers, tailors and business men generally go into the motion picture industry and be fairly successful. They were always willing to learn, and thus there was no trouble about laying a foundation. We would advise such entrants into the moving picture field to leave the details of practical management to trained men, and not interfere in the beginning of their new enterprise. It is unfortunately riot rare that these inexperienced men hamper capable managers with their crude notions. But recently a case was pointed out to the writer, in which the owner of a place who had amassed a fortune in the hotel busi ness paid a manager a salary, but gave him no power whatever, substituting his own new-born ideas for the ripened judgment of the experienced man. The science of conducting a motion picture theater is not revealed to mortals in a dream, but has to be learned like everything else in this plug-away world. A MOST interesting conversation took place the other day in the editorial sanctum of a great New York daily newspaper. It related to an experiment made by that same paper. The experiment was the introduction of a weekly moving picture supplement. The editor had been in fear lest his "high class readers" resent such an innovation. "To my surprise," he. said to his friend, "all our readers commended our step and urged us to keep it up. Our circulation jumped noticeably. I see motion pictures in a new light now, and realize as I never did before their widespread popularity." No one is gladder of this publicity for the motion picture than we are. Though their influence is confined to narrow limits compared to the national scope of The Moving Picture World, much good may reasonably be expected from the attention the motion picture is receiving from the daily press. They create and stimulate interest in kinematography, and thus help both producer and exhibitor. As a rule these local publications do not even pretend to reach the exhibitor ; they utterly lack the equipment, the experience and the connection to be of practical value to the exhibitor and the advertiser, to whom nothing can replace the real organ of the industry covering a field perhaps twenty times larger than the zone of the newspaper which is printed exclusively for the benefit of the general public. THE telephone girls of Boston have protested through the press against being shown in motion pictures in the act of constantly chewing gum. This may seem funny to persons who find it easier to laugh than to think, but we believe that these girls have a just cause of complaint. It is a very cheap sort of wit to which they are subjected. Naturally they like to be well thought of, and they like to keep their self-respect. Civilization could not live through one day without their help. Acts of heroism in times of distress and emergency are often credited to telephone girls, as witness the recent disasters in the Middle West. These clownish jokes do not look well on the screen. KIXEMAPHOBIA— an unreasoning hostility to the motion picture — seems to have reached its highest mark in the city of Pittsburg. The exhibitors in the smoky town, animated by a proper spirit of helpfulness, had proposed to give special performances on a Sunday, intending to devote the entire proceeds to the relief fund for the victims of the recent floods. Both the human and the divine law recognize that it is lawful to do good on the "Sabbath," but the Pittsburg ministers did not read the gospel that way. The supposed desecration of the "Sabbath" outweighed in their minds any possible good that might come out of these performances. Unanimously they protested against the Sunday exhibition, .charity or no charity. The exhibitors, however, refused to be intimidated. Sunday exhibitions were held and the police did not dare to molest them. The world is still running on at much the same gait, in spite of the ravings of these antediluvian fanatics.