Moving Picture World (Aug 1919)

THE MOVING PICTURE WORLD 657 August 2, 1919 MOVINGHCTIW WOJ&D Founded by J.P. Chalmers in 1907 • Entered at the General Post Office. New York City, as Second Class Matter Published Weekly by the CHALMERS PUBLISHING COMPANY 516 FIFTH AVENUE, AT 43D STREET, NEW YORK CITY (Telephone, Murray Hill, 1610, 1611, 1612, 1613.) J. P. Chalmers, Sr President J. F. Chalmers Vice-President and General Manager E. J. Chalmers ..Secretary and Treasurer James L. HofiF Assistant General Manager George Blaisdell Editor A. MacArthur, Jr Advertising Manager The office of the company Is the address of the officers. CHICAGO OFFICE— Suite 917-919 Schiller Building, 64 West Randolph St., Chicago, 111. Telephone, Central 5099. PACIFIC COAST OFFICE— 610-611 Wright and Callender Building, Los Angeles, Cal. Telephone, Broadway 4649. G. P. Harleman, Business Representative. SUBSCRIPTION RATES. United States, Cuba, Mexico, Hawaii, Porto Rico and Philippine Islands $3.00 per year Canada 3.50 per year Foreign Countries (Postpaid) 4.00 per year Changes of address should give both old and new adddresses in full and be clearly written. Two weeks' time should be allowed for change. ADVERTISING RATES. Classified Advertising — 3 cents a word for Help or Positions Wanted, minimum 50 cents ; 5 cents a word for all commercial ads., minimum $1. Display Advertising Rates made known on application. NOTE! — Address all correspondence, remittances and subscriptions to MOVING PICTURE WORLD, 516 Fifth Avenue, at Forty-third Street, New York, and not to individuals. CINE-MUNDIAL, the monthly Spanish edition of the Moving Picture World, is published at 516 Fifth Avenue by the Chalmers Publishing Company. It reaches the South American and Spanish-speaking market. Yearly subscription, $2. Advertising rates on application. Saturday, August 2, 1919 "The Power of the Screen" DON'T overlook that tale of the power of the screen which you will find somewhere in this issue. It was -written by one of the old warhorses, old but in no sense decrepit. Far from that. He is up to the minute, aggressive, will fight at the drop of the hat for exhibitors individually and collectively when any right is threatened, and knows the officials of his home town well enough to call them by their first names. And he possesses as well a sharp tongue and a ready wit. Here's one example : In the same large city where this exhibitor resides the city fathers had slipped over on the picture showmen an ordinance that would have taken out of the box office receipts something over $30,000 annually. Behind the movement were the churches. Our friend was as usual chosen as the spokesman for the exhibitors in an effort to have the obnoxious measure repealed — and it is no easy matter at any time to obtain a repeal. He secured from the exchanges a complete list of accumulated educationals, news weeklies and travel and kindred topics. The spokesman asked of the opposing ministers if they could match such an "array of silent lecturers appearing before hundreds of thousands of the people of the state nightly." One of his opponents explained that this kind of pictures were not accessible because they were all "worn out." The spokesman clinched the argument and incidentally the repeal of the law by calling attention to the fact that the exhibitors had worn them out and delivered their educational messages to thousands who never went to church. The exhibitor of whom we are writing asks if it is not possible to collate an array of releases similar to that which he found so effective and present it at Washington by a real pleader. "Are we ourselves forever to be merely referring incidentally to this redeeming feature of our business, when such a mass of educative and instructive stuff is being worn out weekly before the churches can get it?" he continues. "You will get nowhere by pleading from the dollar standpoint alone. We should take this angle in the tax fight, spring a big educational surprise, and supplement from the dollar standpoint, and we will win. Give the Congressman a chance to discriminate." President Black in Fighting Mood THE soft-spoken president of the Motion Picture Exhibitors of America is in fighting mood. Alfred S. Black's reply to the New York State exhibitors, printed on Page 645, bristles with defiance. While he admits the national body will not be financed and its organization perfected while controversies rage, he declares he will not remain passive under attack. The national president charges the New Yorkers with bad faith in their statement that they never had acknowledged jurisdiction. He deplores the agreement between the old League and the Trade Review and says it was the cause of the animosity shown to the League by other trade papers and the most direct means of the former League's failure. He says Mr. Blumenthal personally is now paying League expenses upon the chance that later he will be reimbursed. As to his personal relations toward the producers Mr. Black defies the New York organization to deny that while the present national executive was a member of the National Association of the Moving Picture Industry, he did not fight the producing interests whenever exhibitor problems in his opinion were getting unfair treatment and calls attention to the fact that he was active in precipitating the withdrawal of the League from the N. A. M. P. I. The whole communication gives a new insight into the character of the man at the head of the national organization. The moving picture business never is dull, but it looks as if the exhibitor branch of the industry in the coming weeks will supply its full quota of lively doings. "Every Cloud Has Its Silver Lining" SO after all, as was predicted, prohibition is playing into the .hands of the exhibitors of motion pictures. The lining of what many have looked upon as a cloud — and one considerably larger than a man's hand — is to the picture showman the added silver that flows into his cash drawer in the box office. Minneapolis and St. Paul have been heard from, in spite of the fact that prohibition as yet is but an infant industry. Already in Minneapolis four of the five theatres that represented the last of the "nickelodeons" — and what a disagreeable sound that word always has had — have gone the way of John Barleycorn. They are not out of business, but have progressed to the class of tencent admissions. It is well. Theatres of the Twin