The Moving picture world (May 1922)

182 MOVING PICTURE WORLD May 13, 1922 Selling the Picture to the^Public Cleaned Circus Money on "The Sheik's Wife" James F. Clancey, of Poli's Capitol Theatre, Hartford, is a showman. He knows that if he wants to get all the money there is in a town he must get out after it. He booked "The Sheik's Wife" for the first date in the East apart from the week at the Strand Theatre, New York, and he knew that he could pull in important money on the usual three-day run without half trying. But he was not content to do that. He knew that if he handled it right he could make several times as much, so he booked it for a week and then started in to see just what he could do. The Capitol has an unusually spacious lobby ; one of the largest in the country. When you realize that the cameraman had to get back some distance to take the general shot and add that distance to the part shown in the cut, you can realize what a whale of a lobby it is. Clancey was counting on using the lobby. He had three booths built on each side and turned it into an Arabian bazaar. Two weeks in advance he posed a tableau with a wax figure in one of the booths, and announced the coming of the Vitagraph production. The Sunday the show was booked to open, he brought in a troupe of fifteen Arab performers, including dancing girls, swordsmen, a great gun juggler, musicians and acrobats. Under the law, he could not open the theatre before evening, but the lobby was opened early and it was packed soon after the opening, for this was a real bazaar, with candy and prayer beads, lace, rugs and all sorts of things for sale. These were run by the women. The men circulated around and gave occasional exhibitions of their skill. Three times each day they went on the stage and did a prologue, using for a backing the drop used by Sphinx temple of the Mystic Shrine in its ceremonials. As soon as the prologue was over, they were back in the lobby, ballyhooing for the next show. The men went to and from their hotel in their Arabic dress, which added further to the advertising and on clear days three of the troupe went around town on horseback before the matinee, to help drive them in. Hundreds of people who came merely to see the free show in the lobby bought tickets for the production, and the cleanup was a new record for the house. It did not cost much, compared with the results, and the sales of the bazaar helped to offset the cost of the troupe. You may not have an Arab troupe handy, but you can fit up booths for some charitable organization or church society and get much the same result, with the added pull of local talent. Costumes are easily made, and you can sell your house to the rafters with very little advance work. Put All the Thrills on a Wichita Theatre Opening Lewis Mark Miller, of the new Miller Theatre, Wichita, Kans., was not going to let a few more dollars gum up his opening. He figured tliat if he did the opening in the proper style, it would help more than the money "saved" would amount to, so he went to an engraver and told him to go the limit. The result is that even the people who do not know were at least impressed, and the better class, who do know, felt that here was a house that would be run properly because the management knew the right thing. There were three pieces in the set. The first was the formal invitation which stated that "Mr. Miller requests that you contribute to the success of the formal opening by your presence on the evening of May first." A small card was to be used to gain admission, and a third card was sent to a limited number inviting them to a reception following the initial performance. All three pieces were printed from copper on plate-sunk paper and cards. They looked "right" because they were right and Mr. Miller will collect on his printing bills for months to come. If you do a thing, do it to the limit of your ability, and you will not lose on the e.xtra investment. A Vitagraph Release ONE OF THE MOST ELABORATE DISPLAYS EVER MADE ON A MOTION PICTURE PRODUCTION James F. Clancey, of Poli's Capitol Theatre, Hartford, knew he could get a big three-day business with "The Sheik's Wife," but he hnew he could get several times that by taking full advantage of the exploitation possibilities the picture affords, and he put in a troupe of Arabs to ballyhoo the lobby and work in the prologue, and he spent seven days in Golconda and got all the money in town.