Our Town (United Artists) (1940)

SELL "OUR TOWN" APPEAL FROM THEATRE FRONT Get the familiar and lovable "Our Town" people—the typical small town folks Whom your picture is destined to make famous—on your marquee with a display that will send across the human richness and warmth of your story. Use blowups of the stills, colored and mounted on heavy cardboard or compo board, for your marquee display of charac¬ ter heads, a background with art representing the small town locale which you can get from the poster paper or have your house artist design. The heads shown here are taken from the following stills: Fay Bainter—52; Stuart Erwin—SE1; Frank Craven—84; Beaulah Bondi— S42; Guy Kibbee—S42; Thomas Mitchell—S59; Martha Scott—S93; William Holden—S93. Set your background of houses and trees on a recessed plane behind the gallery of heads; and use dramatic still blowups for your lobby portals and walls. Those shown here are, left to right, Nos. 63, 35 and SI 00. Show them a gallery of "Our Town" folks, with brief descriptive captions, in a lobby collection of enlarged stills, preferably lined up along one wall and framed in row. There's sock interest for every fan in this lineup of typical American small town personalities, the counterpart of which everyone has known at some time or other. Here are your captions: William Holden, as George Webb, typical schoolboy of Our Town; Fay Bainter as Mrs. Gibbs; Thomas Mitchell as Dr. Gibbs; Beulah Bondi as Mrs. Webb, wife of Our Town's editor; Guy Kibbee as Editor Webb; Frank Craven as the Druggist; Martha Scott as Emily Webb. WILLIAM HOLDEN FAY BAINTER THOMAS MITCHELL BEULAH BONDI GUY KIBBEE FRANK CRAVEN MARTHA SCOTT as George Webb as Mrs. Gibbs as Dr. Gibbs as Mrs. Webb as Editor Webb as The Druggist as Emily Webb THE FAMOUS CHARACTERS OF A GREAT PRIZE-WINNING PLAY COME TO THE SCREEN IN A GREAT PICTURE HOW DO VISITORS LIKE OUR TOWN? For a running newspaper feature of excep¬ tional interest, which ties in smoothly with your show theme and title, get the local In¬ quiring Photographer to visit the hotels daily and ask visitors how they like the town. Fea¬ ture should appear under a standing head such as "What They Think of Our Town." Questions should draw out visitors' opin¬ ions on town personalities and places, and compare them with types portrayed in the picture. For example, does the town druggist fulfill their idea of the typical American drug store proprietor? and so on. For added inter¬ est, one of the town types, such as the drug¬ gist, editor, milkman, etc., might be per¬ suaded to accompany the reporter and conduct the interview. PROMOTE THROUGH BOOKSHOPS The published book of "Our Town" has sold more copies of any play in recent times. Thornton Wilder's other books, includ¬ ing the famous prize-winning "Bridge of San Luis Rey," "Heaven's My Destination," "The Cabala" and "The Woman of Andros," also have had wide sales and great critical acclaim. Get the good local bookstores to feature window displays of Wilder's works, centered around copies of "Our Town" and stills from the picture, with theatre credit. You should also contact every public library in town to see that their display space is devoted to Wilder and "Our Town." Thorough attention to book¬ store and library promotion means important extra profits on your run, since the name of Thornton Wilder is one of the most universally known in America. Follow through by planting re¬ views of the picture which refer to the book in book windows, and by using the new edition of "Our Town" for special lobby promotions, prizes, etc. FILM FANS—CHOOSE LOCAL CAST FOR "OUR TOWN" "CASTING CONTEST'' PLANT SELLS OUR TOWN TYPES For a newspaper contest that will focus widespread interest on the "Our Town" characters, plant the mat shown at the right and invite readers to be their own casting directors for "Our |"own." Here are the typical doctor, the editor and their wives, ■he druggist, the organist, the typical schoolgirl and schoolboy, fe tc. Who are their counterparts in town—people whom readers [would select to play the roles if they were casting the picture? It's a contest that promises great fun for the locals, and is calculated to keep their minds on "Our Town." You can run it as a one-shot or, by using individual stills daily, spread it over a period of several days. Three-column mat shown here is No. 16C—45c; Cut—75c. Prizes For "Our Town” Tintypes Through the medium of your lobby or in your co-operating newspaper, run a contest inviting fans to rummage among their household treasures and get out the old family tintypes to see who can offer the best old-time family pictures of Our Town people of a generation ago. Publish the best entries or display them in your lobby, and award a small cash prize or a few pairs of guest tickets for the best example of Our Town tintypes of a bygone period. Your /publicity on this stunt, of course, should be tied in with descrip- | tions and stills of the typical Americans of the past generation as seen in "Our Town." It's a promotion that will hit right to the softest spot in the hearts of the locals, with sure-fire box- office reaction when you open "Our Town." Here are the typical Americans of “Our Town” as Professor Sol Lesser has cast them from among Hollywood’s famous players for the screen production of Thornton Wilder’s Pulitzer prize-winning play. Reading from top left down, they are: Stuart Erwin as Howie Newsome, the milkman; Fay Bainter as Mrs. Gibbs, the doctor’s wife; Thomas Mitchell as Dr. Gibbs; Ruth Toby as Rebecca Gibbs; Douglas Gardiner as Wally Webb; Martha Scott as Emily Webb; William Holden as George Gibbs; Guy Kibbee as Editor Webb; Beulah Bondi as Mrs. Webb. Page Seven