Showmen's Trade Review (Apr-Jun 1939)

May 27. SHOWMEN'S TRAD]': \< V. V I !•. W Page 35 Paramount Head and Protegee Y. Frank Freeman, vice president in charge of Paramount Studio, listens to his three-year old protegee, Carolyn Lee on the set of "The Cat and the Canary" zvhile Paulette Goddard looks on. Miss Lee zvill play a leading role in support of Fred MacMurray and Madeleine Carroll in "Are Husbands Necessary f" Newcomer Wins Film Contract On Basis of Her First Role Nanette Fabares, 18-year-old graduate of Hollywood High School and the Max Reinhardt School of Acting, has been signed to a long term Warner Bros, contract on the basis of her debut role in "Give Me A Child". Her next assignment is one of the Virgin Queen's maids-in-waiting in the Bette DavisErrol Flynn co-starrer, "Lady and the Knight," now in production at the Burbank studio. Miss Fabares will follow that role with one in "On Your Toes", in which Zorina and Eddie Albert will play the leads. She has been a dancer since the age of three and will have a terpsichorean part in the latter. Stanwyck Re-Lives Early Career Barbara Stanwyck, playing in Columbia's "Golden Boy", is back where she started years ago, at 48th Street and Broadway, but this time it's on a motion picture sound stage in Hollywood, in settings evoking vividly the early haunts of her career. Most of the Clifford Odets stage success, now before the cameras under Rouben Mamoulian's direction, is laid in that amazing canyon known as Broadway. Farrow to Direct Own Story Recognized as one of the outstanding biographies of recent years, "Father Damien", written by John Farrow, has been purchased by RKO and will be brought to the screen under Farrow's direction. John Twist will write the screenplay and Robert Sisk will produce. Farrow's option was recently taken up by the studio, after the showing of his latest picture, "Five Came Back". Vaude Headliners in "Babes" Thirteen former vaudeville headliners turned back the clock at MGM, when they appeared as themselves in "Babes in x\rms", the AIickey Rooney-Judy Garland co-starrer directed by Busby Berkeley. Sequences show the days when vaudeville was at its peak with Irene Franklin, Harry Fox, Joe Caetes, Margaret Young, Patsy Moran, Neely Edwards, Pat West, George McKay, Kay DeLys, Lil.-v Tyler, Rube Demarest, Henry Rochmore and LiLA Bliss. '^^iffl National Distribution Deal Set for All-Negro Features Hollywood — A national distribution deal has been closed by Harry M. Popkin, president of Million Dollar Productions, and AlERKP M. Sack, president and general manager, of Sack Amusement Company, of Dallas, Texas. Deal calls for the Sack company, with exchanges in Dallas, Atlanta and Chicago, to take over distribution of the allNegro features produced by Million Dollar Productions. Two additional exchanges will be added, one in New York and one in Los Angeles. The five distribution centers will give the company complete coverage for the eight features on the 1938-39 program, five of which are already completed, and the eight scheduled for 1939-40. "A Dark Night," sixth on the 1938-39 schedule, goes into production on June 8. Leo C. Popkin continues as general production manager and director of the series. Lester J. Sack will be in charge of the New York exchange, and John J. Jenkins, at present manager of Popkin's Atlanta office, was promoted to home office representative. Star and Director Pose Betzveen scenes of "Golden Boy" in zvhich Barbara Stanwyck is starring, she visits the set of "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" which Frank Capra is producing. Both are Columbia pictures. Barbara got her start zvith Capr.\ several years ago. Bromfield Reports at 20th-Fox For Work on "Brigham Young" Louis Bromfield, famed writer of best-selling novels, arrived in Hollywood last week after an exhaustive study of the Mormon Church, prior to taking the writing assignment at 20th Century-Fox on the film story of "Brigham Young". Immediately following his arrival, the noted writer was taken on a tour of the studio, where he saw one of his most recent novels, "The Rains Came", in the process of production. Bromfield will start work immediately on the "Brigham Young" story. Present plans call for the production to start early this summer. Auer Winds up "SOS-Tidal Wave" Director John H. Auer finished shooting on Republic's thrilling story, "SOS — -Tidal Wave" this week and studio executives are raving over its startling vividness. Ralph Byrd heads the cast supported by George Barbier, Kay Sutton, Frank Jenks, Marc Lawrence and HOLLyWCCt) with the "Oldtimer" Over to Monogram for the preview of Paul Malvern's "Wolf Call", and fell in love with the "pooch" wlio did such a swell job in the picture . . . and reminded us of our own "Butch". Wonder where Jane Daley, Bill Pierce's charming girl Friday, got that very, very "Hedda Hopper-ish" hat, or was it just another frying pan. Chinning with little Jane Clayton, and we mean little, on the set of Pop Sherman's "Double Dyed Deceiver," just returned from location at Lone Pine. Here's a little lady who will l)ear watching. Director Ed D. Venturini looks like the Mexican influence has gotten under his skin. In a few days we will be moving our office to the Hollywood Track in Inglewood, so be sure to contact us at the |2 show window, our second office for the next two months. We'll have to find out from Joe Penner how to make the "bookies weep", or dig up another Sickle Bill. That switch at Warner Bros, from Boris Karloff to Humphrey Bocart for the top spot in "The Return of Dr. X," makes Bocart a triple menace. Gangster, thriller-killer and now mystery-horror roles, to say nothing of the swell job he did in "Dark Victory." Hope he doesn't try to look like Karloff. And talking of horror-thriller roles, MGM has Henry Hull down for three different characters in a new mystery to be directed by ToD Browning, who has been making thrillers, a long, long time. Wonder how it will feel to chase yourself around the set, with your first character spying on your third. Remember Elmo Lincoln, the serial king of the silent days and the screen's original Tarzan? He's now working over at Republic in "Wyoming Outlaws," his first role since 1927. Here's a wish for a successful comeback. Meeting an Exhibitor J. D. Brunsberg, owner of Issoquah theater, Issoquah, Wash., Smiley Burnette, Gene Dorothy Lee. The picture was produced by Autry and Brunsberg's son on set of Armand Schaefer. Autry's Republic picture, "Mountain Rhythm."