Showmen's Trade Review (Oct-Dec 1946)

SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW, October 26, 1946 7 Copras Twentieth Year Twenty years ago this week Frank Capra's first directorial effort, "The Strong Man," opened at the Strand Theatre in New York. Since then, Capra productions have made box-office history . . . and profits for theatremen and the industry. Each one has been a credit to screen entertainment and contributed no Httle to the tremendous growth of the millions who make up the movie patrons of today. At this writing his latest picture, and the first to be made and released under the Liberty Films banner — the company he organized along with William Wyler, George Stevens and Sam Briskin — is now nearing completion and from advance reports, Capra picks up where he left off when he entered the armed services. So look for a typically fine production in "It's a Wonderful Life." Capra's producing organization is, undoubtedly, composed of men who know production from every angle. So, too, is his distributing unit headed by Ted O'Shea because here again he has brought into Liberty Films the best the industry has to offer in the way of manpower. It is indeed a pleasure and a privilege to pay tribute to the twentieth anniversary of a great producer and a great man. The industry may well be proud of him and his achievements. ' We are! AAA Happy Landings, Ed. It is with genuine grief that the industry read the announcement of the death of Ed Kuykendall, for fourteen years president of the MPTOA and for all of those years a respected and honorable personality of our business. It made no difference whether one agreed with Ed and his ideas and policies. One and all had to admit that whatever Ed did he did with the sincere courage of his convictions and, above all, in the hope that what he tried to do would help the exhibitor. His passing is only cushioned by the fact that his illness had kept him close to home and, thus, kept him from his travels around the country where one would meet him on his trips to all scenes of exhibitor organization activity. We extend our heartfelt condolences to his family who were almost as well and affectionately known around the industry as was Ed. Moving Ahead In its own quiet and efficient way. Screen Guild Productions, have been steadily moving ahead. This is a good sign for any venture especially in the business of motion pictures. With key theatre operators and distributors of good background, the planning board for SG had carefully worked out its method of production and operations and then kept a close watch as those plans developed and crystalized. This outfit comes closer to what this page has been praying for than any other possibility for new blood and expanded independent production and distribution. Without such new blood and new pictures the good old movie business would be plodding along in its own sweet way by the same old companies. Any independent exhibitor who fails to lend the encouragement of bookings to Screen Guild would simply be putting himself on the spot. As LSMFT puts it: "Quality of product is essential to success" or words to that effect. From what we have seen of SG's efforts to date, the quality is certainly there. Perhaps not the quality of the top budget pictures of the big studios, but, definitely the quality of audience values that the average movie patron wants in exchange for his admission ticket. With men like Johnny Jones, Bob Lippert and their associates steering the boat, it ought to make port with plenty of fair weather. AAA Controst Donald Nelson, president of the Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers delivered an address this week at a dinner sponsored by the New York Board of Trade. We sincerely hope that your local newspaper carried portions of that speech because it was packed with the kind of statements real Americans like to hear and read. From beginning to end, Mr. Nelson's address was an inspiration not only to his Immediate listeners but to our own industry. It was the kind of a spech we thought Eric Johnston was going to make in Boston in his first appearance before an exhibitor group. Instead, Mr, Johnson went off on a merry-go-round that added up to nothing at all for most of his hearers except the very definite impression that he had been reading a script lifted from the files of General Hays' old speeches. —"CHICK" LEWIS