Showmen's Trade Review (Oct-Dec 1947)

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6 WHATS NEWS In the Film Industry This Week GENERAL— The room was packed, hot with lights and tense with expectation. The House Un-American Activities Committee was starting its probe into the alleged influence of communists upon motion pictures. While cameras ground, witnesses, ranging from sartorially conservative actors who gave fluent testimony to equally fluent but less weD known (by the pubHc) industry executives, testified. As the hearing neared the end of its first week the results showed a mass of testimony, unproved, which named individuals as "un-American" and a vain effort on the part of the Motion Picture Association to get the committee to look at the pictures which were supposedly carriers of commuraist propaganda. (P. 7). While the Washington Red Hunt was going on and meeting with some severe criticism by the press, theatre business meanwhile seemed to take a boost, especially on the coast where one company reported a 30 per cent rise over past weeks. And also on the coast Director Delmer Daves was preparing to make the first industry documentary short, part of a series to show the public what goes on in the indtKtry. Titled "Film Directors," it will be followed by "This Theatre and You," "A Film Goes to Market," "What Oscar Really Means," "Film Writers," "Film Actors," "History Brought to Life," "Pictures Are Adventure." The films are being made by the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences under a committee consisting of N. Peter Rathvon, Frederic Ullman, Jr., King Vidor, Warner Anderson, Mary C. McCall, Leon Ames, Margaret Herrick, Daves and Coordinator-producer Grant Leenhouts. In Hollywood, too, a series of conferences held by Rep. Carrol Kearns, chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, with the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employes and the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners with a view to ironing out the difficulties which are behind the studio strike, ended in a draw this week. The lATSE was willing to make some minor concessions, but the Carpenters wanted to get back the jobs they lost when they struck and the lATSE furnished replacements. The lATSE is insisting that these replacements be taken care of and the slow production pace on the coast right now doesn't offer enough jobs to take care of both sides. An earlier attempt by the American Federation of Labor in San Francisco to settle the disagreement, ended in no results also. Paramount won by default a judgment against Willie Bioff, convicted labor extortioner, by which it sought to get back part of the money it paid him and his associate George Browne when allegedly threatened with a strike of its theatre employes. The court set the hearing on a similar suit against Browne for Nov. 21. Amount paid to both is around $100,000. In Columbus, Miss Susanna M. Warfield, one of the Onio censors, finds that long love clinches aren't the problem in movies today, but ways of killing people and the amount of liquor drinking is. Atter 25 years of censoring she feels that the public decides "pretty largely" what is censorable and that tastes change with changes in convention — witness the fact that a lady today may light a cigarette without anyone looking to see if she stands under a red light. * * * DISTRIBUTION— Film Classics will offer 14 new features next year with 10 in Cinecolor, Board Chairman A. Pam Blumenthal said this week. It will also have a flock of reissues. Cinecolor meanwhile is planning to start plants in Mexico and England. Foreign film distributors are reportedly looking at television as an outlet for their product with Lopert Films planning to lease them day-and-date to video and subsequentrun houses. Monogram-Allied Artists has set up deals for Switzerland, Belgium, Sweden, Italy and Norway and Selznick Releasing Organization will open branches in Montreal and Winnipeg. Sam Goldwyn's "The Bishop's Wife" has been selected for the royal command performance in London on Nov. 25, making it the first American film so selected. * ^: ^ EXHIBITION— Planet Pictures, which makes 16-mm. features for distribution in the non-theatrical field, is ready to expand its activities. (P. 9). Two new drive-ins were planned for the Kansas City area, with the Dickinson Circuit announcing a 750-car installation outside of Kansas City and the Durwood Theatres a 600-car situation outside of Jefferson City, Mo. And Quonset theatres were making some progress in the Chicago area with a 500-seat house open in Sturgeon, Wis., another in Middleton, Wis., and a third to go up in Love Park, a suburb of Rockford, 111. In Chicago the Essaness Oriental was playing a commercial film on nickel production and in St. Louis police of the Carr Street Station were crediting the kid shows of the Carver Theatre with cutting juvenile delinquency in their district by about 10 per cent. From Chicago, Franklin Lamb, attorney for Milton Reynolds in the proposed purchase by that outfit of the Golden State Circuit in San Francisco, said the deal was being held up while the Justice Department investigated it. In Louisville, Theatre Owners of America President Ted Gamble revealed that among the first TOA steps would be to seek at least a 50 per cent cut in the federal amusement tax. SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW, October 25, 1947 Variety Clubs Complete Plans for Okla. Events Arrangements were completed this week for a double-barreled Variety Clubs International event in Oklahoma when the clubs hold the first of a series of midseason national officers' meetings in Tulsa on Nov. 3 and then move to the Will Rogers Memorial at Claremore on Nov. 4 to unveil their bronze plaque at the late showman's shrine. The plaque presentation will be broadcast in connection with Bob Hope's radio show which is moving to Claremore for the occasion and will be shot by all newsreels. It is presented, according to a Variety Club release, to "commemorate the life-long devotion of Will Rogers to the entertainment business" and was authorized by the Clubs at their convention last May. Meeting to Precede The meeting to be held the day preceding will hear the International Tent's report on interim activities, reports on the charitable activities of the various tents, plans to extend these activities and the Tents' reports on the success of the "Variety Girl" premieres, and a preliminary report for the next convention to be held in April at Miami by Convention Director Chick Lewis. Chief barkers from all of the 33 Variety Club Tents are expected to attend, arriving on Nov. 2 to be guests of Ralph Talbot and J. C. Hunter of Talbot Theatres, devoting Nov. 3 to an all-day meeting and being entertained at night by the Oklahoma Club. National officers scheduled to attend both events are : John H. Harris, R. J. O'Donnell, Carter Barron, C. J. Latta, Marc Wolf, Jack Beresin, Col. William McCraw and Lewis. Gamble Appoints TOA Admissions Committee Appointment of a temporary committee consisting of Chairman Si Fabian, Lewen Pizor, H. F. Kincey, and Max Yellen, to continue studies begun in Washington last month on advanced admissions vvas announced this week by Theatre Owners of America President Ted Gamble. Gamble also announced that the Motion Picture Theatre Owners of North and South Carolina and the Virginia A'lotion Picture Association had voted a TOA affiliation with the former, sending Ben L. Strozier as a director from South Carolina and H. F. Kincey as a North Carolina director, while the latter delegated Morton Thalhimer. E. L. Martin of the Motion Picture Theatre Owners of Georgia, R. R. Livingston of the Nebraska Theatre Owners Association and Clarence Kaiman of the Motion Picture Theatre Owners of St. Louis, Eastern Missouri and Southern Illinois have been appointed to the TOA Board. So Sorry Due to a typographical error Love's State Theatre at Elizabeth City, N. C., which outbid the Webster houses on product was reported as Loew's State. A similar error brought out the name of H. D. Hearn general manager of a new Carolina Drive-In corporation as H. D. Head. Para. Sets 2 Jan. Releases Paramount has set Jan. 18 for release of "I Walk Alone" and Jan. 30 for "Albuquerque." INDEX TO DEPARTMENTS Advance Data 52 Hollywood 44 Audience Classifications 53 Newsreel Synopses 28 Box-Office Slants 42 Regional Newsreel 21 Feature Booking Guide 46 Selling the Picture 13 Feature Guide Title Index 46 Shorts Booking Guide 54 Harry Rubin 30th Anniversary Section... 29 Theatre Management 18 SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW, Title and Trade Mark Registered U. S. Patent Office. Published every Friday by Showmen's Trade Review, Inc., 1501 Broadway, New York 18, N. Y. Telephone LOngacre 3-0121. Charles E. 'Chick' Lewis, Editor and Publisher; Tom Kennedy, Executive Editor; James A. Cron, General Manager; Ralph Cokain, Managing Editor; Harold Rendall, Equipment Advertising Manager; West Coast Office, 6777 Hollywood Boulevard, Hollywood 28, California; Telephone Hollywood 2055; Ann Lewis, manager. London Representative. Jock MacCiregor, 16 Leinster Mews. London. W.2; Telephone AMBassador 3601; Australian Representative, Gordon V. Curie, 1 Elliott St., Homebush, Sydney, Australia. Member Audit Bureau of Circulations. All contents Mnpyright 1947 by Showmen's Trade Review, Inc. Address all correspondence to the New York office. Subgcription rates: $2.00 per year in the United States and Canada; Foreign. $5.00; Single copies, I'Ti rent a.