Universal Weekly (1914-1915)

THE UNIVERSAL WEEKLY Frontier and Crystal Dropped From Program ROGRESS is the keynote of the Universal, and not a week goes by that does not see a manifestation of Progress in some phase of its activities. Begin FORMATION OF BIG U BRAND AND ORGANIZATION OF A SECOND NESTOR COMEDY COMPANY NECESSITATE RADICAL CHANGES IN UNIVERSAL PROGRAM. NOTHING BUT COMEDIES NOW UNDER NESTOR BRAND. ning with the first program of the new year, which, by the way, is one of the most wonderful achievements of the Universal production companies to date, there will be several changes made in the line-up which will make for the permanent betterment of all the succeeding programs. In the first place, two brands have been dropped entirely. These are the Frontier brand and the Crystal brand. Their contracts with the Universal expired at the end of the year and they were not renewed by the Universal. ■The main reason for this move was that there were several new brands which the Universal wanted to add to the Program, notably the Big U brand, which has proven to the satisfaction of the officers of the Universal that it is fully able to take its place with the leaders. Tbe Big U starts out with two companies. At the head of one will be Sydney Ayres, who has recently joined the Universal, and who has always been considered one of the topmost directors and players of Western drama on the screen. He will both direct and act in the new brand. His first picture will be "On Desert Sands", which will be released on January 7. The other company will have at its head one of the most versatile actors in the world of motion pictures — Murdock MacQuarrie. Mr. MacQuarrie has been acting in Nestor dramas for the last two years and has done much to make them famous, but many of his pictures have been released under other brands, with the consequent confusion which necessarily arises from this interchange of brands and actors, which the Universal is doing its best to prevent. There was also the objection that Nestor releases comprised heretofore both dramas and comedies. The new program provides for this objection, too. In the future nothing but comedies will be released under the Nestor brand. In order to make this possible, another comedy company has been organized which Al. Christie will direct. Miss Billie Rhoades and Eddie Dillon will be featured. Eddie Lyons will have charge of the other Nestor comedy company under Mr. Christie's supervision. These changes have made necessary the rearrangement of the program to some extent. The principal changes to be made, all of which will go into effect during the first week of the new year, are as follows : Except under unusual circumstances, the features will be arranged in | the following manner, and this order will be followed strictly, with the exception of the multiple reelers of the I-Ko and Nestor comedy companies, for which special arrangements will have to be made as occasion requires. On Monday the multiple reel Victors will be released ; on Tuesday the Gold IN 1915 / hope that you will have the most satisfying year you ever lived in all your born days. I hope that you will be happy, contented and prosperous. I hope that nothing that I may do or that the Universal may do will ever cause you an instant of hardship, uneasiness, worry or discomfort. I hope that the Universal may, in some way, be the means of keeping your thoughts free from sorrow, anger, fear, hatred or revenge. I hope that you and yours will be able to look back on 1915 at the end of the year and say, "Gee, it was one corking good year for us". That's my New Year's greeting to you, whoever you are, great or small. And it comes not only straight from the shoulder, but from, the very bottomest depths of the heart! Seals ; on Wednesday the Eclaira ; on Thursdays the Big U features ; on Friday the Imps ; on Saturdays the "101 Bisons"; and on Sunday the Rex features. The Monday features will be those made, for the present at least, by the Mary Fuller company and the Warren Kerrigan company. There will also be a one-reel Imp featuring King Baggot, Hobart Henley and Frances Nelson, or William Garwood, William J. Welsh and Violet Mersereau. It was planned to release a Sterling one-reel comedy on Monday, but the weather has been so bad on the coast that a Joker has been substituted. The Gold Seal feature on Tuesday will be either a Francis Ford-Grace Cunard picture or a Cleo Madison subject. The Nestor comedy and the single reelers of the Big U brand will complete the Tuesday program. On Wednesday there will be released the Eclair features, the Animated Weekly and the single reel L-Ko comedies. Thursday's feature will be the multiple reelers of the Big U, with either Sydney Ayres or Murdock MacQuarrie, and the other regular releases will be a Rex single reel, with Ben Wilson and Dorothy Phillips, Pauline Bush and Lon Chaney or Frank Lloyd's new company. In addition to the Friday two reelers the single reel release will be a one-reel Victor of the Warren Kerrigan, Mary Fuller, or Harry Myers company and a Nestor comedy. Saturday's features will all be distinctively Westerns, and the single reelers will be a Powers, with Edna Maison, and a Joker. Sunday has been reserved for the multiple reel pictures of the Pauline Bush, Ben Wilson and the Frank Lloyd companies and the single reel Eclairs and L-Ko comedies. President Universal Film Manufacturing Company Universal City and Lankershim, Cal., the movie city's next door neighbor, joined hands on December 12 in a "grand, glittering, gorgeous and gigantic" carnival. The occasion was the formal turning on of the electricity in the new cluster lights recently installed along the macadam-paved thoroughfares of the twin municipalities. Henry McRae and his company of "101 Bison" players, together with the cowpunchers from the company ranch and the crack cavalry troop staged a typical western rodeo with broncho-riding, steer-throwing and crack-shot exhibitions. All the animals in the Universal City zoo were paraded in cages down the boulevards of the twin cities in true circus style. The trained bears and other animals were put through their "stunts" by Jerry Barnes, head animal trainer at the Universal zoo. Later in the evening Al. Curtis and his company of Joker players staged their now famous side-show, "Curtis' Category of Curious Creatures", with an added assortment picked up since the last appearanec of the show.