Universal Weekly (1925-1933)

Vol. 21, No. 18 Universal Weekly 17 Chicago Manager Closes Two Big Deals Signs Ascher Brothers and Lubliner & Trinz for Second White List Jewels CARL LAEMMLE, president of the Universal Film Exchanges, Inc., announces that L. W. Alexander, manager of the Chicago exchange, has just consummated with Ascher Brothers of Chicago, one of the largest deals for service ever completed in the entire country. Max Ascher, president, carried on the negotiations with Alexander for Ascher Brothers. The contract calls for two pictures a month as released. Among the pictures to be played are: "California Straight Ahead," by Byron Morgan, with Reginald Denny, Gertrude Olmstead, Tom Wilson, Frances Raymond, John Steppling and others in the cast; "The Goose Woman," from Rex Beach's widely read story, with Louise Dresser, Jack Pickford and Constance Bennett heading a brilliant cast; "Siege," with Virginia Valli and Eugene O'Brien; "Lorraine of the Lions," featuring Norman Kerry and Patsy Ruth Miller; "The Teaser," from the William A. Brady Broadwray stage success with Laura La Plante and Pat O'Malley in the leading roles; "The Storm Breaker," from the novel by Charles Guernon, with House Peters in the stellar role; "Where Was I?" from the magazine story by Edgar Franklin, with Reginald Denny; "The Homemaker," with Alice Joyce and Clive Brook; "The Little Giant," starring Glenn Hunter; "The Beautiful Cheat": "Stella Maris," a Charles Brabin Production from the novel by William J. Locke, with Mary Philbin; "My Old Dutch," starring Pat O'Malley and Cullen Landis; "The Whole Town's Talking," from the stage success by John Emerson and Anita Loos, with Reginald Denny; "On the Frontier," with Norman Kerry; "Peacock Feathers," from the novel by Temple Bailey, with Jacqueline Logan and a star cast; "Two Blocks Away," with George Sidney and Charles Murray, from Joe Murphy's name went a call on the Des Moines the stage play by Aaron Hoffman; "Snowbound," featuring House Peters; "Sally in Our Alley," by John Chickering, with Mary Philbin; "This Way Out," starring Reginald Denny from the novel by Frederick Isham; "The Love Thrill," with Laura La Plante; "Under Western Skies," with Norman Kerry, to be filmed during the 1925 Pendleton Roundup; "The Still Alarm," from the famous stage play by Joseph Arthur and A. C. Wheeler; "Sporting Life," adapted from the famous Drury Lane melodrama, starring Virginia Valli; and "His People," with the popular stage star, Alexander Carr, in the leading role. The contract also places the International Newsreel in all the Ascher houses, and six of Universal's fast-moving serials in the majority of them. The Ascher theatres that will play this line-up of Universal Jewels include: The Calo, Chateau, Columbus, Commercial, Cosmopolitan, Crown, Forest Park, Frolic, Lane Court, Metropolitan, Oakland Square, Portage Park, Terminal, Vista and West Englewood. Alexander recently closed a deal with E. Stern, general manager of the Lubliner & Trinz circuit, for practically this same line-up of pictures for the following first-run houses: Senate, Harding, Pantheon, Belmont, Tower, Rockwell, Biograph, Covent Garden, Crawford, Pershing, Wilson, Ellantee, Knickerbocker, Lakeside, Vitagraph, Windsor, Dearborn, Michigan, Oak Park, Paramount, Logan Square, West End, Madison Square, State and Tower. The two contracts closed by Alexander with Ascher Brothers and Lubliner & Trinz not only assure the theatre-going public at Chicago that they will see all the Universal Jewels, but gives Universal the best representation they have ever had in the city. up in lights when he paid Theatre, Des Moines, la. Illlllllllllll I . I II II II III! [I II Hill I] IMI II llllll 1 1 Hill II II H II II lllll 111 llll HHI II II II II 1 1 1 II PRAYER MEETING SHIFTED SO FOLKS CAN SEE SERIAL ALFRED ALLEN, who plays the part of Captain Jack Robinson in "Perils of the Wild," Universal screen play based on the story, "The Swiss Family Robinson," relates an amusing incident in connection with "The Great Circus Mystery." Allen was pasing the week-end in a small town in Southern California, and met the deacon of one of the town's churches. The fifth episode of the "Great Circus Mystery" had shown there the week previous. Said the deacon : "We certainly like Universal's Adventure pictures, but I sometimes wish they would come on a night other than Wednesday. That's prayer meeting night, you see, and for five weeks we've had to hold prayer meeting on Thursday." 2 SWIMMING CHAMPIONS MEET ON UNIVERSAL LOT JOHNNY WEISSMULLER, Olympic swimming champion and the world's greatest swimmer, made a special visit to Universal City last week for the purpose of greeting an old friend and one-time competitor in the person of Charles Puffy, the rotund comedian whom Universal brought from Hungary to make America laugh. Weissmuller is to swimming what Nurmi is to running. It was a great reunion between the world's champion and the one-time champion of Germany, for before Puffy reached his present 298 pounds he twice held the long distance swimming championship of Germany. Production of the new Puffy comedy, which is being directed by Dick Smith, was halted for some time as Weissmuller showed Puffy some of the strokes that have made him the swimming prodigy of the age.