Variety (November 1963)

Published Weekly at 154 West 4th Street, New York, N. Y. 10036, by Variety, Ine. Second Class Postage at New York, N. Y. Annual subscription, $15. Single eopies, 35 cents. { © COPYRIGHT 1963 BY VARIETY, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Vol. 233 No. 1 NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1963 72 PAGES TV's $40,000,000 JFK COVERAGE Catholic Born Eva Leon Garners Plum |AI| SHOW BIZ Dybbuk’ Lead For Habimah’s US, Tour By JOSEPH LAPID Tel Aviv, Nov. 26. Habimah,. Israel’s National Theatre, which will play in the Little Theatre on Broadway between Feb. 1 and Maret ae i a unique com. pany practically in every aspect Of/ nuke of Bedford, has grossed close theatrical life. lto $11,000,000 in 10 years from It is probably the only theatre in/turning his 50-room ancestral the world which started playing 1n|home, Woburn Abbey, into a gima language—Hebrew—which wWas| mick-filled tourist lure, he told dead for centuries and was revived Betty Schill of Toronto Star. only a few decades before HabiNut the Wob Abbe mah was founded. The theatre is], ur on the wooburn y entors | terprise is $300,000 a year, he said, a cooperative, owned py the wes ir|and he has about $3,000,000 more e ® » themselves, who decide on to pay of $14,000,000 succession own wages and elect their direc| who still | duties he was faced with after his tors. Some of the players who stl! | rather died in ‘63. Show business appear on the stage, were among ee founders of Habimah, in Mog-|has kept him so busy he’s never cow, 45 years ago. ihad time to speak in the House The theatre ote one of the} i Boxoffice Now Lifts The Family Mortgage Ottawa, Nov. 26. Britain's showman-peer, the of Lords, s, where he has a he has a seat. highest pro-rata ausliences in the} world. It perfor nightly three ive cost gio. GOing to Barber Amt Wot it Wuz ane ‘ rforming on the one P perfo | One lemethen Habimah has sold | in the last season 600,000 tickets, By DALE OLSON Hollywood, Nov. 26. Remember when you could tell in a country of 2,200,000 people. If (Continued on page 14) ia barbershop by the round red } ft all. |and-white striped poll outside the idoor? And haircuts cost 75c? . Some rural areas may not have | a | ‘changed much. But, in Hollywood |where specialty grooming and iglamor have been synonomous | with the motion picture business, ey | barbershops are rapidly being re | placed by expensive, plush salons Washington, Nov. 26. | where style conscious males can (Continued on page 71) ess of President Johnson's as| eyciates is that the Richard Adler| DIMG IN GRIF It’s estimated by authoritative sources that when the final bill is toted up by the television industry, the cost of telling the story of President Kennedy's assassination will reach the $40,000,000 mark. Which, of course, makes it the most spectacular as well as the most costly “special event” in the history of communications. While the television industry is definitely “poorer” in money this week, it is far richer in the deserved appreciation and recognition from the public it serves. The cost alone for the preempting of entertainment programming and abstaining from commercials during the four-day “crash coverage” of the tragedy will exceed $22,000,000. (It does not include radio or, for that matter, the cost of the unprecedented harnessing of news facilities and manpower.) That figure is based on the overall annual television bill — both network and spot biz — approximating some §$2,000,000,000. The four-day dedication to a solemn non-commercial and non-entertainment period comes out to $22,000.000. However, this figure is entirely unrealistic, for this is the Thanksgiving Christmas period when sponsor concentration is at its peak, with the bigger portion of the advertising dollar spent at this time of the year. A $30,000,000 preemption tab for the four days would be more accurate. The staggering costs to networks and stations for mobilizing and implementing its news facillties—unquestionably one 2f the (Continued on page 68) Pres, Johnson to Sustain Kennel White House Aid to Performing Arts Rod Serling & Wm. Froug USIA Docum. on LBJ Hollywood, Nov. 26. Writer Rod Serling and producer William Froug jetted to Washington Sunday (24) at request of the USIA to prepare a halfhour documentary on President Lyndon B. Johnson for showing abroad. Serling will write the documentary and be its narrator. Kenneth Boles, project producer with USIA, called Serling from Washington and asked and Froug to whip up the documentary on a quick 10-day sked. Projection is predicated on concern in Washington that President Johnson is relatively “unknown” in foreign countries and idea is to show that there will be a continuation of Government and action, and that J will i carry on JFK's o on JFK’s eredos. German Reds Nix Twist, Go Makota’ Frankfurt, Nov. 28. The Commie-controlied East Germans, who are furious at all the fuss being made in their own country over the Twist — which they term a degrading western dance — have come up with something of their own to replace it. They claim that henceforth the young people of their country will be swinging away to a grand new Red dance, which they term the (Continued. on. page 70) produced, $100 per ticket Demo| cratic Party fund raising gala set | No Ameri i for Jan. 23 will go on. Adler has can President since Thomas Jefferson | put accent on culture and the arts as did John already ned oP ad big cast of | Kennedy and the First Lady. They were truly is standing by, waiting for definite | the First Family in pursuit, propagation and word. presentation of the best ingredients of the so‘One member of the cast had called 7 Lively Arts, both on a domestic’ and been the personal choice of Presi| cultural exchange basis. ' dent Johnson while he was still | Vice President and President Ken| medy was alive. That was Carol | Lawrence whom President Johngoa recently saw in a night club performance. She is one of three performers named “Carol” who are top favor ites of President Johnson as per: formers, Carol Channing, who has twice | entertained In his home {n the last 12 months, is perhaps his foremost | favorite and is aiso a friend. Miss Lawrence has performed once in | 3+ Stripped of any party lines, it is little wonder that any and all having anything to do with the entertainment industry—lowbrow or highbrow—reacted to Jackie and Jack, an affectlonate tdentification that already is part of our | history. A comic imitating JFK or Pablo Casals on the cello or Robert Frost reading his poems found equal rapport at these “command performances.” These White House invitations were eagerly sought or hoped for by all concerned. enor ness errs down Briday dient as o own ¥ n was doing what comes monte age. home, shout six! naturally. The next day the Vaxmery switchboard other “favorite Carol’ is | in the homeoffice lit up with countless inquiries coal Burnett, whom he met at|@ueries anent weekend performances but by a luncheon a year ago and she jthen all (legit, cinemas, niteries) recoursed to charmed him wkh stories aboutithe show-goes-on tradition until the Monday {Continued on page 65) ‘blackout again. JFK AND THE ARTS Broadcasting (radio and television), an inte-/ gral part of show business, covered itself with glory in the consummate job of bringing. into 1 immediate focus and sharp closeup all the facets. of one of the top stories in the history of this century. The assassination of-the 35th Pres ident of the United States was seen as @-living| ' newspaper—literally history in the making —|: in itself a whodunit that, once again, supports the axiom that truth is stranger than fiction. _ President Kennedy is a loss to America and | the world but, since partisans and indfyiduals | alike inevitably see matters in their own reflection, Show Business is especially the. loser as result of the still unbeliéyable tragedy. Varierr, therefore, speaks not only for itself, but also for the ‘arts and artisans, performers. ahd impresarios, particularly attuned to culture and the lively arts. A fitting monument—as a permanent |. citadel—would be the naming of the. Cultural Center on the Potomac, still in process of fi-| nancing, in JFK's memory. By LES CARPENTER Washington, Nov. 26. President Lyndon 8. Johnson and his wife should be second only to the Kennedys es supportive to the cultural and performing arts. The late John F. Kennedy went further than any oo president in American .history to throw prestige and power behind .esthetics. Symptomatic of his many gestures of recognition and encouragement he invited the late poet, Robert Frost, to speak at his inaugural. Jacqueline Kennedy, with more time was even more zealous. But the new occupants of the White House are also culturally alert and interested, have displayed longtime interest in drama, musical comedy, films and literature. As one insider remarked to Variety: Never mind the cracks about the Texas accent, The new President doesn’t lay aside his book to tune in the “Beverly Hitlbillies.” There will be little or no entertaining by the Johnsons before January and the pall of the assassination will be slow to lift in this (Continued on page 65) UK Teeners’ $36 Beatle Vacation With Boy op & Bo a d The current sen in the 1 CX. for the pop music group, The Beatles, * (has inspired a local hotelier t8 >, come ‘sp with a new vacation. brighton Holes & Guent Hoyees righton Hotels & Guest” Hoyse: , Assn, is offering “A_ Week. in? Sy | Beatle-land”: in a bid": ind ne , teenagers, He, plans to turn ‘New we Brighton, across the Mersey estu’ ., Britain’s ‘most yockin’. resdxt. . ‘With youngst Rire-Rerette, be at the heart} tof ‘the pa , from the horror of the-basic news event to all|, 2. the facets of a family in dignified grief, a nation and the world in mourning, the apprehension of the assassin and the melodramatic aftermath— membership of-a larg ao ! club on: the. seafront promenade. ‘and’ the. facility :of. listening. to | rock. groups. playing’ nfost. nighis:——— ~~~ Hotelier will also offer two big™ .| beat sessions,-free, in a local ballroom, plus -a trip to Biackpool, . English. show biz mecca, to a. thea-:*: tre: where. a pop star ig appearing. | Highlight . of the holiday-cum music week’ will, be a visit fa clubs j such. as The Cavern, where ‘The Beatles, the Pacemakers, and other top groups, started ‘out. on ‘their careers... . . Cost: of the week would be $36, $ everything included. Inagle name in British stow b business at the moment—the (Continued on page 71).