Variety (Sep 1933)

^Tuesday, September 5, 193S PICT E S VARIETY 3^ Variety House Reviews Fox, Brooklyn (Continued from page 31) •fykft It was before when the bankers yere running It. They'vd got Will Osborne, without 'A band; Jay .Mills, without his danc- ing; a fur and fashion show with- out real models: a ballet that isn't"; and a band on the stage which is sometimes not even heard while playing. K the biz was poor Friday (change 'day) night that's i..ore than enough cause—and besides, there's the Brooklyn Paramount reopened un- der showmanly management, for 9verpowering competition. If the 'Voice of Experience' kept people away last week, what the • customers have io blink at around ihere might impel them to stay away altogether. Next week's, feature is advertised simultaneously with the current picture. Inside, and outside the theatre. Not even the smaller Indies pull that stuff. Some Brook- lynltes might think they are going to see two features, and that's mis- leading. So many signs around the place, it's confusing anyway. Might be overlooked that the itxtards and program cite 50 girls in the fur show, when there's only 16, ftnd they neither look nor carry on like real models. Purely a tie-up ,-vlth a local shop or something and '%b& gal who ^ronts as the French eouturlere doesn't impress with her French accent nor her singing. She xnisses the accent often, i liine of girls opens in Mickey iloiise costumes without crediting jthe cartoon. They show no idea of precision. Jay Mills trots out after- iwAxdB, with the band on the plat form, when customers are led to ex poet Freddy Mack. Mills is person able, but he talks too much and too long in his Intros. When Ray Hughes and his blonde Ipartner, Pam, appears, and Hughes 4;racks asks her if she thinks she's '0it Minsky's, there's no telling what iwlU follow. Crude stuff and Mills' ifaitroducing Hughes as the 'well- known Broadway comedian' Is funny. Hughes can't be found in I Mills additionally has a penchant Er qualifying superlatives too often id his 'very wonderful' and 'very ^narvelous' stuff handed out for Borne of the mediocre entertainment uiat follows shows extremely bad Vtste. ' Will Osborne comes on somewhere before the fini._h to croon a couple of songs. One of these, 'The-i^st Roundup,' he states is headed for the new 'Follies,' as yet not even in rehearsal. Apparently, at the Fox, Brooklyn, anything goes. Osborne entertains pleasingly, alone, and for the yet to be produced 'Follies' song, he leads the band while singing. Looks better with a baton in hand. Stan Kavanaugh is also on the bill and gets titters from the audience with his juggling. The fur and fashion show may be interesting to the femme customers but .has no production value. The line girls out in ballet costumes to- wards the close, but accomplish nothing. Feature, 'The "Wrecket' (Col), and next week 'Her First Mate' (U). About five minutes of trailers pre- cede the feature and mostly on the next week'd screen attraction. NRA tialler included and cartoon stuff, plus a newsreel. Show runs around 70 minutes without an overture. Bhan. PALACE, AKRON Akron, Aug. 29. A curtain, shimmering green like wet sea grasses, parted on the first show to grace a professional stage in Akron since last May. And the Palace, former RKO house, now un der lease by the Milt Feld-Dave Chatkin-Harry Katz combination, was reopened successfully, much to the enthusiastic delight of a capac ity audience. Good vaude well staged, com bined with 'Morning Glory' (Radio) on the screen, scored heavily as the inaugural oflterlng under the new entertainment deal for Akron. On the stage Wesley Eddy makes his bow as band leader and master of ceremonies. He reveals a like able personality, introduces the acts, lends a hand here and there, and then steers clear of the objec tionable mechanics of m. c.'ing. Orchestra is on the stage for this form of presentation which appears as a unit, with the Palace Rockets, mostly local gals, 12 in line; con tributing to the opening and the finale. Chorines merely decorate the stage for the opening, but get into action for the finale. Felicia Sorel directs. Howe, Leonard and Alyce com bine song, dance and patter and nut comedy and win a hand. Marty May is assisted by Jean Carroll in a patter act with the girl doing the dumb cluck and May wiseguying. John and Edna Torrence, brother and sister, turn in a dance act of exceptional grace and worthy of a good spot on any variety bill. The routine is new and wardrobe A-1. Fourth act is by the Three St. John Brothers, many of whose tricks look new, and presented wi,th grace and ease. ' Eddy fills in all the way through the hour of stage show, playing many instruments and closing with his own version of 'St. Louis Blues' to the accompaniment of the band. Yascha MischkofC has an eleven- piece band, which after playing the overture in the pit retires to the stage to back up the unit show. Vaude splits the week with Pal- ace at Youngstown, with chorus and Eddy remaining here permanently. McConnell. PARAMOUNT, B'KLYN After resting for the summer, the Brooklyn Par has awakened from its slumber on a new start and with a fresh outlook. It is no longer be- ing operated by Par from the New York home office in conjunction with the company's Times Square deluxer, but by a modest, quiet lit- tle showman, M. A. Shea, best known as Mort Shea. A kingpin of the old Feiber & Shea circuit. Shea stays behind the publicity firing lines, operating his chain of theatres in Ohio and other eastern states without saying much about it, but to all who chance to investigate, with results that are successful. He ought to do all right with the big downtown Brooklyn deluxer he tackles as operator for an Allied Owners-Paramount partnership re cently set up. Brooklyn is a funny show town and Shea can fail, but weighing all angles and possibili- ties, odds and averages, he has as good a chance as anyone to do okay for Par and for the heavy creditor. Allied Owners, which built the the atre and hasn't stopped worrying since. Over here Shea, with Bill Raynor as his major general of operation, a policy that should strike has been inaugurated. ' It's the closest to vaudeville tried by any deluxer, yet gets safely enough away from the routine one-two-three system of vaude as it has been known for, perhaps, too many years. Brooklyn Par is Using a stage band, but it's not a stage-band pol icy that's in vogue. At this house the band rises from the pit to the platform merely to be seen and to provide musical accompaniment for some of the various acts. There is no master of ceremonies depart- ment, no numbers by the band alone and next to no participation or in- terference from Stan Meyers, who leads the band. The.acts do their routines, with a couple cut here and there to meet running-time limitations, as they would in any standard vaude houses where the annunciators still tell who's on. There are no annunciat- ors here, but by some simple means to meet the occasion the- audience knows with a couple exceptions who's trying to Or succeeding in en- tertaining them. • Current show starts out as a vaude bill would, the Lucky Boys' comedy risley act opening. No an- nouncements, no trailers, and no m.c.'ing except the clowning of the laugh-getting member of the risley group who works partly as an m.c. for his own turn. Finishing their complete routine, the curtains come together and the No. 2 act, a ventrlloqulstic team,, comes on. This la one of the best of its kind, bringing out the combined talents of Valentine Vox and Emily Walters, with latter's clever baby- crying interlude. Some of th6 talk has its weak points, but on sheer artistry of ventriloquism act is a clicker all the way through.. Third on the bill, still in the . straight vaude manner, is Roy Atwell with his stuttering mixed-tongue mono- log. Big hit over here. Another who's from radioland is Jeannie Lang. She is among those acts which has the band behind them on the stage Instead of in front in the pit. It makes little dif- ference one way or another, but playing half the show with the band in the trough, the other half with pitmen finishing on the stage does break the monotony. There's no need for a fiash, either, when the band , starts to fill up the stage. No girls over here in line with the new vaude policy that's being cre- ated and, also, not heeded. Weren't missed Friday night, at least by an audience that seemed to get satis- faction for its money. Miss Lang, using a mike as does Atwell, sings three numbers, but could replace that oldie, 'Fit as a Fiddle'. It no longer has an appeal- ing ring, whether well sung as by Miss Lang or others. Another radio turn is Bomby and His Gang, mixed quartet and a woman pianist, which closes In a burst of vocal calisthenics with se- lections from 'Fortune Teller* and heavier operatic numbers, all weH done. In the gang is a soprano blonde eyewash who's more the film type than a prima. First to usher on backing of the band is Paul Sydell with his dog act, standard for gome years now. Stage dish of show Is a courso running 66 minutes, about right. No crowding and no stalling. Acts are being booked in by Fan- chon & Marco, with special assist* ance by Jack Partington or others experienced as stagers, in aiding Raynor on routining and setup of shows. Stage is reported costine around $3,500 a weelC whole nut of house running to around $16,000. Layout has the various units In a little different ord^ir than previously in vogue here under Publix direc- tion. Organ number by Arthur Gutow and Joy RIah follows the feature, then some trailers on free parking, Thursday night previews, etc. Next unit is the Par News, Stan Meyers' overture coming next instead of in front of the newsreel as In virtually every other theatre using stage shows. Unit goes on right on top of the overture, trailer on coming week's bill arriving as a spill period when the stage show is over. House to using the usual Par trailers, which seem to carry less excess of scenlo teasers and eopy than those of some major producer-distributors. Char, Paramount, New Haven New Haven, Sept. 1. . This wenk washes up stage shows at the Paramount, for the present at least. Current bill Is third stage offering in past four weeks and while there's been no kick on b.o. returns, house will stick to straight films for time being.' Partly bo- cause of difflculty in lining up sultar ble talent and partly because new season is ushering in some films that aren't expected to need stage supr port. . After using unit shows on two previous bills. Paramount tried building this one Itself and turned the production angle over to Ned Wayburn. Opened in Hartford a week ago and Is reported to have some time in New Jersey to follow Production end didn't cause any wear and tear on the gray matter and Wayburn's efforts were proba- bly confined mainly to the work of his 12 Rhythm Girls. They do a swell job, and the bill would bo pretty flat without them. Show Is a promiscuous affair that can't seem to make up its mind whether to (Continued on page 78) SEPTEMBER 1, 19» FROM VICTOR TO EVERYWHERE FOUR MESSAGES 1^ GRATEFCri. 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