Variety (Sep 1933)

$ IME would have said, '-Aw, stick it back in thre obit department—- for the record." But SIme isn't herei hoW to mark with his stubby pencil where ''Variety'* copy is to run. And his boys think he rates editorial-page position, in this '^heet~or^any7T)ther, wh6ft" the~bigg^^^^ bravest heart on Broadway stoppMl^ it was a big ^tory. Show business knows that. Andy "Variety*' has always been edited for show business. Sime was often urged to run departments appealing to non-pro readerSfi always turned doWn the idea^ He was afraid the staff would start writing up t6 outsiders and- lose their trade touch. He thoug;ht that When villagers Started to understand ''Variety** then show people wbuldh't. Show people always understood Sime. He advised them? he panned them, he slipped them the lowdbwni s^nd they always Uhderstood him., When '"Variety' slang influenced the language of a nation, that wasn*t Sinie's intent. It was because he niade "Variety** so vital and so penetrating that laymen read it, and thus they picked up the terms of the trade which so fascinated them that high- brow sheets did nip-ups over what in this cia.se Was just everyday colloquial Broadwayese. The most sentimental Old Boy that ever lived, Sime didn't go for flowery, fulsom blurbs. So there will be none here. "Variety/* as a reporter and reviewer, is familiar with the. effective value of eiilogiums, oratiohs and eloquent cur^ slseeches. They have put over many an act. But this isnH ah act» This is Still inside stuff to the profession. The "V ariety" boys are doing their, blubbering and crying amb^hg/tRemse^^^^ 'WhatTarRTTr6w~they are suffefirrg is of^mii interest to the readers. They are mourning a loss that even Sime's audience can't understand. But that's strictly private and will stay that way. What they can share with their world and his is this: The stage and the screen and the ir have lost their chief / mouthpiece, their voice of authority speaking from its heart of loyal love and Its head of wisdom and vision. American journalism has tost a rugged soul which; confined by the limited horizon of a specialized fieldi has left a historic influence on all newspaper publication by courage, indohnitable consistency, Straight-shootirig independence Which, never hesitated before thie temptations of gain, popularity, fear or favor. Show business has lost its square-Shouldered, silver-haired big brother, the liionosyllabic* outspoken, Br6adway-wise^§ruff guy who did his soft deeds in the dark and his hard duties where all could sOe. The world has lost a genius who became and remairied unique and extraordinary around the globe, who commanded the admiration of those who were With him, those who were against himV^nd those who didn't know What he was all about. His pals havelost their pal. "Variety" has lost its skipper; but the "Variety" crew, raised by him and with him, idolizing his miemory and inoculated with his philosophy, will carry on in the tradition which was Sime. He didn't live long enough. But he lived long enough for that. He lived long enough to perpetuate the spirit of frankness with-> out rancor, positive opinion without personal prejudice, sacred fidelity to the trade without neiar-sighted illusions about Its weak- nesses, fanatical faith in the truth without puny reservations of ex- pediency, a hot hatred for inspired propaganda and a cold contempt for keyhole scandal. He lived long enough to convert a hostile field of egotistical and jealous units to a consciousness of power and purpose greater than the single, isolated self-seeking of the individual—^to a realization that iall competitive factors and all economic enemies are interde- pendent and arfe lost when they unbalance the, industry each in pur- suit of personal acquisitiveness. He lived long enough to plant in the world at large the revelation that show business is a huge, important, bed-rocked institution, integral to the healthy body of the nation, essential to the morale of the people—not a fly-by-hight conglomeration of mountebanks, gyps, freaks and short-changers. He lived long' enough to Outlive the era of theatrical sheets which peddled puffs, gouged the unfortunates who slipped or who couldn't get. enough toehold to slip, pandered to the psychological vanity of ambitious weaklings or pompous potentates. He lived long enough to create and leave behind, out of nothing, a nevvspaper-which floats its banner in every land, which is the modern acknowledged herald of an ancient art, He lived long enough tb have Hollywood and Broadway, Which he fought and which fought him, bow their heads In lamentation over his passing. l^e'nvfeB long^en^^^^ wild growths against which he counseled and campaigned through years when his motives were maligned and his judgment was rejected. He lived long enough to say What he meant, take the consequences, and leave a million friends. ^'Variety'* will build no monument to Sime. iSime bu||t "yariety" arid "Va- riety" is his monument. , Jt will always_-bft-Sime!s_sheet.---i-—^ His boys didn't work for him; they worked with him. They believed in him. He was their idol. They are still his boys. They hear him and they see him every iDlrtute. They hear his curt, staccato orders,.his quick, incisive, decisions. They see his cbntagious smile, the smile that usually ckme at the end of the day—a:nd the day> ended anywhere frohi sundown to sunrise. They see him With his white, soft-collared shirt a bit rumpled, the perennial bow-tie slightly screvvy, lighting the Philip Morris cigarets oiie after the other, tilting forward in his chair With his thick, short pencil poised over copy from the Harlem cabarets or cable from Egypt, or running dbwn columns, of moist galley-proofs from Chatter to Page 1 hot stuff. They hear him grunt an instruction and lay down a policy— orders to the fellows who y/orked in their specialty lines and played them up vvithout his mellow and mature understanding that it Was all part of a great whole-show business. ^ They see him cut their stories—for brevity; brevity was one blf his passions. They see him change their phraseology^^—for sim- plicity; Simplicity Wsis one of hjs manias. They see him streak his lightning pencil through single words-—adjectives; adjectives were one of his pet aversions. _They see him reaci thelr^ notices^ and their neWs-reports and 'pass~tlvBm^p as style of "Viriety". Fbr Sinie never changed "a Ime of his reporter's or reviewer*s opinions any more than he ever suggested a word that they should write or omit, or an attitude they should take or avoid. They see him write a head—the heads which bhiy Sime could originate, but which the "Variety" boys can write now With rapid fluency; a head that tells the story and tells it in the language of the trade. They see him downtown. In the printing plant, as they make up the edition against the Monday night deadline—^grading the news and the combinations of news With the trend of show business, in the relative importance of affairs as they how obtain-<-pictures, radio, literati, legitimate, vaudeville. Times Square, outdoors, obituary. Obituary last. Sime treated that department as he trieated the others—as news. And he always held that the opening of a show was more inter- esting and important reading than its clbsing. He never gave rave notices to the ones that had closed, ho mat- ter how long they had run or how mighty had been their triumphs. VVhen we got the grand idea of starting the "Times Square Daily," which cost Sime a fortune ahd all of us a tremendous lot of work and grief, he used to call it 'the world's worst daily," and he wound it up without a squawk or a sigh. When we all chipped iri and bought the. "Clipper" , and tried to make it an outdoor show-business ragf and dropped about a hun- dred C's, Sime paid us all off every nickel that wiB had pUt in; he always shared his hits with us but would never let us share his flops. Well, he closed that one without any ceremonies or afterpieces, too. So we feel that we don't have to brush up the adjectives he cut out of our copy to touch up his last notice. We feel -we don't have to spread this all over "Variety" and violate his love of brevity. We bring it forward jn the paper to the editorial page—and he would probably have ordered it back vvhere he*d think it belongs. But Sime never could believe that he, himself. Was rtews. Having read the Wires that poUred in, having talked to the hundreds who called on the local and lohg distance phones when the first word of our bereavement was whispered in New Yn>rk and Hol- lywood, having spoken to the many who were shocked and stunned and staggered by the blow—we know that he is hews. The boys of "Variety" have written shiploads of news printed with oceans of ink. News is news aind they have been trained tb be clinical in their professional handling of it. They want to be, eVen here and nbw. It's hard, but Sime taught them to do it that way. They see him and they hear him. That is "Variety's" busi and theirs. But they feel him, too. And that is only Sime's and theirs. They feel the kindly pat of his hand, on their shoulders; they feel its strong, warm clasp in theirs. They feel the radiant glow of his inirnitable smile, which Was reserved only for his pals. They feel him in their own "Variety" way. ^-^^The^eflly Wayth^y'M=6V6r shew thwt^^^^^ be to get out "Variety" as nearly like they think Sime would get it out as their intimate schooling under him and their intense affection for him will let them. Jack Lait.