Variety (Jan 1939)

172 VAUDEVILLE Third of a Century VARIETY Anniversary Tssu^ Wednesday, January 4, 1939 THE AGENTS—'38 MODEL By John Hurley Lone wolf agenting on a strictly X0% basis has gone the way of min- strel shows. Economics has forced percenters to broaden their scope from that of specialist to jack-of- all-phases in order to exist. While the chiselers will always exist, coop- eration is new keynote now that few are able to stand alone. Commis- sions are split, departments added and interests merged so that offices rep each other in respective busi- nesses and locale. The agency field is too crowded to permit ex- clusiveness in one field. Today, they all book, agent and pro- duce. The smallies lean heavily on the major offices, and the latter de- pend on the. little fellows to scout new talent and often, new business. Past year has demonstrated this plenty. Period brought an unusual amount of activity in the mechanics oi the business and its internal prob- lems, particularly in the east. Or- ganization groups, attempted legisla- tion on agency laws, union franchis- ing, severing of partnerships, new mergers and incursions into other fields for greater coverage were tried. Year will also istand out as a record for changes in oflice person- nel. On the Coast, the major agencies formed an association, somewhat ex- clusive, for protection against the studios, the unions, the screen guilds and their own chiseling brethren. It was hit, along with those outside the. pale, by the Screen Actors Guild's franchising iand regulation. The un- anticipated dropoff in film produc- tion was another slap for agents. Activity for the newly formed American Federation of Radio Ac- tors meant more headaches for boys. Supposed 'break' with move of siz- able'chunk of radio, program origina- tion to the west meant little to the •average agent, because the majority -':were stellar lineups controlled by few biggies.. Profusion of quiz and other audience participation pro- grams helpe'd nobody, anywhere. Across thp country the American Federation of Actors started'fran- '■' chising .nitery and vaude agents as well as closied-shopping theatres and cabarets, catching them both ways. So far, only keys have been hit such as Chicago; Los Angeles, Detroit, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and New York, i Last has. not yet had franchising ibut niteries are all in line. Theatj-es and agents come next. - ) A'gi^nts' Oreanizatlons Starting. Vrith the licensing drive in New York the agents went to or- .ganizing—i^0organizing in some cases •^and splitting associations. ' Old Equity Agents Association was forced to a {rebirth after being dor- mant several years because of leg- islation, liciensing and poot take. Subsequentlj^ they started clamoring for more commission on engage- ments (5% is the limit) stating they couldn't maintain offices on meagre ' pickings. Stea'dy drop in legit pro- duction and equal decrease in sal- ary standards made it too tough. ; Kow bound together again they have ; all become. licensed, are ready to cooperate with other groups and also dabble afield. The vaude and nitery agents, also plagued by similar p:rob- •lems and very little business tried organizing. Al^ they have is a name EO far. That of Theatrical Agents and Artists Representatives of America. A Coordinating Council, another step to bind all groups together, I .went up in smoke after, proposal by r'Hpward Wheeler, prez of Entertain- t Im'ent Managers Association. He : later had a'rebellion on his hands \ 'When exiting members formed Still j ianother association, the Associated " ■ Entertainment Directots • of New IJ York.- 'Both are currently feuding, >y 'and the acts are in the middle. EMA, parent group, is attempting to form .ft national EMA association to Stand- ;ardize' the club date business. The ^oppOsish group, AED, is trying to sign acts to authorization contracts and-stifle the EMA bookers. For most part, larger agencies have avoided any involvment in or- ganizations but have willingly met the -.licensing and -legislative prob- lems on promise of license depart- ment to help agencies with favorable legislation. All legit agents are banded in one group though it was fb'st suggested that one all-inclusive group be formed, licensing, has thus far netted about 300 around New York. That's more than twice as many as ever befote.* 2Iore , recently the .boys have been applying voluntarily. Couple of pinches during the year, ptomise of help and elimination of fee fixing dau£e« 14 new legislation, plus promise to wioe out chiselers has theni . all coopeiating. Threat of being outlawed via the N..Y. State Department of Labor takeover of employment aided the banding. License department has further promised a separate bill for theatri- cals so that would not be wiped out if the agency end of the general business laws is taken over by N. Y. State. More worries have beset boys in past month with naming of club date bureaus as employers by the State Unemployment Bureau, and Social Security Board. Makes them responsible for collection of taxes and requires a cash outlay for them personally as well. List of 1,000 is being prepared by the authorities, ! but boys hope to escape that label- ling via rush on License Dept. to establish themselves as agents. That category was long avoided, agents using artist representative, employer, manager and any other convenient status to escape licensing, with the attendant supervision and fee fixing. It's a case of taking the lesser evil now, and anyway, it looks like fee- fixing is on the way out,,with prom- ised new legislation. Even the Concert Bureaus Lecture and concert bureaus, long regarded as distant relatives of the other forms of show biz are also being hit. - That fight is to the death with the License Dept. and the American Guild of Musical Artists on one side, and the concert bureaus on the other. They don't want com-' missons curtailed in any degree and want no part of regulation by the union. Nearly all agents book direct when- ever possible, along same principle as that of band booker-managers such as Music Corp. of America and the William Morris offices. Boys must hit everything from fairs to club dates in order to exist and to hold their clients who demand com- plete servicing. 'Agencies with na- tional coverage have no trouble. Method of indies is to.align them- selves with teps throughout «the country in - locations ■ they cannot reach themselves. Commissions are split. Clients are sometimes farmed .out to larger offices altogether on percentage. More important indies rep each other in respective loca- tions. Indicative of this trend is the neyr alignment of the Charles Allen office^ with Crawford, Winslow tt Curtis on the Coast. Herman Ber- nie joined Myron Selznick in New York, for full coverage. Lou Irwin reps Consolidated Radio Artists on the Coast in return for same service here ftom CRA. ^ Charlie Yates took over CRA's theatre bookings of bands with his Simon office. Music Corp. of America opened new branches, William Morris expanded and added departments, RockweU- O'Keefe and CRA also added branch offices during the past year. Further evidence of the new mode is switch of Bill Miller, agent, to booker this year. Though an agent, he took over Folly theatre, Brook- lyn, N. Y., where he employed his own Acts and those of others. Eddie Sherman, booker, is another of the new school. After booking for years he, too, became a dual op- erator, signing acts such as Abbott and Costello,. Ben Yost, Ed Kaplan, et! al, to management contracts. He also has an agreement with the William Morris office to rep' the same acts through hifn. , Some of the agents have been try- ing to get into the major offices and shutter their own shops. They are unwanted because of set ways. Morris and MCA have, turned down plenty with reply that they want people from within their Qwn or- gani:^ions. Locally, boys were given a break when New York City officially ' banned cuffo shows for politicosi department heads, cops, firemen; etc. Theatre Authority has also helped decrease number of phoney benefits. It had conducted an edu- cation program in that directipn, trying to discourage frees perform- ances of acts for which it gets 15% of gross at benefits for splitup be- tween its charity affiliates and .the unions. It has also tended to knife the chiseling agents and bookers who used to work 'audition' and 'favor' tricks on acts when showf were actually paid lor. Showboats, Hurley, Borscht Agents ' got. little or nothing out of showboats this past summer. Nearly all folded' affer short run*. Similarly ret>a.T:'ng of burlesque to •^evue' or 'follies' meant nothing filhce shows rertained the same re- gardless. The regular' hurley per- centers, too, took a beating with I slack-oiT following the ' morals' i crackdown. Burley time cut from I 14 to six houses and the road felt it, too. So-called borscht' circuit j upped as an income source, with such ■ hotels beginning to pay for shows as I against previous board and lodging accommodations for Appearances. Even the larger offices took cog- I nlzance of this and booked some. Almost total absence of units this year was another kick to agents and bookers. South America perked a little and looks like it will improve this year. The Balnearia, Casino da Urea, Rio de Janeiro, largest down there, opened its own offices in New York last, month to facilitate booking of Yank acts. Figure for greater de- mand than ever, aided by cementing of Pan-Americanism, etc. Niteries took up the vaude slack to some extent for percenters. Although there were a fiock of bankruptcies, the activity of open- ings has been greater this year than previously, all of which helped. World's Fair will undoubtedly give boys some color in their cheeks again and promise of vaude is brighter. Starting with 'Hellzapop- pin,' and Casa Manana, vaude pic- ture brightened and there is prom- ise of more, particularly in New York, Record-breaking year of affilia- tions, changes, etc., that have been forced by the times and conditions are listed below in chart of events which paints full picture of the present situation around the coun- try. The Shifting Sands Rockwell-O'Keefe changes in- cluded Bill Burton leaving to man- age' Tommy Dorsey band. Ceil Campbell replacing him. Danny Collins (now on his own), Dick Ingraham, Bert Lown, Jack Witte- more, Ralph Wonders aTI left R-O'K and were succeeded by Harry Romm, Milton Fickman, Cy Manes, Harry Squires and Frank Cooper, In R-O'K Coast pffice Ralph Won- ders replaced Harmon Nelson. Ar- thur Weems and Norman Doyle were added to Coast staff. Dick Wheeler opened the Dallas oflice for R-O'K. Major change in office, however, was splitup of Tommy Rockwell and Cork O'Keefe combo after four years, with O'Keefe opening his own indie shop. Joe Glaser also exited R-O'K setup, taking with him his Negro talent and bands. Opened his own office: Consolidated Radio Artists had Ed Kirkeby, Frank Burke, Milton Roemer quit. .Latter is managing on his own while Kirkeby switched to the Phil Ponce office. Russ Lyons, Paul Kapp, Bill Yon Zehle, Milton Shaffer and Johnny Green- hut were added. Charlie Yates agency took over theatre represen- tation for CRA, while Lou Irwin closed his New York office (from where Larry Puck exited to go on his own), and combined his own with CRA in Hollywood. Also in CRA, Phil Brown was transferred from Cleveland to Chicago office, while Pat Lombard, Ed Kreisler, Herbert Mintz, Lucille Ballantine and Dick Stevens were added to Chi office. Stanford Zucker, v-p of CRA, transferred from New York to Chicago diu-ing year. Nor- man Kendall was added to Cleve- land staff. CRA also opened Frisco offices with Denny Moore, Allen Powell, Larry Allen, Dick Dorso (former partner in band agency with Tom Coakley) and Kurt Tour-, ney. Cress Courtney was trans- ferred from Chicago to Dallas of- fice of CRA, wtiile Bob Sanders took over Dallas management froin Charles Moyerl Sanders was re- placed by Lou Irwin in Holljrwood. Talk of CRA-Rockwell merger has been squashed. At Music Corp. of America, Ar- thur Keriaga, BiU "Von" Zehle, Milton Pickman^ and Lathrdp M^dk exited. Harry Moss replaced latter after varied year of goii^g froih Mills Art- ists to CRA, to Charlie'Rapp, to own office to Music Corp. MCA also added Bart McHugh, Irving Lazar, George Walker and Johnny Dugan to staff. Mills Artists office severed its booking connection with Consolidat- ed Radio Artists. CRA was booking Mills attractions. Mills decided to go back into booking on own again. Norman Campbell was .added and later exited,: HeAad his own office- after quitting defunct Radio Orches- tra Corp., foldee of past year. Hal Sands recently closed his own shop to produce nitery shows for Mills. Paul "Whiteman's Artist Manage- ment has, during the past year, added Paul Wimbish, Frank Burke, Norman Campbell, while Irving Strouse. exited. 'Wimbish now has his own agency. He was with Charlie Shribman 'fore that. Myron Stelznick, Ltd., New York, was formed just a year ago, absorb- ing the Herman Bernie office. For- merly, Leland Hayward office han- dled Selznick's eastern biz. Bernie is new v-p in east, working with Jack Chaqueneau and Bob Glenzer. Guy Martin left when two merged and joined Kurt Robitschek, agent, who has since turned vaude producer with Shuberts. In Mark Hanna-Leland Hayward office Fred Bethal was taken on from Columbia Broadcasting. Dorothy "Vernon came over to Hanna's agency from Richard Pitman after Dora Maugham exited scene. Hayward was also joined by Maynard Morris from Walter Batcheller office, and Larry White came in from Hayward Coast office to N. Y. office. Lyons & Lyons saw but three changes, with addition of Bill Stuhler and Don Stauffer, latter from Young & Rubicam agency. Dave Jonas left to join Bill Miller's Artists Syndicate of America. William Morris office also had sev- eral changes during past year, and looks in line for more. Lou Wolfson switched to Music Corp. and then re turned.. Ed Fishman left Rockwell O'Keefe Dallas office to handle bands for Morris. Ned Dobson and Harry Friedman joined Coast branch. Wal- lace Jordan, formerly McKnight & Jordan, radio producers, joined re cently to head Chi office's radio de partment. Maurice Morton is an other recent radio addition. Harry Ommerle joined about a year ago in radio. Jimmy Parks and Charles Hogan are no longer with Chicago office. Mark Daniels added to legit division this past year. Donald Hyde, Al Schenckin and Joe Sully either upped or were transferred to differ- ent departments throughout organi- zation. Dorothea Lewis succeeded Bob Goodhue in literary division. Al Allen left Morris little over year ago to join Ed Sherman, booker. Office also expanded over past year into much larger quarters. The Fanchon & Marco office first severed its co-op pact with Consoli- dated Radio Artists and then con- densed its New York offices. Paul Dempsey exited to partner with Ed- gar Benson, while John Schultz went off to. solo on the Coast. Harry Flamm also went with the shrinking, and is On his own. Agency has since combined its booking and agenting activities as so many others have during past couple of years.' Have smaller quarters now. • Among the larger indies, Curtis & Allen broke up, with Charles Allen remaining in the east on his own, where he. recently added radio de- partment with Fred Norman, latter closing own office. Curtis wfent to Hollywood to join Winslow, Craw- ford & Curtis agency. Herbert Hoey and Irving Sherman also dropped out of C. & A. Irwin Simon, brother of late Ferde Simon, died this year, with Charlie Yates and brother Irv- ing Yates taking over reins and also working with CRA on theatres. Phil Coscia became associated with them, as did Jimmy Picchiani, former acro- bat, now handling fair dates. Murray. Gordon came in for cafes. Ben Shainen went from Simon to own business. Johnny Dugan went from Simon to Music Corp. Phil. Offin, who exited Simon, is now on his o\yn. Old Leddy & Smith office sev- ered this year, Mark Leddy remain- ing east while Ed ^mith went Coast- ward. He came back fast, and hopes to try again here. Bill Miller took over the Artists Syndicate of Ameri- ca when former partners, Matty Rosen and Lester Lee, exited. Rosen is now road agent with Ramona or- chestra. The Indies 'Among strictly indie agents changes have been very manyi Jaick Pauer closed bis pwn .office to wofk with Arthur Fisher; Irving Tishman, last with Yates, now on his own; Al Roth,:conductor working out of Rudy Vallee office, opened his own book- ing office recently; Alex Hanlon went to /Australia .as agent with ^QllyWood Hotel' unit arid left Sam Shepard in charge; Chester Stratton, forhier chief booker for RKO and last with NBC Artist Service, bas quit the, business altogether, and is now working with a national dis- tilling house. Louis Loomis and Jack Allen have closed their of- fice. and are reading with Ludwig Satz's Jewish Repertory; Edgar Allen has gone to the Coast; Ed MiUen, former : Pantages booker who turned, advance agent, has returned to agenting field. Added are Harold Ward, who quit Al Gross- man to go' for himself; Jack Hart now WPA after working with Billy Jackson; Harry Ward, former RKO agent, is another gone west; Aaroh Kessler, former RKO agent, is WPA show manager now; Dan Friendly, former RKO booker, is agenting, and Al Rickard, actor, .quit the Ed Sher- man office and returned to ventrilo- quism. Sam Robbins also left de- funct Radio Orch. Corp. and moved to Sam Stiefel office, as did Frances Foster, sister of Ed Fishman, head of Morris office's band (Jept. Add to list of newcomers, D'Aguiar Mendonca, booker rep of the Bal- neria Casino da Urea, Rio de Janeiro, who opened offices this year, and Frederick Bros,, band-managing out- fit of Cleveland, which opened New York branch. Miles Ingalls and Jack Davies have also opened an office together, Ingalls originally left Cur- tis & Allen to .work for the French Casino Corp.'s In.ternational Booking Office, Another larger scale item was switch of Charles Freeman, Paramount and Interstate booker, to offices of Billy Rose's Casa Manana, Where he books the shows and Inter- state time. FISCHER OUT OF LOND. CASINO; SHOW TOURS London, Jan. 1. Clifford C. Fischer's show closed at the. London Casino Dec. 31, and goes on a vaudeville tour. With Fischer out of the Casino, house goes temporarily dark. Sev- eral nibbles are reported from op- position concerns. But the only ones likely to acquire an interest in the Casino are Charles Clore and Al- fred Asdaile, operators of the con- tinuous revue at the Prince of Wales theatre. Understood to be taking over any day now and will continue nitery policy, doubling talent from Prince of Wales. Also reported seeking a name .comedian from America. Adelphi shuttered Dec. 31. A review of Fischer's revised re- vue at the International Casino, N. Y., is in the current issue. Hollywood Rink Does Fast Fo!d; 12G Loss Hollywood, Jan. 1. Tropical Ice gardens in suburban Westwood reorganizing after taking $12,000 loss on show. Replica of St. Moritz cost $180,000. Operators are reported trying to raise another $40,000 to pay off con- struction indebtedness. Assemblyman Predicts Passagfe of Agency Bill/ Albany, Jan. 1. In announcing he would reintro- duce his bill to place all private em« ployment agencies, under state con- trol. Assemblyman Hatold C. Oster- tag, Wyoming County Republican, predicted passage because 'the gov- ernor is for it, organized labor is for it, the Republicans control both houses of the legislature and we have overcome the objections offered by New York City.' The measure, which would also af- fect theatrical agencies, has been th« pet project of Ostertag since he en- tered the Assembly in 1932. Nitery Notes Maroel La Mace cafe opened In Hollywood Dec. 23. Medrano and Donna into Waldorf's Sert Room Jan. 5. Gloria, LaMarr warbling at Stage One Cafe. L. A. . Betty Bryant singing at the Mar- cus Daily, Los Angeles. Joe Frisco into Babe Hensley'f Club 17, Los Angles. Florentine Gardens, Hollywood, opened with two flesh shows nightly, and Emil Baffa's dance band. Texas Bockets, dance ensemble, currently at Saks Club, Detroit, for a four-week engagement. Trocadcro reopens in L. A. Dec. 29 with Ted Fio RIto's orchestra. Strouds Play N. Y. Philadelphia, Jan. 1. Stroud Twins, current at Jack Lynch's Walton Roof here, close Wednesday (4) after a two-week run. Play Loew's State, New York, for a week and then head for Europe unless tentatively set dates on Rudy Vallee's air show come through. HOGAN TURNS H^IE Chicago, Jan. 1. Charlie Hogan, vaude agent and booker, lias left the William Morris office to open his'own headquarters. Hogan will continue to book War- ner, Saxe and Standard theatres throughout this territory.