Variety (Sep 1942)

Wednesday, September 23, 1942 TAUDEVILLE 4S ODT Oamps Dowihon^peci^^^ Transportation by Niteries in Ohio As Means to Curb Waste of Rubber Cleveland, Sept. 22. Government bureaus assigned to curb the waste of rubber are bear- Inc down on northern Ohio's swank niteries and may succeed in shut- Uring them- where all efforts ol local law agencies have ttiled. Arrow Club, a thorn in the side of Cleveland sheriffs for Ave years, Is the first here to come under the Arc of the Office of Defense Trans- portation as the result of a new fed- eral ruling. Under this edict neither club-owned limousines nor private cars can be used to carry patrons to a nitery. Local investigator discovered that thn Arrow Club operates a fleet of eight passenger sedans which charge customers %\ per head for a rid* from Cleveland to the nitery in nearby Geauga County. Richard Allen, field manager for the Cleveland area of the ODT Mo- tor Transport Division, appointed to mike investigation, also reported that these club limousines broke gcvernment rules by often driving faster than 50 miles per hour, and that the Arrow's parking lot is full of privately owned autos daily. Alleged operators of the spot, for which the government is gunning for the first time, are Tommy McGinty, Morris Kleinman, Chuck PolizzI, Moe Davis, and the Angersola Bros., also known as George and Johnny King. CleTeland Cafe Man Indicted as Fence For $2,400 Stolen Gems Cleveland. Sept. 22. Grand jury last week indicted Benny Mason, owner of Cedar Coun- try Club often involved in policy racket cases, on charges of fencing jewelry stolen from a local home last November. Although the hot ice was valued ai $2,400, detectives declared that it was purchased by the nitery op- erator tor $110. Sentence being passed later this week. Investigation of the jukebox racket behind five Cleveland bombings in the last six months was also started by the grand jury. Leroy Robin- son, * 37, a jukebox distributor ac- cu-ed of extortion attempts from two cifes that were mysteriously dyna- m.^ed after refusing to install his music-boxes, inspired the expose. Twenty witnesses were subpoenaed to testify against him in case that opened Saturday (10). New Chi Yander Chicago, Sept. 22. Roseland-Stale, playing pictures only, has started Sunday night stage shows, either name bands or five acts of vaude. ^ Jan Garber booked Sept. 20, Claude Thornhill, Sept. 27. Charlie Hogan is booking. CHI AGV A HIKES NITERY SCALES USO TO HOLD AUDITIONS FOR NEGROES IN N. Y. USO-Camp Shows, Inc., will hold New York auditions for Negro per- formers at Nola Studios tomorrow (Thursday) from 2-5 and 8-11 p.m. Looking for small bands and novelty acts. Noble Sissle, Addison Carey and Jimmy Payne will handle the auditions. Good Neighborliness Last minute addition of Tom Scott, erstwhile musical arranger for Fred Waring, saved the new Rain- bow Room (N. Y.) show, which opened last week, from becom- ing known as the Casa Rockefel- ler. Scott does New England sea chanties and mountaineer songs. Otherwise it's 100% Latin, with Perlita Greco, making her U. S. debut; Senor Wences, Del Casino's new band (succeeding Carmen Cavallaro), Dacita and her Rhumba band, and Monno Montes-Alexis Dolinoff, Incidentally, Dacita now owns her own band, instead of merely front- ing somebody else's. Raoul Bara- gan is her pianist-arranger. Leo Reisman follows Casino Oct. 28. Bob Astor opens the New Penn hotel, Pittsburgh, for four weeks starUng Sept. 31. Chicago, Sept. 22. Living costs having risen, the lo- cal American Guild of Variety Art- ists has raised its minimum basic wage scale in Chicago niteries to meet the wartime situation. Class A establishments in Chicago will henceforth pay a minimum of- $75 for principals, $150 for teams, $40 for chorus, and $45 for chorus specialties. Class B establishments in this area will pay $5 for m.c.'s, $100 for teams, $50 for singles, $35 for chorus and $40 for chorus specialties. Class B spots outside the Chicago city limits will pay m.c.'s $75, plus roundtrip transportation. Teams will get $125, singles $60, chorus $40 and chorus specialties, $45. all plus complete roundtrip..expenses. Class C in Chicago will pay $55 for m.c.'s, $90 for teams, $40 singles, $30 chorus, and $35 chorus special* ties. Outside the city limits C eistab lishments will pay $60 to m.c.'s, $100 to teams, $50 to singles, $30 to chorus and $35 to chorus specialties plus roundtrip transportation. Cocktail lounge entertainers and singers within the Loop will receive a minimum of $50 a week in Class A spots. $45 in clas.<; B places and $35 in class C niteries. Outside the Loop, they will receive $50 in class A, $40 in class B and $35 in class C spots. The maximum amount of floor shows per week shall not exceed 22 shows, three on each night and four on Saturdays. All contracts must specify the number of shows. All salaries listed are less 10% with the exception of the chorus, whose salaries are net. Salaries listed are not to be prorated where a week consists of only six days. Six or seven days constitutes a full week, according to the AGVA rul ing. L. A. AGVA Ups Pay Hollywood. Sept. 22. Minimum pay for members of the L. A. chapter of AGVA has been raised to $35 weekly for solos and $70 for teams under new scale draft COAST NITERIES GO RAIDING FOR HELP Los Angeles. Sept. 22 Along with other wartime short- ages, the niteries in this sector are battling with a scarcity of cooks, bartenders, waiters and other em- ployees required in the dispensation of food and drink: Operators of the better spots are raiding their less prosperous brethren and tempting competent workers with higher wage scales and more generous tips. Army draft and Naval enlistment have taken large numbers of em ployees out of circulation, and ..igh wages in the airplane plants have taken more. Another cause of the shortage is the government edict re- quiring alien."! to stay home at night Mpls. Help Situation Minneapolis, Sept. 22. Obtaining kitchen and other help, many of whom have gone into the armed .icrvices or war industries, is becoming an increasingly difficult problem for local niteries and some may be forced to shut .<;hop though busine.cs is at a peak. A few already are working on a six-day instead of customary seven day schedule. Plymodth, WoVcester, May Go Full Week Worcester, Sept 22. Plymouth theatre, running vaude- ville three days weekly, may go to seven days soon. Management is attempting to sked Horace Heidt for seven-day stint, and if orchs of-similar rting can be obtained, house will switch. Wheeler Shells Ont $500 To Skip Passaic Date In Avoiding Triorities' Snag Independent booker Arthur Fisher cost Bert Wheeler $500 to get out of two shows at the Central, Passaic, N. J.,, in order to make the opening of Clifford C. Fischer's 'Priorities of 1943' in its New Haven tryout Sept. 10. That was the same day Wheeler was scheduled to close his one-week date in Pasisaic. It's understood that the theatre management was willing to let Wheeler off for the two shows he would necessarily have had to miss in order to make New Haven in time, but Fisher, who books the house, instructed the Central to hold out for a money settlement. He actually suggested over the tele- phone that Wheeler would probably pay $500—which the comic did. Actually, the entire mixup was the result of Clifford C. Fischer switch- ing his opening, day for the New Haven tryout. Originally it was set for Sept. 11, which would have given Wheeler plenty of time to complete the Passaic date, but at a late hour Fischer learned that Al and Belle Dow had booked a vaudeville, show into New Haven for Sunday (13) at pop prices. Fischer then scheduled his three-day break-in one day earlier, so that he would not be forced to. compete with a lower- scaled stage show on the Sabbath. \% lATSE TUT IN DEL; STAGE SHOWS? Detroit, Sept. 22. A 10% increase in pay is being worked out in all contracts being lined up ))?re by the lATSE. New contracts for that increase for stage- hands have been signed with the Lafayette, Cass and Paradise thea- tres, Ray Showalter, business agent said, with no change in working conditions. All new contracts will be handled on the same basis. The negotiations were closely watched here by several nabe op- erators who are planning to install stage shows this year if costs don't go too high. Vaudeville seems on the verge of an upswing in the neighborhood houses because of the war boom with the only other ob- .Macle beside production costs be- ing the availability of talent. Ted Hanunerstein Joins Camp Shows as Super Ted Hammerstein joins USO- Camp Shows, Inc., as a field super- visor working out of Atlanta, Ga. He replaces Ken Nichols, who is coming to New York to handle the spot show bookings in place of Bert Wishnew. Latter shifts over to aid Harry Delmar in the production dept. With Denis Dufor working as a field supervisor out of Chicago this is tantamount to a revival of the old production firm of Hammerstein & Dufor. Making the Big Time PitUburgh, Sept. 22. Donna Geisler, local one-girl band who started here on Brian McDon- ald's WJAS Amateur Hour just a few years ago, finally hits the big time this week, going into the show at Billy Rose's Diamond Horseshoe in New York. Gal was discovered by Sid Marks, an agent, who still manages her. Up until just about nine months ago, her only experience was in club and banquet wodk here/ Lately, however, she's bean malong a lot of out-of-town niterieys. inoluding Bow- ery, Detroit, and plaHng some vaude as well To Mull Joint Arbitrary Group That Would Settle Jurisdictional Snarls Proser Pays Off Monte Proser has paid up several overdue salary obligations contracted a couple of years, all of which he had personally guaranteed, and is now off the unfair list at the Ameri- can Guild of Variety Artists. Coin was due Carmen D'Antonio and Toy and Wing for their work at his old Beachcomber nitery in New York. Total amount involved was around $400. N. Y. HOTELS SET FOR TOP SEASON Hotel Plaza's Persian Room, N. Y., reopens tonight (Wednesday) ' with Hildegarde and -Bob Grant's music. It's the first time away for Miss Hil- degarde from the Savoy-Plaza, which will continue Renee de Marco and Roy Ross' music until Morton Downey opens Oct. 1. The Hotel Pierre, N. Y., is aiming for mass attention via regular MBS 'Dinner at the Pierre' radio pro- gram with Stanley Melba's music. Latter is also general entertain- ment director of the hostelry, which inducts the new policy Oct 1 with Virginia Schools, from musical com- edy, and Myrus, magico, as floor interludes. Expects Big Season Hotel St. Regis' managing director, Giiston Lauryssen, thinks so much of the season to come that he's re- opening the Maisonette as well as the Iridium rooms, latter on Oct. 1, with a benefit dinner dance for Musi- cians Emergency Fund. After that th>; room will be informal, for the duration, and the last die-hard spot to let down the bars. Paul Sparr's orchestra and Ethel Smith's trio will give out, moving downstairs from t!i(> Vienhese Roof. The Maisonette will have a Mrs. Vineent Astor gala Oct. 7, for the Soldiers & Sailors Club. Bob Terry and Freddy Miller, newcomers, will head the two bands in that boite, variously known as Maisonette Russe, Hawaiian Maisonette and now just M. Waldorf's $1,7S« and % Gracie Fields headlines the Wedg- wood Room of the Waldorf-Astoria, N. Y., when it reopens for the sea- son Oct. 9 with Emil Coleman's or- chestra. English comedienne is in on a guarantee and percentage. Danny Kaye may follow her in No- vember, doubling from 'Let's Face It.' Miss Fields, who got $2,500 weekly at the Chez Paree, Chicago, is in at $1,750 and 50% of the covers above a set figure. Sophie Tucker, who follows Miss Fields into Chez Paree. Chicago, is due to come to New York around Xmas to succeed Joe E. Lewis as headliner at the Copacabana. 'V We Sing' Lyricists Denied N. Y. Injunction Lyricist of songs used in the stage production 'Of V We Sing' were denied an injunction last week by Supreme Court Justice Benedict D. Dineen in a suit which also seeks an accounting of profits from Alex Cohen, young producer of the show, and La Conga, N. Y. nitery where it had been presented as a floor show. Claiming a violation of their per- formance rights, the plaintiffs, Sam Locke, Mike Stratton. Al Hayes, Lewis Allan and Lou Cooper, allege the songs were used without au- thorization. Jack Harris, owner of La Conga, had originally booked the show for two weeks beginning Sept. 3, on an agreement with Cohen for $1,250 a week and a percentage of the gross. Soph's Seattle Date Seattle, Sept. 22. Sophie Tucker opens at Mike [.>cns' Show Box night spot Oct. 9 fo. two weeks. Then plays other Coast spots. Paul DuUzell, executive secretary of Actors Equity, last week called a confab of representatives of the theatrical craft unions to discuss the possibility of organizing a joint com- mittee to avoid future jurisdictional squabbles similar to the recent tussle between American Guild of Variety Artists and Equity over 'Wine, Women and Song.' In 'Wine,' the producers, who in- clude the ShJberts and Izzy Herk, among others, had concluded their arrangements with AGVA before Equity entered the picture. Dull- zell's argument is that a joint com- mittee would settle the problem of a show's rating before any contracts were issued and enable all the crafts to give a show the same rating. In the past the two-a-day vaude shows have been getting a vaude rating via AGVA and a legit rating from the musicians. Reps of the musicians, stagehands, treasurers, managers, wardrobe women, and AGVA attended the confab, with further meetings due in the near future after the several units have had a chance to mull the proposal. Army CalF Splits, Up . DuVaL Merle & Lee For Duration of War Pittsburgh, Sept 22 With departure of one of the trio'i two male members, Howard Lee, for the army this weekend, comedy -adagio act of DuVal, Merle and Lee will disband following their cur- rent engagement here at the Stanley, Threesome has been together for nearly four years, but DuVal and Merle have been partners since 1928, when they were half of an adagio quartet Impossibility of getting a replace- ment who wouldn't also be subject to an early service call prompted turn to retire when Lee shoves off. Act closes at the Stanley Thursday night (24) and he goes into the army the following day. REVUE-TYPE VAUDE INTO N.O. HOUSE New Orleans, Sept 22, This city will have stage shows again for the flrst time in years. The St. Charles theatre, renanied the Casino de Par^e, will reopen Friday (25) with the flrst of a se- ries of tab musicals. The building has been leased for five years by.,the Folies" Bergere, Inc., of which S. Jay Kaufman, of New York, is pres- ident. Productions will be French In flavor and performances will be con- tinuous, the usual policy being four shows daily, with an added mid- night show on Saturday. Eddie Lynch is the dance director and Lennie Burton, stage director, Edward Waldo, former New Orleans newspaperman. Is press agent. The theatre has a seating capacity o| about 2,500, No Pitt Chorine Dearth Pittsburgh, Sept. 22. Pittsburgh is one key city any- way where there's no chorus girl shortage. Issuing a call for chorines a month ago, with Hirst wheel's de- cision to drop traveling lines and let each burlesque theatre have its permanent ensemble, George Jaffe, manager of the Casino, was met with such a rush that he not only filled his own needs but was also able to send a couple of dozen sing- ers and dancers to other wheel cities where shortages existed. Several went to Akron, Bridge- port, Dayton, Toledo and other key spots in the Hirst setup, and Jaffe'a still interviewing girls as a result of many requests from other fellow- managers. Gals in burley lines are getting $30 per week this season.