Variety (Dec 1942)

SCREEN RADIO MUSIC STAGE Publlshad Wcaklr >t 164 Weat 46th Street, New Tork, N, !., by Variety, Ina Annual aubgcrlptlon, 110. SIntU ooptea II canta Entered aa Second-claaa matter December 9t, 1906, at tha Poat OSlca at New Tork, N. X., under the act it MArch I, IBTt. COPTRIOHT, IMS, BT TABIETX, IKC. ALL BIGHTS RESERVED VOL. 149 No. 2 NEW YORK. WEDNESDAY. DECEMBER 23, 1942 PRICE 25 CENTS Temme Theatrical Task Force' AWddWarUShowK^ By JOE SCHOENFELD Sunday, Dec. 27, Somewhere in ' England, will end one of the great chapters in the saga ot American show business in the war effort On , that date, before an audience of I United States' and United Kingdom ' troops, four girls will be winding up the longest consecutive tour yet played by volunteer talent at off- shore ba5es. In cold type that doesn't read so ; romantic. Yet, behind It is an ex- citing story of courage and persever- ; ance, sympathy and patriotism that 1 so completely redounds to the credit . ot the girls that the entire entertaln- ; ment world can take a bow for being '. their springboard. Remember the names: I Kay Francis Martha Raye Carole Landla. MItzl Mayfalr. That's the 'Feminine Theatrical , Task Force." but it's not the order of their billine. Shuffle them any way ; you want and you must come up with a heroine of sorts. The roles they play in the com- mercial theatre are at startling vari- ance. Kay Francis is the glamorous lady; Martha Raye the hoyden: Carole Landis the sweater girl; Mitzi Mzyfair the dainty dancer. Before they embarked on this tour, two of the girls, Misses Raye and Mayfair, j (Continued on page 25) Regal Gesture Finale of all performances on their tour of U. S. Army camps in England by Kay Francis, Martha Raye, Carole Landis and Mitzi Mayfair has been the sing- ing of the 'Star Spangled Ban- ner' and then 'God Save the King.* When appearing for the distaff side of the Royal Family at a special performance, the girls surprised the Queen- by their knowledge of the lyrics to the British anthem. Later, when she received the performers, the Queen pledged herself to learn the words to the American anthem in return. FILM Bi; m GRADE B BANDS BYDRAH Crosby, Whos« Plugging Skyrocketed %nas/ Now CanH Sing'tt Xmas he Hollywood, Dec. 22. j Although credited with skyrocket I ing Irving Berlin's 'White Christ— ■,mas' to its immense popularity ' through film and recording. Bing Crosby won't be allowed to sing it ; on his Kraft airshow Thursday (24). Sensing there would be a rush of the tunc, Martin Gosch, producer of the Abbott & Costello program for Camel, cleared the song a month ago and immediately put in his bid with NBC, which shut off the ballad from any other show airing within two hours on either side of the Camel entry. 3 Soldiers Get the 'Army Spirit/ Set It to Music Trio of privates at Camp Upto*. Long Island, are authors of a march- ing tune recently published by Leeds I Music. They are Alan Wilson, who I did the lyrics, and Nicholas Conte I and Buddy Kossc, who cleffed the I music. I Tune Is 'You First Get the Spirit in the Army.' It was originally writ- ten for use solely at Upton and sung as 'You First Get Ihe Spirit at Camp Upton.' It's paradoxical, In view of the fast turnover of musicians, but a number of bands below the top rungs in popularity are now showing up with the best.combinations any have ever, presented. With conscription constantly "wrecking various brass, reed, rhythm sections, sometimes.be- fore the teams can be welded into units, the reason for the improve- ment,, in most instances, is the clean- ing out of men who had held thoir positions only because they had been with a particular band so long they were fixtures. When these men are forced out of (Continued on page 47) Midnight Corfew On PounnjiiinNiteries Re?ives Hip-Totin Washington Hears RuiiijUes of Renewed Pre i^»u r e Should Hollywood At- tempt to Weaken Self- Regulation—OWi's Script 'Approval' Another Head- ache to the Industry Honywood Adheres to OWI Script Censorshp Edict Albeit Burned Up Sign of the Time* SPARRING ALL SIDES Washington, Dec. 22 If Hollywood persists in heckling the Hays office production code and attempts to weaken the moral fibre of self-regulation, then some 100 pas- sive agencies active for a clean screen will become aggressive in Congress for Federal censorship. Legion of Decency representatives were active on Capitol Hill last week, and they found receptive ears in members of tha House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Com- merce, who still favor the Neely bill and are ready to reintroduce it. Governor Neely, of West Virginia, failed in his attempt to regain his senate toga but the foes of the'mo- tion picture Industry are alert. Congress was busy packing up (Continued on page IS) ^ 290 PICTURES ON THE WAR Hollywood. Dec. 22. Pocket flasks, standard equipment with dinner jackets in the prohibi- tion days (remember?), are mnking a snappy comeback, what with a midnight curfew clampinc down on tht serving 91 drinks. The better stores are rei.iortinK a run on the slim containers and it's quite the thing to get one for Christmas. As in the dry days b.r. (before Roo.se- velt) it will be considered smart to dole out a drink after the witching hour. All th:it niteries ask is to keep it off the table. Night spoii were told last wcc k by Siv'.e Eonrd of Equalization that the lining up of drinks or unc.iikin; of bottle-: just before midniyht arc out. Office War Information, In ad- vising iWer and better war pic- tures.' points out that Hollywood has a total of 290 features on war- time angles either completed or in some stage of work or preparation. Figures show 40 features based on military themes released between Sept. 1 and Dec. 1, and half of them were about enemy spies, saboteurs and other hackneyed subjects. OWI advised the industry against drafting unnecessary war angles into pictures where they don't belong. MOSS HART'S AMERICAN WAR PIC FOR WARNERS Three-way deal for Moss Hart to join Warners as author-produccr- dlrector, which has been under dis- cussion, is near the Inking stage. Hart may do an American war theme similar in scope to Noel Cow- ard's 'In Which We Serve.' Conditions under which Hart is likely to join WB are similar to those for George S. Kaufman, with whom Hart has collabed, at Colum- bia. Those dime-a-danca oraep joints under tha old Columbtu avenue a'l in New York used to feature: 'Dancing, 99c for man, ladies free.' One spot now gives it a swltohr 'Ladies 7Sc, men In or out of uniform free.' STARS INSISTING ON 'BENEFIT' REGULATION As the benefit racket has now de- teriorated into an out-and-out black- jack, the Broadway (tars are band- ing together to put an end to it onca and for all. It's reached the stage where even the Park avenue bunch, which formerly paid fancy fees for coming-out and kindred social hoopla, now call their dances 'vic- tory parties', give a few bucks to USO or some such organization, and then put the slug on stars, In the name of patriotism. Jim Sauter, executive secretary of United Theatrical War Activities Committee, and Abe Lastfogel, pres- ident of USO-Camp Shows, Inc., now that he's back from London, are due to Mfr" toe«tja^r on this pronto, at~ tti^ insistence of such stars as Gsorde Jessel, Danny Kaye, Clifton WeWi^ Ray Bolger, et al. It's reachiTd the stage where these (Continued on page SO) > r ; Trop^Park Opeoing Ginng Mianu Big Hypo; •vV Miami, Dec 22. Wi^i niteries and. other spots al- ready? doing boom business, particu- larly'over weekends, when crowds are .jifeing turned away, .ppenins of Troi^cal ' Pork-jr^erday (21) and the scheduled pr6am of Lou Walter's Lal^n Quarter toritght (Tuesday), arel giving Miami the necessary hyttos i;punteract the anticipated drop in tratic. due to gas rationing and other wartlrn^ restrictions. While the inflitic of vnnter resi- dents is not neal-ly as great as in previous years, there isn't a nltery in town losing money. Not even the 12 o'clock ciu-few is hurting trade any. for the majority 6f paying cus- tomers are service men and they (Continued on page 92) Hollywood, Dec. 22. Although considerably disturbed by the ^Lowell Mellett order for sub- mission to the OWI Hollywood offica of ti^e^tments, scripts and pictures in Ibng cut, producers are continuing to comply by turning over scripts to Nelson Poynter, Mellett's rep in Hollywood. Spokesman for the of- fice said today (Tues.) that studio's have entered no objections to Mel- lett's ultimatum which some con- strue as on opening wedge to Fed- eral censorship of pictures before they are made. .Some producers insisted no scripts would be submitted except thgse having to do with war or home f^^ morale. Control of *|raining and propaganda pictures J^T^believed be- ing contested by Elmer Davis with the Army and Navy. Letter sent Hollywood studioscand which threw the Producers AjfSbclation into a mild furore at a meeting late last week, contained the following para- graph which some studio heads say won't be taken lying down. It reads: 'For benefit of both your studio and Office of War Information it would be advisable to establish a routing procedure whereby our Hollywood office would receive copies of studio treatments or syn- opses o( all stories which you con- template producing and of finished script^.' Propose Periodic Fire DriOs b N. Y. Theatres for Sliife^ Periodic fire drills In theatres is among new measures proposed. last' week in New York city council ^9 a means of tightening safety regu- lations in places of amusement in this sector. Another measture intro- duced calls for auxiliary.'lighting and loud speakers in theatres. Neither of the proposals has yet been acted upon, nowever, and await further discussion in committee. Officials o( the N. Y. City Police, Fire and Building departments, meantime, arc considering several other regulations designed to further (Continued on page 27) Theatres Tacking Cards On Trolleys, Buses Again Theatres are going back to the old system of advertising in tfbiley cars and buses, as a result ot the increasing travel on public convey- ances brought about by gas ration- ing. In addition, the amusement placet are buying advertising space on signboards, once leased by national motor companies, which have - no cars to advertise.