Variety (February 1944)

Wedneada^' February 2f 1944 PICTURES 19 Deerea For a Decade Continued from page 9 from he consent companies though no mention is made of the size ot blocks to be offered at any one time. Changes in the. agreement now be- ing considered at the Chi indie conr fab include easing of ^the provision limiting circuit expansion and would allow chains to acquire new houses in a territory without obtaining court permission in following cases: 1. Showcase houses; 2. acquiring house for road show attractions; 3. replacement :deaU 4. .entrance into town where not already represented. Fool, operators would be given one year to discontinue their agreement and one member of pool would be al- lowed to take over entire owner- ship of house and the arbitration of designation of run clause has. been changed' to allow indies to partici- pate on'\basis of future acquisition of the changes as they affect the overall decree. Decree Trio Stands Federal Judge Henry W. God-' dard Tuesday (1) reappointed and extended until Feb. 1,-1945, the terms of George W; Alger, chairman; Albert W. Putnam and Robert Mc. Marsh, members, of the three-man appeal board es^ tablished under the film indus- try's consent decree. . Action taken after TomC. ■ Glark, Assistant U; S; Attorney : General handling the decree/had •forwarded a request to the court to reappoint the men. Attorneys for . the five consenting com- panies also, approved the move. of theatres. Originally this clause applied only to indies doing business at time decree was drawn up. :'. Another proposal extends time for filmv cancellations because of moral or purely local objections and al- / lows five days to cancel if not play able. .■ .,. Clark's Beaction Also being discussed is a clause forbidding withholding of prints to give a competing exhibitor a. prior playing date not provided for in his license. Clark will make a decision within 80-days, it is expected; on whether to>>accept :-the altered proposals or throw the entire dispute into Fed eral Court. "It would be better for the indus- try and all concerned at this time,' the Asst. U. S. Attorney said, "to have this thing cleared up by nego- tiation and not court action." He emphasized that the changes j^eing discussed in Chicago do not neces- sarily reflect the wishes of the Dept. Of Justice which still may approve or disapprove :of the proposals in line with its decisions as to merits ; . .Pennsy Indies MeA Philadelphia, Feb. 1. More than 125 indie theatres were represented at the 6th. annual meet- ing of Allied Independent Theatre Owners of Eastern Pennsylvania at the Hotel Warwick last week, Chief speaker was Abram F. Myers, general counsel of National Allied, who discussed the proposed increase in taxes on amusements and the consent decree. Elected to the board of governors for three year terms were David Barrist, Harry Fried, Norman Lewis and Henry Sork. Alternates chosen for one year ; terms ; were George Ickes, : Melvin . Koff and Thomas Lazarick. Sidney.' Samuelson was elected general: manager- Ben Fertel^ treas^ urer; E.'B. Gregory, secretary; Harry Ghertcoff, national director, with Morns Wax and George Ickes, alter nates. Joseph Conway was again chosen chairman of the finance com mittee, War Loan Drive Gonttnued from page 4 'bottlenecks" and to lend an ear to troubles and problems confronting local groups. Members of the "Flying BondS' .men" group are Qeorge J; Schaefer, Leonard Goldenson,. Robert Moohrie, Dan Michalove, Oscar. Doob, Abe Montague; Joe Vogel, Major Leslie E. Thompson. John H. Harris; Herman Robbins, Hariv Kalmme and Herman Wobber. I Most 'o£ the members of this group were present at the meet- ing last Friday when talks were made by Skouras, Si Fabian, Fran- cis S. Harmon, B. V. Sturdivant, Claude Lee and Robert Coyne; assist- ant national director of the Treas- iiry's War Finance Division. Meantime, roundup of bond drive activities around the country are indicative of the strong effort being made by showmen to spur the cam- paign. More Bonds Than Town's Pop. ■ e. L. Martin, independent .exhibi- tor operating the Republic, Republic, Mo., sold 985 bonds. Jotal population of the town is 841. Theatre seating capacity is 300. At Quincy, Mass.. Frances Dee and Alan Marshall sold $200,000 in war bonds at a dinner. In Philadelphia the Board of Edu- cation endorsed the "Junior Home Front" tleup which will place 250,000 Philadelphia school children into the Fourth War Loan drive. At least 400 theatreB in the .city will join in this tieup, Anne Baxter, at a dinner in Balti- more, sold $5,000,000 worth of bonds. Franchot Tone and Lucille Ball; appearing at a Navy Yard in Phil- adelphia* sold $300,000 worth of bonds.."" Ella Raines, appearing at the Issac- son Iron Works, Seattle, Wash,, sent bond subscriptions of workers up 200%, John Garfield and Jinx Falkenberg, appearing at the Mills- Indu-stries plant, Chicago, sold $113,000 bonds, tripling, the: quota. They also sold, $150,000 worth of bonds at the Utah radio products company and $115,060 worth at a Kiwanis rally in Forest Park, lU, Charles Ruggles and Elaine Shep- ard account for the sale of $529,000 worth of "E" bonds, Owensboro, Ky. In Spokane, Edgar Kennedy and war heroes, sold $750,000 in war bonds at a rally at the Spokane Army Air Depot, Red Skelton, appearing in Okla- homa City; sold $6,865,000 worth of bonds. ■ . ■ ■ ■■■ ■■ W. I. Williams, Victory theatre,' Eads, Colorado, sold a bond for every one of the seats in his 200-seat house. Population of Eads is 700. Bonds sold in the: theatre.amounted to $23,050. William H. Blair, owner and op- erator of the Blair, Osborne, Kan., helped' the; town double its quota of bond sales. He sold $134,558 at a Blair theatre rally 1 City's,quota was $64,900. Theatre operators in Denver plan to stage 33 bond preems. Treasury officials for Cook County, Illinois, stated that Jinx Falkenburg and John Garfield, had been largely responsible for the selling.of $55,000,- 000 in war bonds during their 10-day to.ur.' RKO'a $4,000,000 RKO Pictures and RKO Theatres Corp. have purchased $4,000,000 of U. S, Treasury Savings Notes Series "G" in connection with the Fourth War Loan: drive. Arrangements have been, made to allocate credit for the purchases through local war finance .commit- tees in cities where there are RKO houses or: film exchanges. President's D. C. Birthday Ball Continued from page S met a more receptive audience. It was a joy«*o play for them," Guy lioihbardo, maestro at the: Statler,-. had to be rescued by policis from autograph seekers. They sur- rounded the platform of, the: Royal Canadians and refused to let him lead his sweet musicians. , Plea, for Letters At the Lincoln .Colonnade ball for colored, John Garfield urged all sports lovers to write letters to Kid Chocolate, former. boxing.:champion, who he said had lost both legs and is now confined to Walter Reed hos-: pita!' . .' ■,■':■^^,;, :;;'. Paulette Goddard failed to make the Birthday Ball because of a mix- up m plane priorities: She was run- ning a temperature and needed a nurse to administer treatnient. On the California end the priority was sought for a "hair dresser," by mistake. No priority would be granted for such an appendage, the reserved': space being held for stars doing bond work. On the advice of her physician Miss Goddard re- mained .: in , Calif ornia,.. rather risk an illness. Fever was supposed to have been caused by inoculations taken, for her latest picture, '.'Oft Shore." When -John Garfield arrived in Washington he was. ushered to a hotel suite, discovered its: closets occupied. Later when he went into the .bathroom he' found the cabinet filled with shaving appointments. Clothing belonged to army officers^ Inquiry at the hotel desk disclosed that the only suite available was. .one: occupied by the two officers who ..were away over the weekend.. Later another room was .found tor Garfield; .Bean . Murphy; emcee of . the. Earte 'theatre, placed his shoes.. m the hotel Statler servidor. When he inquired about them they could not he found.. So he did his stunt' at the Earle and Capitol theatres in his. carpet-slippers. While the star list was not as im- pressive as on previous occasionsi • Washington Birthday Ball receipts will run 30% over the previous high record. Midnight shows were sell- outs and hotel reservations tor-the Saturday night (29) whoopee broke all records. The increase is attribu- ted to the large number of Govern- ment workers who had never: seen a ball in Washington and shelled out for the experience^ In 1943 the net receipts were $143,000 for the cele- bration. This year they will reach $iaO,000._ Midnight shows at Capitol and Ear'le were sold for $1.65 and ,'$2 20 March of Dimes collections in the theatre last year netted $31,000. This year they will reach $60,000. $9,000,000 to Date Hollywood, Feb. 1. Motion Picture War Finance Com- mittee announces a record figure of $9,000,000 for the first half of the Fourth War Loan Drive. Total was boosted to $1,500,000 .by Warner Bros, purchases. ' Although the ' Hollywood Bond Battalion tour for moA of the screen players ended last weekend, many groups will continue to tour for the remaining two weeks of the drive. . Wlieities:' anJ ''Brtikfist of'- Clumpipris" tte fwiscfi'e'd trail <narki of Gcnertl MilU; Int. : 'fGee whiz pop,,don't teli me they had Wheaties in tliem.days. In the Battle of the Sexes, Wheaties do indeed play a vital ■roleii . but persuasivelyf tather than through brute force. For in- stance, many a wife converts her husband' from an early morning .terfor into a truly civilized being, via a bowlful of Wheaties. RKO HlUstreet Bond SRO Premiere at the RKO Hillstreet theatre, L; A;, last night (31), was a complete sellout. : B6nd sale total of $6,140,000 rep- resents a bond for each of 3,000 seats. A similar bond show is to be held next Monday C7) at Grauman's Chi- nese theatre, Hollywood, U Newsreeler Back After 2 Years With MacArthur Earle Crotchett, Universal news- reel cameraman and war correspond- ent; back in N. Y. after two years with, General Douglas MacArthur, was able to obtain about 3,500 feet of film on the battle of Gloucester; his last assignment before returning home. He claimed that the Army scissored about 500 feet of this foot- age. Crochett expressed the belief that much newsreel footage, pre- viously censored; would be released to various companies: after the war was ended. Admitting it was tough to get any battlefront action material, he claimed the closer the newsreeler got to the battlefront the better the cooperation from the military com- manders. Crotchett has been with, U since 1931. POSTPONE HOCHSTEIN TRIAL Federal Judge;Vincent :L. • Leibell Tuesday (1) postponed the trial of Harry Hochstein, former Chicago of- flcial, until March 7 in N. Y. federal .court., ■■ ■ Hochstein is accused of committing perjury before a Federal grand jury in connection with the recent $1,000,- 000 extortion trial of six Chicago gangsters. New York Theatres 6th WEEK CARY GRANT JOHN GARFIELD in Warner. Bros. Hit "DESTINATION TOKYO" IN , PERSON ; CHARLIE BARNET & Ore Alao Ella Mae Morse Lowe, Hite & Stanley "iTv m"*" strand "'.iTTtu * Merle OBKItON • Geo. SANDKBS Laird CBEUAR "The LODGER" A 2»th Century-lfox Pletiire Plus .4 n ^ \/ V ROXY ,o„fs,. Ttiure., FO, 3 . On Sereen Rofiallna Bumelt Briaja Ahcme in "WHAT A WOU\N!" In FersoB MARION BUTTON Kxtnil WI3880K BB08 20TH CENTURY-FOX Presents ■ "SONG OF BERNADEnE" ; Continuous Performance , Doors Op«n 10 A.Mk RIV O L r B'wtty & 49th St. Oo the Semm 7th W«k SpMctr TRACY Irtnr DUNNI In M G-SI'I 'A Guy Named Joe' Ctua\tev Miwntm I •> flu mur^' , , In Verson Kathryn , GRAYSON L RIchird HIMBER t anil His Oreft LOU HOLTZ anri Others ALFRED HITCHCOCK'S LIFEBOAT nr JOHX SXEINBKCK : Contlnuoiia aQTrtP B'wiiy * PopnlaT rrlc« AOlUn 45ti, st. PALACE B WAY & 47th St. Mk'Uele Jack: IVank MOBGA>- • HALEY • SINATBA "HIGHER and HIGHER" ?APv«» MUSIC HALL "JANE EYRT SpMtaeular Stags Productions I Waid's Objective, Flyoii Hollywood, Feb. 1. Warners handed Jerry Wald the producer taslc on Errol Flynn's next wartime starrer, 'Objective Burma." Filming starts about March 1, with Raoul Walsh directing from script by Alvah Bessie. RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL Betty UL'TTOK Eddie BBACKEN m .Paramount's ■Th« MIRACLE at MORGAN'S CREEK' ■ ■■, In Person , Jolinuy:LOMG t HID OrclieHtra Huzel SCOTT Cll I./VMH - PABAMOUNT "^iT." /"?""^»'?- HVV MOBB ' WAK BONUS The Greatest Name in Show Business EARL CARROLL VANITIES