Variety (Mar 1946)

UTKRATI WedncMlay, March 6, 1946 Literati Cert Answer; Winchell and liyons ■ ■■■ - New York. ■ Efiilor, Vaiuf.ty: W;ilUi- Winc'noll and Leonard Lyons have accu-ed nic on 22 sep- arate occasions 111 Iho past few months o£ using for my own advan- tage old jokas and anecdotes I have taken from others. Since I have specifically staled in the prefaces o£ "Try and Stop Mc" and "Laughing Stock" that the material was the re- sult of long friendship and" business relations with mo^l of tha principals quoted, supplemented by stories I remembered from shows, radio pro- grams, books; magazines, old-joke compendiums and newspaper col- umns, and since at Ica^t hall a dozen other books alonff the same general lines arc published every year, I am; not quite sure what all';the shooting Is about. If the practice i.? a repre- hensible one, however, it is obvious that Winehell and Lyons ate just the two boys to- level the charges. For years, everybody must realize, they have conducted their own col- umns without printing a single joke, anecdote or paragraph , they didn't originate themselves. : , . Bmiliett Cerf, Story Vs. N. y.Vr. IG A plagiarism suit brought by Story Riagazine against the New Yorker ■was .settled last week for $1,000 in Federal Court in New York, just ber lore the trial was to begin before Judge Vincent L. LciboU. The action ch.nrKcd : that a story published in plaintiff's mag in Octo- ber, 1942, Vi-ritten by Guide D'Agos- tino, was lifted by the New Yrvker and published in its Sept. 2, 1344,-is- sue, under the by-line of Carlos Bulosan. Story mag sought $5,000 damages. Attorneys for both sides, in ."set- tling tlie suit, agreed to the defense stipulation that the settlement was not an admission of wilful-piracy. Ashton Stevens' Ten Ashton Stevens is cooking a na- tional banjo revival with Fred Allen who, likewise, is a plunketyrplunk addict. The veteran dean of dramatic critics figures that Allen's Kenny Delmar (Senator eiaghorne) could give tshe banjo an . impetus like no- body else. ■ Incidentally, Stevens, recently back from a Mayo Clialc checkuprr-and okay — observes that "writing for Variety's Anniversary Number gets me more fan mail tlian writing for my own paper (Herald-Examincr) in Chicago." desk ijChfcdulas still extant do idon- tify ihom delinilc'.y. The (iiflTeulty,, if ;,anyv i» production ■ of the picture. "O'Mallcy of the Sun," will not be duo to paucity of material, but to .^election, since there's an abundance of data about the 0"Mr.lley saga, not to mention anecdotes and pgi'sonal. recollectidhs, no end by clo.->r !i.s-.ocialcs and ac- quaintances. Incidentally, some of the classic O'Mallcy importing and writing achievements arc, going to be contained in an anthology of re- porting that is now Being. Gompil«d for a book by an active New York news and feature writer. Also, Mr. Wil.stach needn't have any regrets about there being no history of Jack's restaurant. Many columns of type telling intriguing and colorful tales of the, place are at hand, and the O'MaUey lilixi story will certainly include some intimate- ly apropos flashes 6f the. celebrated than death." observes Fowler pore, "in that he switched just in time from being a fair acto.r into what I hope will make a crack new.-paper- man.'^;''':--'';:''.-' :v:^',' Salute's Sellout ■ First Issiie of Siilutp, iviontViiy pro- duced by former Yank and Slai-s .t Stripes editors and writers, ap- peared on N. Y. new3Stand.s Mon. U) . With- 40,000 copies allotted to N. Y,, mag claimed sellout that day. Mag ran olT .300.000 first issue for nationwide distrib; plans a 300,000 run for second issue, jumping to 500,000 for the third. Mag, 52-page combo of fiction, ar- ticles and GI stuff got nice press from M. Y. dailies (Times, PM, etc.) as well as several mag and radio breaks. Vcfietiir'an Author "Second Carrot from the End" i.s the saga , of the famed Farmer's Market, Los Angeles, tor which Fred Beck writes a daily, column in the L. A. E.\aminor, which some aver is "the best column written out there." "Carrot" has just been-brought out all-night "owl's retrei.t." jn book form by Morrow, with H. A check of morning Sun city desk Allen Smith doinc the foreword, schedules, 1915-19 discounts Mr Wilstach's statement that "no Sun; man of his (O'Malley's) tima is now on the Sun." Keats Speed. Charles Still, George Gaston, Eleanor .Booth Simmons, Henry McBride, John H. Barlow and the undersigned add up to several, and some other veteran Sun men in various, departments lilce Col. Gilbert Hodges, Charles E. Lux- ton, Sam Wolfenden, J. Edgar Martin. Ralph Grofl, Hurry Sabel and Hans Muller knew O'MaUey well enough to call him "Franlt." And there remain some Evening SUn 'men like City Editor Bartnelt. Messrs. Hickey, Mount.sier and Henry: :King,: All these have ssrvcd the. Sun no fewer.than two and one-half decades, most of them three or more: G/iarlcs Stolberp. Allen Smith doing the foreword. Incidentally, Allen, himself now a country squire (in Mt. Kisco, N. Y.), has just UirnCd in the final mss. of "Rhubarb," his baseball novel, to Doubleday. which has scheduled it for June publication. SCULLY'S SCRAPBOOK Closc-Vp Due r>tarch IS Close-up, a bi-weekly tabloid cov- ering the motjon picture, stiirpicture and , television field, will hit the stands on March 12. Publication, with-Jack Denton Scott as editor- publisher, is designed for amateur and pro: .photographers, dim pro- ducers, and photographic manufac- turers. Sheet will .sell for 10 c^nts a .cop-y,: , Scott as a sergeant in the Army served as editor of the news- paper of the Astoria Signal Corps studios. G. Bernard (Tools) Shor G. Bernard Shor—^that's-no error, the guy's just better known as "Toots"-^ha.s turned author and com- mentator. Operator of the 151st street, N. Y., restroom for tired ce- lebs substituted for Bob Sylvester in ye.sterday's (Tuesday) N. Y. News. (Sylvester also ghosted). Among things ; he revealed he didn't like was Sherman Billingsley's name. He wouldn't use it, he said, even if it was my own." Mentioned Stork Club op is reported taking no action, Likewise, G. Bernard doesn't go for "Pygmalion," because the guy whci wrote it took his name. Dr. SlieUlOn^s rosthumous Coin Dr. Charles M. Sheldon. Congre- gational minister whose book "In His Steps" accidentally fell into public domain upon publication in 1897 and then .Sold 8,000,000, copies to become America's most unprofltable all-time best seller, died in Topeka la.st week with a fortune ironically just within grasp. In Hollywood, William Wilder ■was reported readying plans to start production of a picture based on the book's collection of stories of Gospel teachings. In New York, a radio agency was searching for a sponsor for a series of 13 half-hour programs built ■around the book; while Gros.sett & Dunlapi publishers of the book's only authorized edition revealed that sales were starting to climb once again. • . Soundins Frrneh Honrs Vercors {Je.m Brullcr), author ; of "Les Silences de la Mer," and lead- ing novelist of the French Rcsistr.ncc. thru L. A. and Frisco (lC-21) for a series of lectures under auspices of Alliance Francaiso. Then b.ick east- and to , Paris. Vercors is tlie; second speaker in the new French series. First wa.s George Adam; Other leading French v.'riters due to tour U.S. soon under tho same ;au.spices include Ffancois Mauriac, Louis Martin-Chauffier. Georges Duhamel and possibly Andre Cham- son, . • .. > ■ A-Bomb Air Serial Hollywood Writers' Mobilization held its third in.: -a series of 'weekly seminars. Tliis one was conducted' by atomic soienti.sts for the edifica- tion of radio writers. The writers expect to get a radio scries out of it. similar to ''Reunion U.S.A.," which it SBonsored, and which copped honors as a public service feature. Curmudgeon Column at 50G Ex Sec of Interior Harold L,, Ickes "becomes a three - times - a - week columnist for N. V. Post syndicate, first week in April, at a. salary said by the newspaper's editor-general manager Ted Thatkrey, to total be- tween S.'iO.OOO and $00,000 a year. Ickcs will make his h.q. in Wash- ington. Tit'o for his column had not been picked as of Ust week. ■ . ^ More 00. frank Ward OlMaHcy New York. Editor, Variety: That; was a good line about Frank Ward O'Malioy in.th(3 letter by John Wilstach 11) last week's VARiET'i'.; It's worth repeating. "Frank was. a mod- est guy—rgnd if: they: got a:, modest nev/spaper; man in a Hollywood plovie, that would be news." And, by the bye, Mr. Wilstach can rest assured that O'lVEaHey's un- paralleled stoiics ai'e- not . loiit to posterity bdeause .they' were printed sans a byime until he did Sunday, nrticles and Satevppo-,'t features. His colleagues- sihcl c6ntcmpibr.aries cciitlcl rcCogtiiie his pieces immistakafaly' Respite that lack f)f, iderilificatibii. And if they couldn't have. Sun city AVhat Methoas? Hollywood Quarterly, class mag of the University of CaliJornia i;nd the Hollywood W.i'iters Mobilization, has a piece in the hopper for the next issue on how radio .shows are re-i viewed particularly deals with soap '. operas with Varikty's Rose getting' the biggest play for his exposition of reviewing methods used by tt»e paper. L. A. Dailies Cut Radio Lofcs Los 'Angeles dailies have taken another cut. at radio station copy, and are whittling down on program logs. Stations had been kicking about what they considered cramped space in comparison with news- IMipers in other key cities. Now they are. complaining about proposals to combine similar Hsliings, .arid, elimi- nate all but nationally recognized pci'sonality names. Dailies are also asking reduction of space on radio disk and news programs. ■: Gene, Fowler's Credo Gene .FoSvler: iS now, workiiig:'oh::a' i book 6ii "Rip Van .Wiiiklci"; vt'hilo i awaiting publication ncSt month of ,! his latest P'oWler schedule which cohcentrates on 4-7 S.rn. scripting. : As. b.o expl.tiins it, '"fhe clrii.nks pre :usiia]Iy i'ri. be'cl by four, and'there's, iio ,lavv .which , pel'';, tiiits saIoDris'i(j opthi; befoi'(jin;, tlie morning, .so that's (he three hours I'tti-'SLtre ■ol'.*''.V/' . Intidcihlall.v, his bo,y. :B'ili F^puler, 23, now .on the L. A. EM..iiiner's city desk, "was saved from a ftitu wor^t; CHAXXEB Jim Tully la'trying, his hand at nn Irish fairy tale. . ■ ' ■ Lorna D.. Smith helping Theodpre Dreiser's widow coinr»lete iris last bOOfc . A. A. W,yn (Current Books) ac- fiujrcd control of L. B. Fischer Pub. Corp, N. Y. Celestino Silveiro in Hollywood to write a series of articles tor his three Brazilian publications. Lew Amster, back from the Navy, is sigmng his, ;corijmunigu<;s to edi- tors, " Human Being, j.g." , Ian Keith, film: actor, is writiiig the Ifist chapters of his first ' novel, 'There Needs No Ghost." Relman Morin. recently appointed chief of the AP Paris bureau, vaca- tioning for a month in Hollywood. M. Lincoln (Simon &) Schuster, presently vacationing in Havana, i Cuba, returns the end of this month. Elwood UUman. scriptef for Comet Pictures, sold a short story, "Gunter and Murdock," to Satcvc- pCKit."- Louis Sobol, a.s a concession to the brown market which is this side of the black market, wears brown ensembliss, ',; ;: Kny Ci'mpbell back to the Coast after huddlin'j with the Holiday pub- lishers iSatcvcpost people) in Philly on .special stories. The St. Louis Star-Times has been elected to associate membership in- the Associated Press with service begintiing Feb. 28. More examples of useless swear- ing in "Don l Swear Like That," by Daniel J. Lord, S. J., llian in the rowdiest, legit , shows. ,: ,:. ; ■ R:iy Jo.sephs, author of "Argentine :,Diary,," wiio's been doing ,a lecture tour, on; Argtintina the iiast two sea- sons, 'will return:, to .Latin America t.liis, siimTri,cr for .'a year's .stay.: Hb'H h.q. in Rio,: ■H. Allon Smith, Mt. Kisco (N.Y.) Sblo'For 'roin-Toms,*'; 1 squire and cjiiondiiffj atithoi-, has just toUows a unique writing j'delivered the filial di*Kft of hi.s'.biise- bull iVovct,, ''Rhubarb,'' .' to. Doublc- di-jy-. Avh'ich liaS ssheijuiccl it for June (ipu'blic'iilian. '■::;■ Reagan, '■ ''Tex ■) . iMcGrary, ,form(;r N.Y. Mew.spaperisian [jnd ono', tithe: ouivorial ohiet of - the;NiY., jbaiiy Mir- ror, ,ai3poihfc(i Cxoe ■editor of Am can Mercury: ivtebi'ary; ..is, i'Qcii3htl.y (jut of thq Array':Ajf 'E'oii£!(!S i'iiiiiik*i<J as Lt. Colonel. i-' -J'.'. '''''[, By Frank Scully « ♦ i♦ m ♦ » 4 , ^W^HhH- * Zany Walk, Feb. 26. It I should' ever write Moin Day, Mrs. Roosevelt would never get around to hers, being too occupied with reading mine. Take yesterday, for iti- stance., "V'ou take it, please. I don't want to .see all or any part of it ever again. 1 started with the sunrise and hardly got an hour's work done after breakfast, when oil I had to hop to see Ed Morrell. He's the most \aliant of the old guard whose "The 25th Man" did so much to change San Qiioiitin from a hellhole to the model prison it is today. Morrell's story, incident- ally, contains the greatest chase in western literature and nobody can tell me that pfOclucei'S'Tare"hungry for .stories as long as they haven't filmed this one. FrOni BO-Vear-old Ed, battling his asthma, I walked down to Hollywood and Vine and who.se name should I hear called f^om behind mc but my own. A guy said, ;'I know who you are, but I'll bet you don't know who I am." "I don't know who you arc," I said, "but I koow what yoit are. You're an ex-New York cop." He laughed, pu.shcd open his coat and showed me his gun and badge. , • . "-What are you doing out here?" I asked. "You never ask a plainclothes man what he's doing," h* said. He offered to take mc to lunch, but I went on to Chi-chi's wber* I had a date. It was crowded. Arthur daesar, wearing, as ever, a white carnation in his blue suit, got up to give me his seat. He said he preferred to walk around and be mistaken for the hcadwaitcr anyway. I thanked him and told him, "I see where Shaw has a six-million-'doUar problem, but at least he gave you first billing." He wanted to know whore that Irad happened and I told him in London, and the picture was called "Caesar-And Cleo- patra." That immediately launched him Into saying: nice words about Shaw because Shaw had said some nice things about Caesar's curtain- raiser called "Napoleon's Barber." It went ahead of a Sh'aw play and launched Caesar to the point where lie could claim rart in the cantiu-e of Dillinger, for it was Caesar's "Manhattan Melotlrama" that lured Dillinger into that picture house. ' Written'. Inside ' From the restaurant Norman Sper and I walked a few more bloc1:s up the Boulevard to meet a guy who had ju.st finished 20 years at Folsom, the toughest canitorium this side of the Rock. I didn't know much about the man from Folsom except that he had written a book while in the clink and two years ago had-asked me to h(?Ip him find an agent to place it in the studios. I did this and the agent: hap- pened to be'one of those very refined ladies to whom e;ven a tralTic cilatiuit is practically a scarlet letter. She called me up in a few da.ys and.said, "Do you realize .that ::maQ. is in prigon.?''; I .told her of course-1 realized it, "But think how iuekg' yoaare " I .said- "Here's one author who can't keep pestering you, wanting to know why: bis story doesn't get: action; from .tiie ' producers." And now here I was face to face with the three-time lo.scr. He didn't look a day over 50 but said he was 74. He looked e\ery inch, in fact, like the retired copper I'd just left. ; He was-impressed about the. progress of his story which was last heard of at Jimmy Cagney's, but I told him if. he had-only one story to sink or swim by, he better get out a cloth and start polishing windshields. He presented me with a synop.sis of the story. It read like a nice piece of Americana, a sort of cavalcade,: and didn't seem to deal much with prison life. I then learned from him. that he had been a dramatic critic in St. Louis, but had done some writing outside with too mucii of it in syn- thetic checks and what was known in those days as forgery. With a 20- year rap behind him, he Still, had two years of probation ahead of Inm. Though 74, he was released with $25, seven of which was his own received in small gifts and postage stamps through the years; I told' him the best solution was to get his story a show-window in New York and let it travel westward toward the studios. I asked him ;\\ lU're the story was and he told me at an agent's at the Cro.ss Roads of the World, adding that he'd be only too glad to get it. Though it was only a few blocks away, he was gone so long Sper said, "Thirik he skipped?" By tl»e Tan An hour later, however, he returned and the sight was enough to sta.^sor a draft horse. He was bogged under two huge volumes the sixo of un- abridged dictionaries, the sort that find anchorage in college libraries. Tliis vvas Ins magnum opus called "Backward, Oh, Backward." It ccjBtained - 1,000.000 words, all written in lon.ihand in his 20 years atf olsom aiid subr sequently neatly type by some unrecorded angel. I looked at the tonnage, roughly gucs.sin.t! it contained 10 v(iluin(^s, wliieh (;vcn if it had been by DreLser couldn't have been published in Ilvs than five years, and told him that to read that and say "No" v.-ould cost any - publisher $750 in reading fees. "What you'd better do is make a 10,000-word synopsis and give that to a New York agent, who will send it on a shopping tour^" I sugge.stod.' "Otit ; of 40 publishers, three might be interested in .seeing at loast the tit.st 100.000 ; words. Aleanwhile yon break this dovi/n and have it rebound in 10 vol- umes instead of two. Leave it here until you come up the next limo from Balboa with a truck." He looked around and rubbed his chin. "Thore'll be no storage charges," I assured him. He laughed, relieved, and baid lie d be back in a week. By then I had to get home to meet a guy named jloth Reynolds, a desert rat with the clothes of a deluxe dude-rancher. For weeks he had been on my trail wanting to present to the studios his idea of how thoy could avoid making the small technical errors which seem to annoy so many .small people—eiicalyptus trees in New Bn^and scenes, defendants getting up in court and blasting D. A.'&—things like that I had been telling him by letter and telephone that the studios tiired guys as technical advisors in bunches and then when they had to squeeze cvei-ything down, all that pre- cision stuff was thrown to the incinerators. "So you think my idea is crazy ?" he asked rather plaintively, "Crazv .ns a loon," I ;tssurcd him, while ivritinj; down a li.st of produci^rs, diiectois: and;writerS:\¥ho:raight at least listen to one more wail from a member of their wounded public, And MsrcvTet ., ■ As I gave him the list he rcaehed in his pocket and ofr(-red mc S20. He ; really offered me half of it, but I didn't sec how I could tear it in two. .So I gave it back to him, telling him the only thing I charged lor \v;is v.'viting and often I forgot to do that. ■ ■ Well, he left, a-grateful desert rat, telling me as he went out the cloor,; "If this don't pan out I'll have to sell real estate.'' I assured hinrln! \'.'t*s ■ moving into a boom market and might find protluccrs in the /IlIcI against;; him if he didn't hurry. " You're thinking that was the end of Mein Day? Oh, no. There »ns a .tcle:;ram .signed Frank Sinatra urging me to atie'td a meolin,^ to doritle W£?yS and;,means of .s'pilting the giiijs of those who i.rc obstlruciing ii veoull. t'lciction- in this mushroom oehtcr of Jfallen angois;' There Avas a t'evoicd triteiid. of Preiser's who felt 'Khe had to come- ovei? With her husband for an hovir 'and^gct awai^ from the chaos called hpme. Thei'o was a Uuvyc.r and ; his bride who also wanted to punch the bag and felt sure that al'lcr Mdy. an easy day as this I was the most refreshed person in Hollywood to punch. .it with. , : :Th^, by the crack ofmidhight I limitaJed :into, bod, v;oiKtcrin.!?, wliy .'I ever thought I shouldn't campaign at least for the job of sovcriior ol thC; state. ',;'-' ■'.•.: }'XA-;''---"'-'' ■ r ii'^''-':'y'-':}' So ondeth Mcin Day. Nov^ see if you have enough strength left to ;;o oA to Peunor's. . '