Variety (Feb 1947)

JSteteJissg h 1947 MTKRATI 61 Literati Stern Sell* Three Paper* In a »udden move which caught the Newspaper Guild flatlooted, J. j&avid Stern late Friday night (SI) announced that he had unloaded his newspaper and radio properties to Ihe Philadelphia Evening Bulletin. The action, coming after almost three months of the Guild strike, meant the death of Stern's three newspapers—the Philly Record, the Camden Courier and the Camden post. Feb. 1 issue of all three papers was the last. This means that, at least for the present, there will be but one morning newspaper in Philly —the Inquirer. It also means that there will be no newspapers in the huge South Jersey area covered by the Courier-Post newspapers. ■ The Bulletin announced that it will publish a Sunday paper in the near future—"at the earliest pos- sible date," including the Record's features. Robert McLean, Bulletin prexy, also said he "hoped that the services rendered b; the Record and Courier-Post would be resumed under independent ownership." Sale also involved WCAU, Philly CBS outlet, which Stern purchased about six months ago from the Levy Brothers for $6,000,000. ». Under terms of the sale, Record employees who have been at work " for the past 60 days will be contin- ued on the payroll and receive their regular weekly salary or wages. Provision has been made to con- tinue this for a period not exceed- ing ten weeks for those who do not accept other employment. A Bulletin spokesman also said these provi- sions applied to Record executives who have been getting out the pa- per since the strike was called, and that Record employees not, on strike had been informed the Bulletin would endeavor to hire as many of them as possible. It was learned over the weekend that Bulletin officials have several potential buyers for the Stern news- paper properties. However, names of these prospective purchasers were not even whispered, and thus their Identity remained as closely-guarded a secret as the negotiations which resulted in suspension of publication ©f the Record and Camden papers. The Bulletin, in its Monday (3) issue, front-paged a statement- call- ing attention to the fact that Record features and comics were appearing in the Bulletin. Drew Pearson's Washington Merry-go-round column appeared on the back page of the Bulletin, the "anchor" position it always held in the Record. Other weekend developments in- cluded the fact that a meeting of the Guild was held Sunday. (2). At- tendance was large. Upshot of the meeting was that the Guild will con- tinue the strike, "to insure the co- hesion and unity of the three news- paper staffs so that they will be im- mediately available to prospective rtew publishers." The Guild will continue to picket the plants, and distribute the "Real Record" and the "Real Courier-Post," eight-page papers published weekly. In Washington, the House Labor committee prepared for a hearing with Stern, Record publisher, and national and Philly Guild officers to probe the causes of the paper's fail- ure. Investigation will be taken in connection with the committee's hearings to dilute the National Labor Relations Act. One spokesman said of the strike which caused the pa- pers to shut down: "We consider this e_ recent and most outstanding ex- ample oi the need for a change in the National Labor Relations Act." Star also agreed not to discriminate against the carriers who participated in the strike. Strike was the first time in 66 years that the Star missed publica- tion. The staff played Johnny-on- the-job throughout the strike, pre- paring copy as usual, but having it read over the Star's radio station WDAF, instead of being set in type. WDAF which jumbled its programs extensively during the strike, re- sumed its regular schedules Mon- day. Lot of the Guys Need It The Screen Writers Guild mem- bers frankly make it a point to col- lect unemployment insurance (be- tween pictures) in order (1) to make it easier for those scribes who really need the $20-a-week (for 20 weeks, per annum) and (2) to punch home that this isn't charity. The double- sawbuck is a legitimate return for which proper insurance deductions were made. True, one actor who used to go down with liveried chauffeur and collect the $18 (before it was raised to $20) made such a ridiculous pic- ture that he was shamed out of it. gate, Gallup Poll editor; Jay Frank- lin on FDR; Roger Butterfield on George Washington, and pieces by Robert St. John, Vardis Fisher, Raymond Swing, Grace Thorne Al- len, Ken Purdy, Dr. Roy Chan-ran Andrews, Sigmund Spaeth a; ,i oil- ers. SCULLY'S SCRAPBOOK By Frank Scully *« *** ***** ■Joh; Golden as .A«tS»t»r John Jolden sometin ••■>■ :.pemh- Sunday .»? mme writing ,tf-uue for j magaziiif, most of the yarns being j about ■•!• v business personalities. | He ha> :, .d six out of the last seven, his agent having little trouble in peddling lie scripts. His latest yarn, "My Dca,. Old Mom," is about the '' mother of the late Jack Hazzard. ;> well known actor who lived in AV>-. York's west side. Latter v ■ "Turn to the Right," one oi the big- j gest hits produced by Golden and ' the late Winchell Smith, who also ' had a band in the playwri^hting- Mrs. Kober's Sad Landing: Flown to Palm Springs for her health, Mrs. Arthur Kober's ambu- lance plane was forced to a crash- landing in Texas and she had to change planes, necessitating another $2,000 for- the private airship which, however, the insurance company as- sumed. The original NY to LA plane ride costs $3,500 unless there's a re- turn passage booked, when it is halved. Wife of the author, incidentally, hitting the sun for the first time in eight months, is responding nicely. Kober meantime has accepted script- ing chore with S. P. Eagle at Uni- versal-International. Kaycee Strike Over • Strike of the Kansas City Star- Times which began Jan. 17 was settled at a meeting Feb. 1 between Roy A. Roberts, managing editor, and other officials of the newspaper, and George L. Berry, president, and other officers of the International Pressmen's Union (AFL), held at Pressmen's Home, Tennessee. The Paper resumed publication with the morning (Times) edition Feb. 3. The walkout had been called by the local pressmen's union seeking recognition of its group as bargain- ing agent»for the contract carriers. Star's stand on the question was that carriers' are not employees, but inde- pendent merchants who buy and sell newspapers as other merchants deal in other commodities. This point the Star agreed to set, aside for'.legal study in the settle- ment, which also gave a substantial increase in pay to the pressmen. The Walter Reade's Sun Folds Fold of the Asbury Park, N. J. Sun last Wednesday (29) represents a substantial financial loss to pub- lisher and theatre circuit owner Walter Reade. Founded a year ago, sheet grew out of a grudge which Reade held against the 50-year-old Asbury Park Press for failing to support his candidacy for council- man in a 1945 election at the New Jersey shore resort. Miffed when the Press did not aid his political aspirations, Reade yanked his film advertising and in association with John J. Quinn, Monmouth County Democratic lead- er and publisher of the Red Bank, N. J. Standard, moved the Standard to Asbury and set up the Sun a block away from the Press. Origi- nally designed as a throwaway, the Sun claimed a peak circulation of 7,000 in its brief existence. Sun's editorial staff comprised some 20 employes headed by man- aging editor Morris Mogelever, for- merly of the Newark Star-Ledger. Harry Talmadge, who had come to the Sun from the Long Branch, N.J. Record by way of the Standard, was business manager. Shortly after the Sun's birth, Reade was reported to be dropping an estimated $5,000 weekly and last fall this loss was said to have been pared to $3,000 weekly. Several libel suits were also filed against the Sun. Speculation is rampant whether Reade's advertising for his four As- bury Park theatres will return to the Press. Even if he seeks space, it's understood he may be refused. While his ads were out the Press carried a listing of film attractions as a public service. As an indication of the Press' strength, it has picked up 6,000 more readers in the past eight years to hit a current circula- tion of 20,000. Advertising rates were also recently hiked. CHATTER Reginald Whitley, London Mir- ror's film editor, heading for Eng- land after four months in Holly- wood. Dean Dorn 'md Teet Carle col- laborated on a m.stery novel, "Nine More Lives," fo'. Spring publication by Random House. Bill Orustein, Metro trade contact, has three byline pieces-in currant mags. Prairie Scheoner, Decade of Short Stories an,d Writers' Journal. Emory A ?^3lowan, racing „ fl '.*or of the Philadelphia Daily News Jnti publicity director of the Atlantic City race track, died in Philly Sun- day (2). Art Linkletter ("People Are Fun- ny") has authored a semi-autobiog on his radio experience, which Doubleday will publish in Septem- ber under title of "Being Out. of My Head." Reg Whitley, special film corre- spondent for the London Express, back to England on the Queen Eliza- beth after three months o.o.ing : ;he U. S., Canadian and Mexican film scene for his paper. Most of.the time was spent in Hollywood. Kraft's "N. Y. to L. A.*,' H. S. (Hy) Kraft has authored a Hollywood story with Paul Stewart- utilizing Variety's "NY to LA" as the title. Martin Gabel has the legit 'rights to Kraft's dramatization of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Last Tycoon." '47 Mag' Makes Bow First issue 6£ '47, highly-touted as first contributor-owned general magazine, bows on newsstands to- day (Wed.). Monthly, selling at 35c, is owned entirely by 300 writers, artists and photogs. Major' article of i first issue' is a 10,000 word piece by ; Darrell Berrigan, "Facts Out of Ja- ■ pan." Mag also contains a short sto- j ry by Pearl Buck; "My Country, ' Right or Left?" by William A. Lyd- FOREVER IMBER, OR HOW HOT CHIPS FALL Unlike "The Hucksters," which deals with the advertising end of the radio business, Lew Lauria's novel, "Let the Chips Fall," concerns the acting end of radio. An actor, writ- er and director, besides having con- ceived and founded .the National Radio Artists Telephone Exchange, a highly successful and profitable business catering to radio artists, Lauria mentions plenty Of names. He claims his book is "a true por- trayal of those people of whom the industry is composed.. .except for an occasional instrument of plot... the names of advertising agencies, broadcasting companies, products and a few of the leading charac- ters." The story is about, one Theresa (Tree) Drake and Dick Randall. The former js an ambitious radio actress, who parlays her ambitions until she finally reaches Randall, a seri- ous radio director. These two go through a series of unending mar- tinis in the tournament of Adam. There's a dope-selling villain, a homo and a lezz thrown in for good measure, and even near-rape, be- sides some inside stuff on auditions and radio-artists "repartee." One I wonders how these hard-working | artists of the radio find time for the many soap operas, mystery-dramas, quiz shows, etc., that must be fed to the radio grist mill daily, Lauria pictures these artists as true Bo- hemians. Burlesque and films in its pioneer days Were just a kinder- garten compared to the life led by artists as pictured in "Let the Chips Fall." Lauria has a smooth-running typewriter that pants out hot love scenes and pumps out vigorous dia- log with graphic descriptions. When the lay public reads this book there will be many applications for mem- bership to the American Federation of Radio Artists, for everybody will want to join the very Bohemian crowd of radio artists pictured. It must be fun! I never knew my AFRA card entitled me to so much entertainment. And I surely am going to tell my co-workers, Sena- tor Ford and Harry Hershfield, to be i sure and read "Let the Chips Fall." ] I am sure they, too, don't realize j what fun they are missing by turn- ' ing down those "radio cocktail par- i ties," and by not reading "Let the Chips Fall." I I don't know if it would make a i picture but it would make a swell j trailer for "Forever Amber." I Joe Lourie, Jr. Lion's Den, Feb. 2. Grace Moore's finale in flames just about closed a peculiar chapter in show biz. Never again are gals likely to move up from musicomedy to ..pera, and in any case they are not likely to take their hard-earned coin and go abroad to spend it on training, for the simple reason that all the top teachers are in either NY or LA by now. In Miss Moore's time Bartelemy in Monte Carlo was still the top coach. He had tutored Caruso, Martinelli, Mary Garden and Mary McCormick. In fact, between operatic seasons Caruso was under his wing for 16 years. At the time Grace Moore came out of a Music Box revue, Jue Quon Tai came out of a Billy Rock's "Silks and Satins." Both headed for Monte Carlo and Bartelemy. Jue Quon Tai was Chinese, and if she made the grade would be the first of her race to star in opfera. Everybody raved about her. Mary Garden said she had heaid only one voice that even approached it in 30 years. She would have made a beautiful Delilah. Both girls were doing beautifully under Bartelemy during the summer of 1928, and then Jue Quon Tai got caught in a pincer movement involving marriage and movies. Though nothing could make her act in them, her marriage definitely made her career secondary to pictures. Movies were like a mistral that continually blew music out of the lovencst. She had married a great American painter who had turned to directing pictures, and she became such a good wife in the Chinese tradition that she never sang again. 'Blueplating the Yellow Peril She was told that her marriage might get by on the broad-minded Riviera, but it would never be accepted in Hollywood. As a result, when her husband was wafted to the Coast she followed and set up house in Beverly Hills. Still smarting under that crack about her social unaccept- ability, she began laying out parties to which only the cremc-de-la crcme was invited 1 . These in time grew to as many as 200 for dinner. When she had received acceptance at least once from everybody who was anybody she double-checked the list and then closed the doors Jo all visitors. She had vindicated her race, her social position and her cooking, and thus was ready to call it a day. It was quite a performance and she put it over without singing a note. Having heard her often under Bart- elemy, I can tell you Hollywood' missed the best part of her act. Jose Sings That opera stars do these things more often than not, there's the case of Jose Mojica, who was going great guns with the Chicago and San Fran- cisco opera companies 15 years ago. Suddenly he announced he was quit- ting the stage for a monastery. Like others, I thought it was a publicity gag, but Ed Perkins, who handled Mojica, assured me it was the McCoy. Well, R. W. Hemphill recently ran across the great Pdexican tenor in, of all places, an almost inaccessible monastery in Peru! It was at Cuzco, the capital of the old Incan empire, a 400-year-old retreat, guarded by Andean peaks four miles high. It is called the Recoleta Monastery and is run by Franciscans. There Hemphill found Mojica, now a Franciscan brother, full of vigor, his hands calloused from hard work and 1 playing his happiest role. He rather expected to find a sad, shrinking recluse. On Saturday nights Mojica sings for others of the order and any visitors who may be presfidt. He sings not only religious songs, but numbers like "Pale Moon* (and "The Dream" from Manon. What message he had for those who remembered him in the States was proof that he had found a better solution than most. "Tell them," he said, "I love them all." Barnum and B. O. Just 100 years ago Jenny Lind took off from Copenhagen tor her native Sweden, but as terrj as she was, Grace Moore outdrew hit in Copen- hagen. In her Ame ican tour Lind grossed $700,000 in 95 cliicerts. Her net was $177,000, w >ich was all velvet, there being no ineouie taxes in those days. ' Even autographs nad a different value. Shopkeepers w4u*d give a fur coat for an autogr ph. Pefiple paid crazy prices for the first ticket to one of her concerts. ler first Castle Garden concert, which Aew 5,000 cus- tomers, found on culture chump pacing $225 for the firs! t-jb. That was Genin, the hattf.-. In Boston top was $625; in ProvideBCe, $650; Philly, $625; St. Louis, $150; Baltimore, $100. * "Arise, Knight, You're Right" > Seeing in many places the story that Laurence Olivier wits'not knighted for his prod- xtion, direction and performance in "Hen.r>; V" because he had mart iec' a "divorcee, I rise to ask if Sir Alexander Korda was not divorced fr'm Maria Korda and 1 married to Merle Oix.x n wj?«n he be- came Si- A .exander Korda for his production of Henry VHL ." One-Sided Feud Friend? of Basil O'Connor, prez of the National Foundation for Infantile Paralyri/ as well as the American Red Cross, point out that feuding be- ; twto L'f*<s group and Sister Kenny's is one-sided, as his .bunch put up the 6VJt m< ney to launch her treatment in Minneapolis and makes a specialty ; of byp issing feuds. ! O'Connor's formula is to get all possible publicity but not if it involves . a clash, a toughie since clashes make news. Thus his embracing the | March of Dimes, even if it meant scuttling of t':c gir'liday Ball and his - obeisance to the Rosalind Russell version of Ss-atv.' Kenny and his soft- | peddling of any differences of opinion on methods of treatment or distri- I bution of funds. But he finally was forced into the open wh»»u the picture industry tried to hand him $30,000 in a lump sum -instead of permitting his people to conduct personal collections. When he .turned down Edward Arnold's check he made one thing clear: The day o£ personal charity as opposed to ' community giving is not over. Effective Immediately That radio is here to stay I'm now convinced. Months ago Zeke Manners, reading a commercial, announced that "taking Bayer aspirin -shows no effects." He meant no "ill effects." But the fact that he said it showed no effect whatever, for it helped the sales curve.upward. Profit Deals Continued from page 3 magazines. Boyer never before would consider such an ad tieup, Taplinger said, j Ginger Rogers, Enterprise exec also indicated, is currently in Den- | ver on a-double mission for the stu- ! dio. She's squaring the unit for its j cancellation of a promise made some : time ago that it would preem "Ram- rod" there and assuring Denverites i at the same time that her forthcom- ing "Wild Calendar" will' get its world tee-off in the town. Miss Rogers is also making a flock of ra- ' dio appearances. Veronica Lake, who starred in "Ramrod," and her husband, Andre de Toth, who directed it, are pres- ently making a tour, in a plane pi- loted by dc Toth, on behalf of the film. It will be preemed in the Utah territory in which it is background- ed, with star Joe McCrea also par- ticipating in the doings there. David Lewis, who produced "Arch," is going to Paris for the world preem there, while Boyer is arranging for a special showing of the film for the French ambassador in Washington. Taplinger went on with a flock of other illustrations, demonstrating, "it's different when it's your money in a picture." Effect is also felt, Einfeld pointed out, on the set, with stars showing . much more interest in getting to work on time and wasting as few minutes as possible This desire to i>et on with the work, he said, com- municates itself to the grips and gaffers and technicians in general, with the result that appreciable pro- duction coin is saved .