Variety (April 1950)

PICTURES "With the “fuiriiiterition of wait- ing out the h^rd times that have now hit British production, J. Arthur Rank, chief British fiim- maicer currently visiting the U. S., has fixed a course of ■limited pro- duction fdr the next two years. It Is designed to cut the dra^in on his cofters to a minimum. Entire film output will be corifined to two brackets, those made jointly with American.majors and a program of niodeSt-budgeters backed solely by Indie producers, without the use of Rank’s coin. \ Within the limits of these two brackets, Rank hopes to have 15- 20 films yearly available as neces^ sary fodder for his tremendous theatre interests. This policy will stand unless the British govern- ment: slashes- the entertainment taxes which Rank contends are weighing heavily against possibilK ties of squeezing: profits out of British films. All big-budgeted pix will be made jointly with U. 3/ majors to take: the financial brunt off the Rank Organization. By so doing, Rank can get the needed AA: prod- uct to head theatre programs and at the same tinie halve the cost to his production : units. Rank will contribute 50% of the negative nut and, iU: turn, grant the American major Western Hemisphere dis- tribution rights while retaining the eastern half of the world. No Yen for Big Names British producer is hot interested In American stars, directors and other personnel for these films, al- though he has nO objection to them if his Yank parti-er wants them. Since his distribution extends to the Eastern Hemisphere only, he is not particularly concerned with the b.o. appeal of these films in the Ui S. What he does want is a 50- his organization but by indie pro- ducers. These indies would make thO pix on the Rank lot, usihg as many Rank studioites; as possible. (Continued on page 24) U’ Rank Mpvct in WitK U J. Arthur Rank’s American wing, headed by, Robert Benjamin, this week vacated its offices in the Tishmaii building. Park avenue and 57th , street, to . take smaller quarters with tlniversal at^ the same, address. Move was made as an economy measure since Rank haS cut down on his pro- duction activities and inde- pendent promotion: of British films in the U. S; Previous offices" were oc- cupied Under sublease from U, since that company priglnally contracted for the space, Of- fices are being leased to an ; outside company. New Rank occupancy is on the seventh , floor in rooms cleared by con- solidation of U’s personnel. ' ‘ Hollywood, April f. : Screen Actors Guild is sending a delegation of top e.xeCutives east this Week to take part* in the an- nual membership meeting of the Guild’s New York branch at the Hotel'Astor, April 14. ? ^ Delegates are Ronald Reagan, SAG prexyl WiRiani HoldCn< first veepee* and George Murphy, sec- ond veepee. s mx to Co. Aims to Sell Rank’ s Pix on a Volume Bash Ditching by Universal of its Prestige Pictures unit which pre^ viouSly handled J; Arthur Rank’-s product on an art-house basis is aimed at a drive to Widen the bookings of the British^made fea- tures. XJ will campaign to slot the Anglo iittports into circuits and conventional houses wherever pos- sible with the idea of copping volume playdates and boosting re- tums on Bank’s features. CuiTCnt- ly in the Xi. S., Rank is reported still dissatisfied with the revenues which his films are obtaining in this copntfy. Rank is urging both U and Eagle Uion, his two distribs, to heighten their. Hrive for complete accep- tance of British films on the same level as Hollywood output. He has also griped about the returns which his films are getting from other Western Hemisphere coun-: tries, particularly Latin America. U and EL distribute his pix there also, Henceforth. Rank’s films will he bandied by U-s $alesmen in the same manner as the company’s U. Sr product. Irving Sochin, for- merly head of Pveitige, takes over a new special films division con- centrating bn .British pix. Pres tige label is . dropped. Soc^^^ is to stress hew outlets for the films. Jeff Livingrton vvili act as exec in charge of the division’s ad-public-^ ity activities. “Tight Little; Island,:’ “The As- tonished Heart.” VA Run for Your Money’’ and .“Rocking Horse Win- Chicagb, April 4. Possibility of experimenting in; Chicago with special showings, of children’s films was discussed here yesterday (Monday) by L Arthur Rank with Elmer Balaban and Harold Butchin. Balaban may try some of Rank’s moppet pix in one or more houses to get reaction. Rank ha$ taken a special interest in jkid pix and has made them and used them iii his theatres in Eng- land. idea of testing them in Chi was conceived by Butchin, erst- while Universal arid Eagle; Lion exploitation man here, who was re- sponrible for the Rahk-Balaban; confab. British film tycoon today went to Kansas City, where he’s the guest of Fox-Midwesl Theatres topper Elmer Rhoden. Rank will Stay in President Truman’s suite at the Muehlbach hotel. He had lunch with a representation of local ex- bibs today and will Visit milling companies in the K.C. area tomor- row. Rank is England’s biggest miller. Tomorrow he goes to Denver as guest of another 20th-Fox theatre exec, Frank R. ; (Rick) Ricketspn, Jr., head of Fox-intermoimtain. Saturday (8) the British film exCC goes to Hollywood, where he’ll re- main until April 22. Officially he has no appointments there and. will stay with his son-in-law arid daugh- ter, Mr. and Mrs, Fred Packard. Nate J. Blumberg, prexy of Uni- versal, in which Rank is a large stockholder, flies to the Coast this week to join Rank there. Robert M. Benjamin, prez of Rank’s U. S. setup, joins Rank in K.C. tomor- row and travels to the Coast with him* Jerry Dale, assistant to Rank , (Continued on page 20) Paramount proposes to follow I through on the enthusiasm raised by the 20th-Fox Showmanship meets and wants the bther distribs to ‘’put iip inoney, riien and ma- teriaF’ for the same alindustry purpose, Max E. Youngstein, Par’s ad-pub chief, said yesterday (Tues,), Youngstein outlined a three-point plan Which his com- pany will plug and at the same tiriie expressed fear that ’ ‘‘the en- thusiasm may be dissipated unless an overall iridustry job is done,” Twentieth, he declared, should not be left to carry the ball alone. “Our job is to get exhibitor co- operation in specific areas on the basis of promotion and increase that cooperation beyond good in- tentions,” Youngstein said.“We think 20th-F6x did a wonderful job requiring courage and > foresight. There were some people who hung back. We must not let that harmful tongue-in-cheek attitude hurt the industry.” To push showmanship along, Par will place greater emphasis on co- operative ads, Youngstein con- tinued. List of cities where co-op ads are used has already been upped from a previous 55 to 150„ For “Samson and Delilah” over 1,000 situations are earmarked. Youngsteiri-complained that less than 26% of exhibs give a distrib ^Continued on page 24) Holly WQod, Editor, VAWErv: . Domingo Olesa Is 55 years old and retired. In the last 20 years he has 'seen only one moyie^ ^‘Snow White.” . That is he had seen only one movie up until two weeks ago. Theii a momentous thing hap^ pened to Domingo Gless. He was dragooned irito going to a double feature by some frierids he didn’t know very well.. You can under- stand it was a difficult task getting Mr; Gless to break a . habit of suhh lengthy stariding. But go he did' arid he was amazed by what he saw. The pictures he saw were, not airiong the top. 10 ini current' boxoffice draw, blit Mr. Gless erijoyed them. He enjoyed them so 'much that in the last two weeks Mr. .Gless has . gone, to the movies every riight except one. He is firmly back in the habit of go- ing; to riiovies again after a 20ryear 'hfatus; i ' -.■r-. y So this occurs to me after re^ fiecting upon the success of one double bill in getting Mir. Gless back into the theatre: ^ ' There are 17,500 motion picture theatres in the United States. Surely they Win average six em- ployees per theatre. If every em- ployee of evei*y theatre was to give a pass every , day to Someone who had been broken of the movie habit, it would expose 105,000 new, potential moviegoers to pictures every day, 735,000 per Week; If the Inoculation were to take in 50% of the cases, more than 18,000,000 could be brought back into the miOtion picture fold as reg- ular moviegoers. That would be a real job. Should. anythin g ever come of this,. I think theatres ought to have an ariniial observance of Domingo Gless Day in his honor. The won- derful thing about it is that it’s really true. Colin Miller. U.S. Fix Coil Coase Being in Dutch Washington, April 4. Howard Lane, director of broad- casting Tor the Marshall Field En- terprises, Chicago, has been ap- pointed co-chairman for the Na- tional Assn. of Broadcasters of the joint NAB-MPAA committee to combat trends toward censorship. Joseph Hazen, of; Hazen-Wallis ProdUctioris, heads the MPAA sec- tion of the joint group. Commit- tee has held no meetings as yet. Hazen will contact Larie shortly to set Up a session. Constant .progress being made by the American industry in chip- ping away restrictions imposed by various countries during the past few years is •xemplified in reports this Week frorii the Netherlands. It v^as learned by the Motion Pic;- ture Assn, of America in New York that a very good possibility exists of removing all currency re- strictions in Holland within a few weeks. Dutch, after the war, imposed a regulation permitting remittance to the U. S. of only 60% of earn- ings of Yank. films. This was upped to 70% this year and the prospects are now that U will be jumped to 100%. - Gerald Mayer, MPAA’s Conti- nental rep, returned to Paris this week fplloWing huddles in Am- sterdam ori the problem. He’ll be I'eturning in a few weeks for what is hoped wiil be final talks with ! the Ministries of Finance and Economics and bankers. Screen quota of 12 weeks a yea r for domestic product con- tiniies. There appears to be little ' chance of removing that. Nationai boxoffice sM'eepstakes last morith wound. Up in a photo- finish for first money, with “Fran- CIS” (U) nosing out ' Ginderella” (RKO) for top position 'The two pictures ran neck-and-neck most of March, with “Francis”, landirig the most coin and being geheraJ.ly big to sbek despite having rid advan- tage of major affiliated circuit houses r , i-i. “Cinderella,’. Which likely will four pix slotted |je heard frorii much in the future, to the new division. - " - ■ - Charles M. Reagan. Metro’s as^’t general sales chief, takes on the added chores of directing the film Industry’s participatiori in the 1950 U. S. Savings Bond drive’ Reagan was tapped , by Samuel Pinariski, Boston circuit op and Theatre Owners of America prez, who heads naturally ^as a strong second-place winner. Reports from Variety correspondents iri some 24 key cities revealed, that the, AValt Dis- ney color cartoon riot only was drawing great kid patronage, but was surprisirigly big at riight. , Pic won two first places, the same as “Francis.” Taking third place is “Young Mari With Horn" , :(WB), which is proving remarkably stout around the keys despite its iukewarm the.industry’s committee. Reagan will serve as chairman, of showing^ in N.~^ the distribs’ committee and will co- Rio” (M-G), riding along on the ordinate efforts with'exhib group.s. i current yen for light fare and mu- Drive begins May 15 and ends i sicals, pushed up to fourth slot, i being third one week and holding March Golden Dozen T.--‘T’rarieis” '.(tJ);- 2. “Cinderella” (RKO). 3. “Man With Horn” (WB). 4. "Nancy To Rio” (M-G). 5. “key To City” (M-Q). 6. “12 O’clock High” (20th )i , 7. “Samsori-Delllah” (Par). 8. “The Outlaw’’ (RKO), '9. “Red Shoes” (EL). 10. “Willie Home” (20th). 11. “Third Man” (SRO); 12. “Dear Wife” (Par); to fourth position two other ses- .sions.;, “Key to City/' another fi‘om Metro, wound up fifth, measuring up to the promise showed in final days of February. This is another pic which did not do well in New York but went big around the na- tion. “12 O’clock High” (2()th), third in February, held siirpri.sing- ly well for a sdebrid month to finish just behlrtd “Key.” Seventh money w goirig to “Sa m- (Coritiniied bn page 24) N. Y. to L. A. Anthony Bartley Nate J. Blumberg Mrs. Meyer Davis Dorothy Fields .Herb Gordon Al liorwits Hedy Larriarr Irving Lesser Sam Marx Norman Siegel Spyros Pv Skouras N, Y. to Europe Flbrerice AqUirio Lewis Blumberg Virginia Bolen Harold Clurnian Ben Edwards Forrest C. Haring S. Jay Kaufmari Peter Lawford Harold Mirisch Mervyn LeRoy William B. Levy Roland Petit Robert E, Sherwood Jose 'Torres Robert Whitfehead April IftSO sir Alexander Korda won a dual vietbry this week in preliminary skirmishing with David O. Selzrtick over “Gone ta Earth,” the Jen- ifer Jones-starrer they jointly pro- duced* DOS lost but in both. New York and London In efforts; to oto- tain an injunction against exhibi- tion of the film in Its present vCr- > siori in the eastern hemisphere; Iri the U, S., Robert P. Patterson submitted a report as special mas- ter recomriiending to the court that Selznick.be denied a temporary re- strainer. In * England, Justice LloydrJacobs dismissed a motion by Selznick asking aii order against Korda’s London Films. ? In both cases Selznick asked for the injunction on the basis that the version of the filiri Korda proposed showing abroad would be damag- ing. Judged Patterson stated that Urider the written agreement be- tween Selznick rind Korda, the ver- sion of “Gone” to be released by Lbndori Filiris was to be slightly diffm*ent than that to be released in the western hemisphere by the Selznick Releasing Organization. It. was also ; understood, Patterson said, that the eastern version might not correspond in eyery respect to the novel on which the story was based or to the script and story line. Special master concluded that Selznick had not shown that exhibit tion of “Gone*' by Korda outside ,the western hemisphere would vio- late his contractual rights. Patter- son will hold further hearings next week on thq basic dispute, which resolves itself irito whether Korda or Selznick Is going to pay for re- takes. Korda may. be in the U.S. by that time to testify in arbitra- tion proceedings before Patterson in this matter and a concurrent bat- tle between the producers over terms' on “Third" Man,’’ another joint production. In London, Justice Lloyd-Jacobs ill rendering judgment said he couldn’t see why Korda should be penalized when the filrii corre- sponded with the script which Selz- nick accepted as final. DOS claimed six variations between the book and the film and one completely-ruined dramatic effect. Selznick returned to New York Saturday (1) from a vacation in Puerto Rico. His plans for going to Europe are indefinite as yet, pending outcome of- the present arbitration. L. A. to N. Y. Margaret Barinerman Beverly Barnett Frank Capra Owen Crump Robert Cummings Roy Del Ruth Buddy De Sylva Irene Dunne Jose Ferrer Joan Fontaine Harry Goetz Nathan L. Halpern Courtney Haslam Hugh Herbert Bob Hope Al Jolson Evelyn Knight iRlchard Krakeur Leo Lefcourt Don Loper James Mason Loiiis R. Mayer Herschel McCoy Buddy Morris i George 0’Hanlon j Ella Raines 1 Wynn Rocariiora I Tom Rbckwell 1 Bo Roos David Rose I Jack Rose I Jonas Rosenfield, Mel Shavelson J. S. Scidmari Dinah Shore Dimitri Tiomkin Richard Todd Hal Wallis i Johnny Weisstnuller ' Emlyn Williams . Europe to N* Y. Peter Foy . Malcolm Goodwin Gene Paiito Frank Phillips , Gregory Ratoff Richard Rossen Leah Salisbury . Al SculatU . Cliff Whitley