Variety (August 1950)

Wednesday, August 2, 1950 XITERATI 55 Albany Daily’s Celeb Hoopla Flock of showfoik, columnists and Hearst bigwigs will tefe off the new plant of the Times-Union at a dinner to be held Aug. 11 at the Hotel Ten Eyck. Among those scheduled to appear at the festivi- ties are Ethel Merman, Joe E, Lewis,, Kay Francis and Sylvia Sid- ney. \ Emcee will be Bugs Baer. Others slated to be on hand are William R. Hearst, Jr., John Hearst arid columnists George Sokolsky, George Dixon and Westbrook Peg- ler as well as a number of sports luminaries. Coincident with the plant unveiling, local Hearst link also marks its 95th anniversary, Capp’s New Digest Mag Cartoonist A1 Capp's organiza- tion, which just brought out the first issue of the teenage slanted True Movie and Television mag, is launching another publication late in September. ’ Selling for 25c, it Will be tagged Why—The Magazine of Popular Psychology. New digest-size monthly will cover developments in psychiatry in popular ternis. First issue Con- tains a byline piece "by Loretta Young. Publisher is Elliott A. Caplin. Lawrence C. Goldsmith is editor. m L. A. Times War Rationing First of the downtown Los An- geles dailies to start curtailing de- liveries to newsboys due to the Ko- rean war is the Times. $heet has cut orders from street shouters in outlying areas. Although no shortage of news- print is current, understood Times management fears that a worsening of the situation will cue another siege of paper allocation, hence the Times’ own rationing system. CHATTER Noel Busch in Hollywood doing a piece on Cary Grant for. Life mag. . Jean Stahl, Hollywood movie editor for Life shifts to the N. Y. 1 office Sept. 1. Rudd .Weatherwax and John Roth well collaborated on “The Story of Lassie,” to b.e published in October by Duell, Sloan arid Pp/irpp Tup Virgil Thomson, New York Her- ald Tribune music critic, wrote the foreword to -'Piano Works of Claude Debussy/’ which Duell, Sloane & Pearse will issue late this riiorith. Marguerite Higgins, only woman war correspondent now covering the Korean conflict, is scheduled to peri “War in Korea: The Diary of a Woman Correspondent” for Doubleday publication early next year.. . J.; Kingsbury Smith, European manager of International News Service/ was decorated with the Legion of Honor at a luncheon given in his honor by GUerin de Beaumont, Minister plenipotentiary in charge of press relations of the Foreign Office, All phases of film production will be covered in a forthcoming volume titled, “The HoW and Why of Motion Pictures,” to be issued under j o i n t sponsorship of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the University of California at Los Angeles. C. E. McBride retired as sports editor of the Kansas City Star after turning oiit his final column of “Sporting Comment” for the July 25 (evening) Star. He came to the Star in 1907, and has been sports editor since 1915. One of the country’s eminent sports au- thorities, McBride was also , wide- ly known for his column of chat- ter and comment. enlarged because the public will make a greater demand for TV tickets than it ever did for radio show tickets. 10. A lot of people who enter television in the .early. stages of the medium will fade from the public’s eye within a few years. (I hope I’m not one of them). 11. Networks - will run out of available time for sale. (I pre- ++ f ♦ > »» > ♦♦»»»»♦♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ f + »♦ » > 4 » ♦ » • » ♦ 4 By Frank Scully Success, Cal., July 28. . For years people—well, people like me, anyway-—used to confuse J. Stuart Blackton with Sidney Blackmer, Betty Compton With Betty .. . ...... , men ■ Cdmpson, Ben Blue with Monte Blue, John Wray with John Wayne, chcted this would happen by 1950, i g e ^y Lynn with Diana Lynn, George Montgomery with Robert Mont- DUt I Was tOO early. However, 1 ■.-«"Rill UnlliMn with niMTTarriPan F.lirahpth Tavlftr with 7apharv am told it is rapidly becoming true during 1950). 12. Each big show of any stand- ing will have to have, its own com- plete Unit-—its own director, writers, etc.-—arid not share them With one or more other shows. The only one who can b£ shared efficiently is the musical conduc- tor.- : fin not Nicodemus, but I think my guessing average on television has been pretty high. However, I’ll leave it to you in the trade to Before I close, let trie make one hope (instead of a prediction) for the future: I hope that the busi- ness , end . of television is. not brought too strongly backstage. Businessmen and entertainers, in- telligent people, should be able to find a line of separation in their relationship. This line should come at the footlights, where show business ends and the theatrical profession begins. Falmouth Hit Sparks Continued from page 50 strawhats in the country. Besides the auditorium and. backstage, the building holds two rehearsal halls, scene shop and prop rooms, be- sides a first-floor ’dining room and bar, a dining terrace. overlooking Coonamessett lake, and shops in the lobby. The grounds also in- clude the swank Coonamessett Inn, a golf course, tennis courts, swim- ming, fishing, boating, polo field, airfield (with 90-minute charterj plane service to New York). The playhouse, seating 600, can gross about $11,600 on a regular eight-performance week (Miss Bankhead’s $14,000 included two extra showings). The operating nut is about $8,000.- With a total gross of approximately $95,000 on the nine-week schedule, the straWhat made a substantial profit last year, which is something of an accomplishment for a first sea- son's operation. Although costs are slightly higher now, it may better that mark this year. That is in face of generally disappointing business conditions on the Cape this summer. Besides the Falmouth playhouse here, Richard Aldrich also oper- ates the Cape playhouse in Dennis, about 30 miles away, and the Cape Cod Music Circus in Hyannis, about 20 miles distant. With both spots also playing to near-capacity, Aid- rich shows -are drawing a total of almost 2,000 people a night. At that rate, the total patronage for the season is expected to reach about 150,000. The summer popu- lation of the entire Cape is about 225,000 (the winter figure is about, 50,000). In any case, it is already evident that, contrary ito Aldrich’s fears, the Coonamessett! Dennis and Hyannis Operations do riot com- pete with each other. The setup here is located on the old 25,000-acre Coonamessett ranch owned by the late John Qrane, of the Crane plumbing family, early in the 1900’s. The Club, originally budgeted at $125,000, cost about $250,000 to build/ but it always op- erated at a loss until 1941, when it was taken over by the Army as an officer’s club for nearby Camp Ed- wards and Otis field. Aftefc the war, a name-band policy was tried, but failed to draw except for a moderate play Saturday nights. Aldrich’s contract to use it as a playhouse is for a seven-year term, with renewal options* The Coonamessett Inn, which had also been. financial,,doda .up. to that time, was acquired by an outside management in 1941,. at a ridiculously low rental. With the entry of the U.S, into the war, trade boomed at the establishment, and there has scarcely ever been a vacant room since then. The en- tire Coonamessett layout is now owned by Mrs. Francis Crane, brother of the original John Crane, and her son, Robert Crane, who is also associate producer of the Fal- mouth playhouse. The Cranes were associated with the old Uni- versity Players when that group, including Joshua Logan, Henry Fonda, Margaret Sullavan and others, ran a summer theatre at Falmouth. Another Crane son is married to Logan's sister. Continued from page 49 at present a hypnotist). The critics are never excited about anything, not even about the Oliviers, when they were here* last season.. But the public doesn’t pay any atten- tion to the critics. A play runs de- spite, hot because of the reviews. Perhaps that is the reason for not feeling very exuberant about our run here* There isn’t the feel of a hit, even when you have a long run* After playing Melbourne, “Streetcar” had a two-and-a-half week run in Adelaide (population about 50,000). Here, too, the reac- tion was similar. The critics took it in their stride, but the audiences were much more eager. Now we’re in Sydney, where the re- sponse has been about ditto. As to the production set>up here in Australia, it is more of the Little Theatre sort. A company leases or buys a building, then proceeds to import plays and principal players. It is apparently almost impossible to lose money on a. play. People come to see it in sufficient num- bers to cover the nut easily. Every- thing over, (and there always is) is gravy. But despite the dependable audi- ences, there seem to be no Aus- gomery, Bill Halligan with BilrHarrigan, Elizabeth Taylor with Zachary Taylor, Milton Berte with his mother and Sears with Roebuck, But since Monday (31), when Sidney Blackmer added still another trophy to the earlier acquired “Tony” award for his acting in “Come. Back, Little Sheba,” fewer people—muggs like me included—should confuse Blackmer with anybody again. '■ * He is currently working in “The Hero” in Hollywood, with John Derek starred, and if Hollywood were what Hollywood used to be they’d shelve the whole thing, call for, a new script and star Blackmer in “The Conquering Herd/ - for certainly no man ever came pack, to such acclaim, after, shuttling between legit and pix for 30 years, as this same Sidney Blackmer. He's just about as handsome as he ever was, He Weighs maybe five or 10 pounds more than when he played the line at the U. of North Carolina and nearly had all his good looks gouged beyond recognition by a Wake Forest tackle named Laurence Stallings. He still- has his own hair, his own teeth, his own gracious urbanity and singular mod- esty as well as his old southern charm with not a you-all in a hundred sides of dialog. 4 , Fifty is the right time for success Of this sort to come to a man i* any field.. He’s old enough by then to Allow for all the factors that played a part in Jiis success, I dined aftd wined With him for five hours at the Masquers the Other day; and if it were left to Blackmer to fill out the picture with droll tales of Blackmer you’d be practically look? ing at two columns pf lovely white space. There’s none of this “Well, enough of me, wfrat did you think of my. last picture?” about. Blackmer. When you realize that hfcr legit career began before the first World War, with Richard Bennett in a play Granville Barker directed called “The Morris Dance,” you get an inkling of how long art is for time- minded' people, I first saw- him with Margaret Wycherly in “The 13th Chair.” I have a dim idea he was-one of the handsomer chairs. Drink Tq Me Only With Thine i’s Since those far-off days he has played pictures, vaude, television and platforms. Jjtight now he could make a million lecturing on the evils of ill tqpnperance. Every lush in the country knows his story of a frus- trated chiropractor loused up by young love and old regrets, a fat Wife, a dead dog and suppressed desires which only a homicidal bender can seem to satisfy. That he never does quite hack' Shirley Booth’s fat off with a hatchet but comes to his senses and settles down to accept that “the important thing is to forget the past and live for the present” has made him a hero to similarly frustrated alcoholics now wrapped in the’ comforting cloak of anonymity. During the run of “Sheba” he went on one of those midnight disk jockey things to kick it around for five or 10 minutes, but phone calls kept coming in from faraway places, and the questions seemed to indi- cate that they were confusing him with a Mr* Anthony of sorely troubled stews.. It took him hours to get out of the role. The. unanimity of critical opinion v has naturally warmed the cockles of his Carolinian heart. Ward Morehouse thought Blackmer and Hep- burn were about the season’s best. Brooks Atkinson thought Blackmer and Booth deserved the wreaths. Whitney Bolton thought he was not only superb in “Sheba” but would have played “Salesman” better than most of those who had essayed it. . Thyra Samter Winslow was the first to say that Blackmer and Booth, at first merely featured, should be starred. The Theatre Guild took the directive and moved them above the title. John Chapman, Gilbert W./Gabriel and Robert Garland tossed their garlands to the sopse of the century. Considering all trip simu- lated drunks on stage and screen, notably Barton/ Nugent, Wolheitn and Bannister, not to. stress Barrymore and the like off stage, Black- men’s performances must have bedazzled even Bacchus. He will essay the role in pictures for Hal Wallis, but I suspect much of the adult motivation behind the character’s actions will have to be watered down and with it may go much of Blackmer’s frenzy, if not the character’s whole raison d'etre. If you want to get some idea of the span of Blackmer’s career take a I look at those Who have dropped by the wayside since he first played in ’ their company: Pearl White, James Cruze, Clare Kummer, Alice Duer Miller, John Emerson, Walter Connolly, Otis Skinner, Walter Huston, O. P. Heggie, Ed Wynn Continued from page X I find that my guesses still stack up. Either they have come, true or are still in the process of Com- ing true. I’d like to go on record with “Wynn’s Wily Wisdoms” on TV tralian playwrights, nor opportun- ity for any. For that matter, there i George Bancroft, Warner Oland, Buck Jones, Guy Kibbee* and Henry are virtually no professional ac- j B. Walthall. As for those who are hasbeens but still among the living the list rep- resents a long and melancholy trail, for Blackmer shares the civilized View that the saddest words of tongue or pen are “I’m at liberty again.” In his time he has taken some awful beatings, particularly in Hollywood where he skidded most imperceptibly through the years from the best of the majors to the most fragile of the indies. It got so for a while that the only part any casting director thought I he could play was Roosevelt. Funny thing that the first time he wad tested for it he asked Who, F.D.R.? They assured him it was for T.R. He looked around among the prospects and saw one guy who looked the living image of Terrible Teddy, arid he hadn’t been touched by a a tors, directors, designers or any professional theatre people except theatre managers. It’s the re- verse of Broadway, where the pro- fessional theatre people practically outnumber the audiences, where few shows make money and where the critics are the last word. But don’t ever say it isn’t interesting. Adele Longmire. (The writer is a Broadway and 1. The biggest ratings during , Hollywood actress and playwright, [makeup man. “What about this guy the first few years of television will go to the variety shows. 2. Most entertainers will go in for variety shows at first because they are easiest to do, 3. Many programs of the ama- teur show format will appear be- cause the talent costs are much cheaper. 4. The growth of television will be so great and so fast that net- works and sponsors won’t be able to keep up with it. It’ll be like the stock market crash of 1929 When the ticker-tape couldn’t keep up with the falling market, 5. The time will come when dealers will be selling iriore tele- vision sets than radio sets, a fairly obvious conclusion. Profitable Biz 6. Men who laid out a lot of mon^y to establish a TV/station will double or triple their invest- ments. (I am told that this has happened in some-cases and is ex- pected to occur in many other in- stances), 7. Every entertainer of any standing in radio will have to ge into television, Again, this is obvious. 8. Weekly shows will be the best type for TV if they can be accom- plished. ; 9. Within two or three years the "capacity of studios Will have to" be —Ed:) New Faces ▼ Continued from pace 1 groom them properly or lack of money,, are rushing them into top spots for which they’re not yet ready, according to the exhibs. They point to Samuel Goldwyn’s “Our Very/Own,” for example, in which. Farley Granger and Ann Blythe are Co-starred. While each is a good 'future star possibility, according to theatrepien, neither yet has a name big enough to lure customers to the boxofffee. Same holds true, they feel, fox* Metro’s “Next Voice You Hear,” In that One, James Whittemore and Nancy Davis carry the marquee load. Even though the picture might be a fine production, arid it’s gotten good reviews on that score, it won't do the business it should because of the lack of top star values. Exhibs think that Metro, on the other hand, did the right thing, for instance, by team- ing Elizabeth Taylor with Spencer Tracy and Joan Bennett in “Father (of the Bride,” thereby giving Miss Taylor a chance to build boxoff ice lure of her own for subsequent ! pictures* Blackmer asked. “We tested * him,” explained the casting director, “and on film he looks more like William Jennings Bryan. Come let us take you over to Percy West- more.” . ' “Which Roosevelt?” He Asks With that began one of the most strangling type, castings in Holly- wood history. He played the part of Terrible Teddy 14 times. Once. a whole picture Was wrapped around T.R* and the Rough Riders. Black- mer played that one, too. Recently asked to essay the character once again for TV he wired his regrets: “I’m a lifelong Democrat arid just don’t like to play Repub- licans anymore.” This is being pretty outspoken for an actor in 1950. In fact it’s being pretty outspoken for anybody. Considering now th^t Blackmer is a happily married man with two small children it’s about time he reached the age of discretion or what remains of a once magnificent dynasty may not enjoy chicken every Sunday* His wife, who once played opposite , him, is Suzanne Kaaren and the children iof this marriage are William Brewster (Blitz) Black- mer and Jonathan (Johnny Cake) Cole Blackmer. The father had no •intention of naming any child of his Sidney or./Junior or anything like it but at the christening of Johnny CakeHhere was r a pause and some- body shouted the name as Sidney Jonathan Cole, and so It appears in the church record. That the children may not have such a time establishing their right to eminence as their father was recently illustrated at grace at meals one day. Blitz was saying it. But he took a long pause half way through the prayer. Everybody thought he had either forgotten the prayer or that MacCready had once breathed on his grandfather, Not being able to bear the suspense, the moppet's grandmother took up the prayer. “Please,” interrupted Blitz, “Grandma, that’s my line.” ; I don’t know whose line it was that Sidney used in giving thanks for his recent award last Monday night, so I guess We will have to credit old Anon, the greatest poet who ever lived next to Ibid, if hot before him. It raff: 1 .? i Things owned are mere oblivion's duels , Things loved the soul can never lose. * Somehow the quotation seems to fit Sidney Blackmer as If tailored for him... It couldn’t have Happened to a-nicer guy*