Variety (August 1950)

22 PICTURES Wednesday, August 9, 1950 Eagle Lion Classics has been operating in the black since its kickoff some eight weeks ago, For the past six weeks, ELC has been averaging $300,000 in weekly grosses, Which means a fairly solid margin for operations, since, it re- quires $240,000 to break: even. Former Eagle Lion outfit, prior to its acquisition of additional product from Film Classics, was averaging a $2,000 weekly deficit. Bernhard-EL Continued from page I ended selling to forestall a claim i of damages by Kaufman. Latter [last week obtained permission of I the court to bring suits if neces- sary, MacMillen had previously warn- ed Kaufman of the halt to sales after the two failed to agree on the proportion .of rentals which would be returned to FC. On this score', ELC is holding 27% as distrib fees and handing over 3% to the FC assignee* Because MacMillan has been out Big help in its present strong j tfn oma short vacation, ho and showing comes from the company’s j Kaufman _ have, had certain pro* veteran standby, “Red : Shoes,” i hminary-talks.Via telephone. Vi*- British-made ballet pic brought in j f“X ls m ee tmgs with Bernhard par- $40,000 last week, almost two years j ticipatmg are alated for later this after release. . Film, turned out by ■ weekv ■ If the deal as now mapped J. Arthur Rank, has just crossed ' £°. es through, creditors would re-j the. $3,000,000 mark on 2,000 book- i ceive some cash from ELC, and ings. “The Jackie Robinson Story” ! Bernhard would be given _an op- also came through with $38,000 for j portUmty of coming into the new the week. | company if he wants to* Attempts io 1 by Kaufman to up the share of fees Company 1S _ now counting on , elC have been dropped in big . returns from "Destination : i , of th ‘ * arr ‘ neem " t Moon,” which is ready to break in; tavo? ot tne new arrangement. j Bernhard is reported considering ] becoming an indie producer in- stead of an exec With ELC. He • may move to the Coast for that I purpose. It is not known whether : ELC would distribute any such • pictures. quiring the viewer to use no optical j Meanwhile, Kaufman stil in- device. Polarpid ( system hinges on ‘ dicates that he will bring suit Un- the spectator donning a pair of less a compromise is worked out. special glasses. Lester Cowan is 1 Original merger fell through When about to produce a feature pic- Bernhard could not obtain -pro- cure in the latter process with the I ducer okays fpr some of his pix backing Of a group of indie cir-! involved in the transfer. Number cuit owners. ; of these, not involved in the stop- Those who have seen the Waller ; sell order, are being handled by a number of first-runs. Continued from page 4 ELC under separate with their owners. agreement Vaults Bulge Continued from page 7 system have generally felt it to be impractical for general use since it requires three sets of projectors, plus another machine for the sound, which is on a separate track. That would treble production costs. In addition to the cost of construct- ing the booth, which must be spread across the back of the the- ; fair,” and ‘Treasure Island,” Walt atre, special machines are required. \ Disney feature, Film is not of standard gauge or j Metro, with 22 backlogged, fol- sprocketing, although that may i lows. Studio here is pinning its eventually come. | highest hopes on the Judy Garland- Process also requires at least. Gene Kelly teamer, “Summer three times the normal rawstock. ! Stock,” also its Christmas. release, RKO’S JACKPOT TIEUPS FOR TREASURE ISLAND’ That’s compensated for, however^ according to Waller, by speed With which a pic can be shot. Since the cameras cover such a wide angle of view, many fewer * setups are needed. One of the Oyster Bay demon- stration pix may be used in the Broadway showing. Reeves said. That is footage made on. a Coney Island rollercoasteri It has not been determined yet whether the remainder of the product for the Show will be feature-length or a series of short clips. Esther Williams’ “Pagan J^ove Song.” High on the list, too, are “King Solombn’s Mines,” “Kim,” “A Life of Her Own,” with Lana Turner, and the TechnicOlored “Vengeance Valley.” Next, Uni- versal-International has 18 features ready, including “Harvey,” “Lou- isa” and seven action specials in Technicolor. Paramount has a 17-feature backlog, foremost of which are i “Sunset Boulevard” and “An Amer- i ican Tragedy.” Not to be over- looked, however, is the Fred As Rockefeller, a member of the taire-Betty Hutton musical, “Let’s Standard Oil clan, has been asso- ciated with Waller in development of the process for 12 years. Time came in three years ago and was Dance”; the Bob Hope-Lucille Ball comedy, “Fancy Pants”; or Bing Crosby’s “Mr. Music.” Republic, too, has 17 in the vaults, headed by talking of ^making features and [ John Ford’s “Rio Bravo,” teamiiig John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara. 20th Has 16 Twentieth-Fox is in a strong po- sition with 16 top-budget films in the can. Toppers here are “The Black Rose,” “All About Eve,” co- starring Bette Davis, Anne Baxter and Celeste Holm, and “Halls of Montezuma,” a Technicolor action biggie with Richard Widmark. Warners’ list of 13 is headed by “The Glass Menagerie,” “Captain Horatio Homblower” and “Tea For Two,” a Technicolor musical team- ing Doris Day and Gordon Mac- Rae. Monogram, with 11 ready, has its highest hopes for an ex- ploitation special, “A Modem Mar- otherwise utilizing the new tech nique. Rockefeller’s departure, after in- vestment of a large part of the approximately $500,000 that Wal- ler spent on develpment, appar- ently results from a tendency to be more conservative than his part: ners. The others, headed by Reeves, were anxious to get ahead With production of pix in the proc- ess and a public demonstration. Wanted to Wait Rockefeller wanted to wait until it was better developed. Reeves’ stand was that if Henry Ford had waited to develop a perfect car before offering it for sale, the pub- lic wouldn’t be riding in automo- biles yet. , In addition to this , fact. Rocke- feller is active in aircraft manu- facture and other war babies that have suddenly put more pressure On his time. Since he brought Time/ Inc., into the setup, it fol- lowed him to the. exit ■ United Artists’ backlog of nine is headed by a pair from {Stanley Kramer, “The Men” and “Cyrano de Bergerac.” Eagle Lion follows with eight and Lippert with four. Also included in the completed list are eight films with no definite Reeves’ syndicate, which was in ! release set as yet. Excluded are at minority position, thereupon took , the J, Arthur Rank 'productions to over the shares owned by Rocke- : go but through U-I.arid EL. feller and Time. Reeves refused to reveal who his associates are. j With the heavy backlog, Holly- wood execs are confident that His sound, recording service studio j they’ll stil] be sitting pretty high. in New York is the largest such indie .unit in the world. although, the war situation may again up costs. Disney Aide Called Up First man to be called up for service front the Walt Disney org is Gene Retruski, 21-year-old em-. ployee in Disney’s N. Y. office; PetruskjL reports to the Marines at Camp Lejeune, N. C. He lias been with the film outfit • for the past 346 years. I SCHINE MGB. JOINS BANK Syracuse, Aug. 8. John Crowe, house manager of Schine’s Paramount theatre, left Monday (7) for New York to take a position With the Chemical Trust bank in that city. He started at Paramount as an usher. Crowe will also enter New York U., to study accounting and finance. When the last of 40 key cities get Walt Disney’s “Treasure Island” under way Aug. 24, more than 3b0 merchants in those 40 cities Will have contributed more than 500,000 line of free advertising on the pic- ture, in one of the greatest treas- ure hunts in the history of motion pictures. About 14 men of the RKO field force accomplished this with the aid of 40 theatre managers and the promotion and managing ed- itors of a great many newspapers. The list of newspapers, which gave front page and volumous space to the Disney *%e$sure Hunt ‘and the picture ■ fwcmded Albany Times Union, Philadelphia News, New Haven Register, Syracuse Post Standard, Birmingham Nows, Baltimore News Post, Charlotte News, Boston Post, Portland Press and Herald Express, Washington News, Indianapolis News, Chicago Herald American, New Orleans Item, ' Cincinnati Post, Memphis Press-Scimitar, Columbus Citizen, San Antonio Express-News, Hous- ton Chronicle, Toledo Blade, Fort Worth Press, N. Y. Journal-Amer- ican, Denver Post, $. F. Call-Bul- letin, Miami Daily News, Tulsa World-Tribune, Los Angeles Exaihr iner and the. Portland Oregonian. Four Canadian newspapers in To- ronto, Montreal, Winnipeg and Vancouver have signified their willingness to go along with the plan when the picture opens there in September. In cities where the newspapers could not cooperate fully many de- partment stores and drug chains went along on an advertising basis, including Saengers in Dallas, the Rothchild stores in Minneapolis and St. Paul, the Samson Co. in Milwaukee, Miller & Rhoades in Richmond, the Gray Drug Co. in Cleveland, Whelan chain in N. Y. City, Bon Marche in Seattle, Daw Drug chain in Rochester, Dey de- partment store in Albany and a drug chain in Buffalo. The RKO field department was able through promotion and buy- ing at manufacturers’ costs to sup- ply these 40 cities with merchan- dise with a total retail value of better than $250,000. They also supplied upwards of 16,000,000 numbered pasteboard keys. Each city had about 30 treasure chests holding a portion of the prizes, which sent the keyholders scurry- ing through all stores looking for a number to match the one on their key. Theatre managers, newspa- pers and merchants reported al- most en masse that the stunt in its entirety caused a city-wide furore. The Walt Disney Treasure Is- land Treasure Hunt, originated with the RKO field department and was carried through its maze of complications by Dave Cantor, Hal Olver, Ralph. Banghart, Doug Beck, Hank Howard, Alan Weider, Russel Morgan, Ed Terhune, Hugh Mac- Kei.zie, T. Bidwell McCormick, Fred Calvin, Lou DuFour and Joe Longo. Dwan Flies Rep. ‘Wings’ Hollywood, Aug. 8. To Allan Dwan goes the pro- ducer-director r job on “Wings of the South Pacific,” heralded as Re- public’s most ambitious film since “The Sands of Iwo Jima.” Lined up for top roles are John Wayne, Rod Cameron, John Carroll, For- rest Tucker and Bill Ching. Picture, currently being scripted by Andrew Gear, former Marine, will go into work as soon as Dwan finishes his current task, “Bell Le Grand.” Kodak Honors Dr. Spencer London; Aug, 8. Dr. Douglas A. Spencer, - with Kodak, Ltd., Since 1939, has been named deputy managing director of the Eastman Kodak subsidiary. He also was elected to the board. Upon joining Kodak Ltd., Spen- cer aided in reog of the com- pany’s research activities, later taking charge of research labora- tory’s contacts with British gov- ernment. Picture Grosses MONTREAL (Continued from page* 12) Last week, “Happy Years” (M-G), $7,000. Capitol (C.T.) (2,412; 34-60)— “Caged” (WB). Sock $16,000, Last week, “Night and City” (20th), $9,- 000 . Princess (C. T.) (2,131; 34-60)— “Sidewalk Ends” (20th). Fair $11,000. Last, week, : “Frontiers- man” (WB), $i1,000. Loew’s (C .T.) (2,855; 40-65)— “Duchess of Idaho” (MtG) (3d wk). Okay $11,000,, following, socko second session at $18,000. Imperial (C.T.) (1,839; 34-60)— “Kill Umpire” (Col) and “Tyrant of Sea” (Col). Routine $6,500. Last week, “Live by Night” (RKO) and “Golden Twenties” (RKO), $9,000. Orpheum (C. T.) (1,040; 34-60)— “So Young/ So Bud”: (UA) and “Destination Murder” (UAL. Good $8,000 or near. Last week, “Guilty of Treason” (EL) and “Father Makes Good” (EL), $5,000. Disney's ‘Seal* for Festival Edinburgh, Aug. 1. A Walt Disney film, “Seal Is- land,” was picked for showing here at the fourth International Film Festival, which is part of the larger Edinburgh Festival of Mu- sic and Drama. It runs from Aug. 20 to Sept. 10. In Denver; ‘Own’ 11G, 2d Denver, Aug. 8. Biz is spotty here this round. “Cariboo Trail” shapes best new- comer, fine in ’two spots. “Annie Get Gun,” still fancy in fifth frame at the Broadway. Wins sixth week, equalling the longrun mark at this house. Estimates fofr This Week Broadway (Wolfberg) (1,500; 35- 74^—“Annie Get Gun” (M-G) (5th wk). Fine $8,500, Holds again, Last week, $8,000. Denham (Cockrill) (1,750; 35-70) —“Going My Way” (Par), (reissue). Light $6,500. Last week, “Furies” (Par) (2d Wk), $8,500. Denver (Fox) (2,525; 35-74) — “Cariboo Trail” (20th) and “Lost Volcano” (Mono), day-date with Webber. Fine $16,000. Last week, “In Foreign Legion” (U), $12,000. .Esquire (Fox) (742; 35-74) — “Stage Fright” (WB) and “Hum- phrey Takes Chance” (Mono), day- date with Paramount. Lean $1,500. Last week “Winchester ’73” (U) and “One Way Street” (U) (2d wk), $1,500. Orpheum (RKO) (2,600; 35-74)— “Our Very Own” (RKO) (2d wk). Good $11,000. Last week, big $19,000. Paramount (Fox) (2,200; 35-74) — “Stage Fright” (WB) and ’{Humphrey Takes Chance” (Mono), also Esquire. Poor $5,000 or less. Last week, “Winchester ’73” (U) and “One Way Street” (U), $5,000. Vogue (Pike) (600; 60-74)—“Kind Hearts, Coronets’• (EL). Big $3,000, and holding. Last ^yeek, ‘‘Titan” (UA) (2d wk), fine $3,000. Webber (Fox) (750; 35-74) — “Cariboo Trail” (20th) and “Lost Volcano” (Mono), also Denver. Nice $3,000. Last week, “In Foreign Legion” (U), fair $1,700. tndpls. Goes for ‘Words' At 16G; "Treasure* 10G Indianapolis, Aug. 8. ‘.‘Three Little Words” is piling up one of season’s best figures at Loew’s this week to lead town by a wide margin. Otherwise, situa- tion here is quiet. “Treasure Is- land” is getting only an okay play at Indiana. “Night and City/* at Circle, is tepid. . Estimates for This Week Circle (Gamble-Dolle) (2,800; 44- 65)—“Night and City” (20th) and “Triple Trouble” (Mono). Slow $7,500. Last week, “Cactus Creek” (U) and “Secret Fury” (RKO), $ 8 , 000 . Indiana (G-D), (3,300; 44-65) — “Treasure Island” (RKO). Okay $10,000. Last week, “Stella” (20th) and Lost Volcano” (Mono), only $7,500 despite opening day boost by Victor Mature and “Stella” stars on stage. Loew’s (Loew’s) (2,427; 44-65) — “Three Little Words” (M-G). Hefty $16,000, and will hold. Last week, “Rogues Sherwood Forest” (Col) and “Custom’s Agent” (Col), $ 10 , 000 . Lyric (G-D) (1,600; 44-65)—“The Lawless”: (Par) and “Rangers Cherokee Strip”; (Rep). Fair ■ $4,- 500. Last week, carnival of 20th- Fox reissues, dull $3,500. Kaplan Joins Berger. Minneapolis, Aug. 8. Lowell Kaplan has resigned as buyer and booker of Independent Theatres, non-profit buying and booking pool of 18 Twin City thea- tres, to take a similar post with the Bennie Berger theatre circuit. The duties formerly were 1 assum- ed for Berger by Ted Bolnick, his general manager, who recently re- signed. ‘WORDS’ ROUSING 18G IN L’VILLE;‘CRAZY’5C v. Louisville. A«g. 8. Outstanding here are “Three Little Words” at Loew’s {State and “Gun Crazy” at the Strand, Former had brisk teeoff and pace is head- ing for- sock round. “Gun Crazy” and “Without Honor” will give Strand its best stanza since last April. These are the only new pix on the main stem. Estimates for This Week Mary Anderson (People’s) (1,200* 45-65)—“Flame and Arrow” (WB) (2d wk). Easing off to modest $4,500 after last week’s sturdy $ 8 , 000 . . Rialto (Fourth Avenue) (3,000* 45-65)—“Going My Way” (Par) (re- issue). Under expectations at mod- est $7,000. Last week, “White Tower” (RKO) and “Arriiored Car Robbery” (RKO), modest $8,000. State (Loew’s) (3,000; 45-65)— “Three Little Words” (M-G). Musi^ cal pic broke away fast and rousing $18,000 or near looms. Last week, “Rogues Sherwood Forest” (Col) and “Custom Agent” (Col), nice $ 11 , 000 . Strand (FA) (1,200; 45-65-)— “Gun Crazy” (UA) and “Without Honor” (UA), Pair is lifting house out of doldrums for neat $5,000. Last week, “Love That Brute” (20th) and “Lost Volcano” (Mono), $3,500. * :’ MiU Eg,000, Seattle;‘Dachess’ 7G, 3d : Seattle, Augi 8. , Rain over the weekend is help- ing biz this stanza. But there are some dull spots. “Stella” is most disappointing at Paramount. “Annie Get Gun,” now in fourth week still is big. “Where Sidewalk Ends’* looks mild at Fifth Avenue. Estimates for This Week Blue Mouse (Hamrick) <800; 59- 84)—“Winchester *’73” (U) (4th wk). Fine $3,500 after big $4,200 last Week. Coliseum (Evergreen) (1.877; 59- 84)—“Woman on Pier 13” (RKO) and “Hostile Country” (Lip). Fair $6,000. Last week “711 Ocean Drive” (Col) and “Snow Dog” (Mono), $6,800. Fifth Avenue (Evergreen) (2,349; 59-84) —: “Where Sidewalk Ends” (2Qth) and “Isle of Samoa” (Col). Mild $8,000, Last week, “In Lonely Place” (Col) and “Hi - Jacked” (Lip), $7,200* in 10 days. Liberty (Hamrick) (1,650; 59-84) —“Duchess of Idaho” (M-G) and “House by River” (Rep) (3d wk). Swell $7,000 or near, Last Week, big $9,300. Miisic Hall (Hamrick) (2,200; 59- 84)—“Annie Get Gun” (M-G) and “Mystery Street” (M-G). (4th wk). Huge $9,500. Holds. Last week $9,600, Orpheum (Hamrick) (2,600; 59- 84) —“Kid from Texas” (U) and “Adam and Evalyn” (U). Fine $9,- 000. Last week, “Great Jewel Robber” (WB) and “50 Years Before Eyes” (WB), $4,700. Palomar (Sterling) (1,350; 40- 52-971 — “Cariboo Trail” (20th), (2d run) plus stage featuring Flo Aash and revue. Good $7,000. Last week, “Night and City” (20th) (2d run) plus vau.de, $6,400. Paramount (Evergreen) (3,039; 59-84)—“Stella” (20th) and “Desti- nation Murder” (RKO). Light $8,- 000. Last week, “Furies” (Par) and “Lost Volcano” (Mono) (2d wk-6 days), $4,700. Get on ^ Hollywood, Aug. 8. Norman Frank and Melvin Pana- ma closed a deal to write, direct and . produce their own yarn, “Callaway Went Thataway,” foi Metro. Picture is described as a modern cowboy comedy. Filming starts when they wind up the Ezio Pinza starrer, “Strictly Dishonorable,” on the same lot. Set Arg. Pic for U. S. Hollywood, Aug. 8. From Argentina comes “The Fire Dance,” produced by Einelco Corp. and aimed at general release in the U. S. after English-dialog dub- bing in Hollywood. Dubbing will be supervised by Humberto Correll, executive of Trans-American Films, which will handle distribution. Previous Ar- gentine pictures have been con- fined chiefly to art houses in U. S.