Variety (December 1950)

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LEGlTlM^Tfi Wednesday, December 6, 1950 As usual, the supposedly hard-> ^ ' boiled N, Y. drama critics are prov- j pjQp ^garaK' Backcrs ins: softer touches than ^play- ^ Return of 10% going pubhe. In J>t. Backers of "Legend of Sarah,” dicated record percentage of hits gl^oj^garden’s recent pro- for the season thus far, reflecting | of the James Gow-Arnaud more than normal public response j d^Usseau comedy, have received an at the boxoffice, the reviews have | initial/return of 10'; t? on the $60,- favored more shows than have j 000 presentation.^ . _ found audience support, 1^ _ on the hasis Of fhe fir^h^of! ^^esUn tHe.^^to Ug ended “no": w'lhe c^^^ from the stock rights. ■ Kansas City AI Fresco To Preem in'51 With 10 Shows; Berger to Head Kansas Gitj% Dec. 5.- Four-year. plan to have summer eight New York dailies wrote 42 % \ favorable reviews, while only • 34.8% of the shows Were indicated hits. For the entire previous season [ of 1949-.^0, the favorable reviews ] comprised 39.37of the total, wliile only.' 1 .'5.91 % of the sfiows ultimately paid off. Included in the figuring- for the ! first half of the current season are , outdoor operetta here has now 26 regular Broadway productions^' jelled, with appointment of but excluded are the stock presen-■ Richard JI. Berger as production tations of the Arena Theatre, Fes- manager of the Starlight Theatre, tival theatre and Theatre Venture ' Berger was given a two-year con- (Bleecker Street Playhouse>.: Of, tract at a salary of $20,000 per the 200 reviews of those shows, 84 I were favorable, 98 were unfavor- j Recently program^ for i able and 18 inconclusive. That fig-NBC television in N, Y. and earlier ; ured a.s 42% favorable and 9''b , a film producer for RKO, Berger i undecided. ! was production director o.f the St. J “Toughest" of the critics thus . Louis Mirny Opera at one time, far has been Brooks Atkinson of ' While at St. Louis in the late -SOs, the Times, with seven favorable he brought an opera to Kansas notices, (26,9%) and four “no opin-; City, and made connections here ions" (15.4%) out of /26 shows, which helped in establishing the John Cha|>man Opines In the N. y. Daily News, Dec. 4, drama critic John Chapman observed: “It grieves me that the edi- tor ^ Variety has become a softy . . . has dropped from his weekly the drama critics’ box score, which was such a fiend- ish irritant for 26 seasons. Variety graded daily paper play reviewers on their ability to sense the financial success or failure of a production. It maintained that it wai^ doing so to eliminate a great amount of ddubie-talk, or yes-and-no- but-ron-the-other-hahd confu- sion : in the notice-writing trade. It achieved this pur- pose—-and it seems to hie there has been a noticeable increase of double-talk in play reviews, since the box score was offi- cially dropped on Nov. 22. “Oh, how we reviewers used to yell twice a .season, when the box scores came put! Soiitie yelled in print, others in pri- vate. 'We are not interested in money, W'e are interested in art,’ we wpuld chorus, and the nearer I got to the bottom of . the bbx score the more indig- nant I w'ould become. But I never once said the crazy thing should be ahandoned. I loathed it, but on the other hand, was fond of it—and I shall miss it” In^e Stolf-L^ Although Abe Burrows gets second billing as co-author of the book of ‘‘Guys and Dolls," he actually wrote every word of dialog in the show as now presented. Jo Swerling, who gets first billing, worked eight months on a treatment of the Damon Runyon story, “Tlie Idyll of Sarah Brown," and certain of the basic plot situations he supplied are used, for which he splits the 3% author royalty with Burrows. He has remained on the Coast on a film Writing contract. Swerling was the third writer whom producers Cy Feuer and Ernest H. Martin worked with on the show idea, and there were seven others who followed him before Burrows took over the assignment, hut all were paid off and do not share in the royalties. Burrows brought in radio-TV scripter Peter Lyon for assistance on the story structure, but the latter received a fiat fee and does not get billing. Burrows, with director George S, Kaufman helping with suggestions and encouragement, was the only writer present at rehearsals artd during the: five-week Philadelphia tryout. Frank Loesser wrote the songs for the show. Joseph Kesselring, who Authored “Arsenic and Old Lace," has re- poitedly conie up with another bizzare plot situation in his new comedy, “Four Times Twelve Are 48," which Aldrich 8c Myers, Julius Fleisch- mann and Otto Preminger have in rehearsal, under the latter’s direc- tion. Premise of the play is said to be that three generations of Amer- ican Indian; women, each having home a daughter at the age of 12, are agog over whether the_ fourth generation daughter is about to have a baby before her 13th birthday, thus making the eldest a great-grand- mother at 48. Ernest Triiex w’ill have a leading part in the show. In her announcements to sub.sCribers, Sylvia Siegler, president of Show-of-the-Mohth Club, stressed that since the organization is co- producing “Let’s Make an Opera," she could guarantee them all the seats they wanted in the center section of the orchestra; Last week, however, she discovered that in the Golden theatre, N. Y., where the audience-participation musical opens next Wednesday night (l3), there is a center aisle and thus no center section at all. So she has had to mail an explanation with each allotment of tickets to the organization’s ihembers,'. N.Y. Ballet Planned U.S. Tour Is Off ; ■ • ■ . I . Recent four-week engagement of caught, Bracketed as next-hardesl-: present contract. . ^ , i to-pleasc were Howard Barnes, of i Starlight Theatre will have its ; the Marquis de Cuevas Grand Bal- the Herald Tribune, and Robert 'first outdoor season next summe% i let at the Century, N. Y., cost the! Although no ‘ announcemeht has been issued, the cast of “Golden State," at the Fulton, N. Y., has been informed that the comedy will ! probably close after a three-week run. In a speech to the company just j before the opening curtain of the second performance, author-director Samuel Spewack called the compahy onrfage to take the blame for the play’s failure, think them for their cooperative spirit and excellent performances and advise them to start looking for other jobs. Bella AMrs.) Spewack presented the; show. John Rumsey, president of the Society of Authors’ Representatives, . • • A •«A. A ... A: ‘ V. 1 ^ ^ i - 1.1. il__' i ■« .ir •• land, all much of the time, caught only six shows, of which he liked two, and had no “no opinions." Descending Toughness In descending order of tough- ness after them were Robert Cole- musicals will comprise the first four years ago at Morte Carlo, was summer’s production. : making its first American visit. The summer s pi- . , , ^ ^ W M Symon, biz manager for , Marquis. had hoped to tour the the group, said production costs I U. S. after the N. Y. stay, but nego oh each show is expected to run about $40,000, the first one being inent of the Dramatists Guild specifically forbids a producer from collecting a commission on the film sale of one of his shows, June 23, Sadler’s Wells “Sleeping Beauty” ballet, piece de resistance of the tiations between him and’ Sol i company, will only be played five times (Once in five cities) Iliirok and the Shuberts, who were ■ before the troupe goes back to England in February. Scenery for the jointly to handle the tour, fell ballet takes 14 to 19 hours to hand, and outside of the first night, or through. The Shuberts reportedly the ballet can’t be scheduled, as one day’s performance would be offered the Marquis $5,000 a week lost. New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago and Boston, are man. Mirror, and Richard Walts, or nine Jr., Post, each having caught 26 j fo? season tickets * shows, liking 10 and having none : $6 to $30, plus tax: [for his company, the Marquis hold- five cities that have seen or will see the ballet. Berger plans to begin I Grosses for tlie recent engagements of “Kiss Me, Kate" in St, Paul musical got al- Auditorium. St. and three “no opinions," re- spectively; John Chapman, News,, . on 25: shows caught, 11 fa- : names and othci vorable notices (44%) and five the opinions John McClain, subbing for Garland, on 17 shows, caught, wllf vptn.rn'^to Kansas Citv 1 son) on services of his four leads— i Minneapolis, both approximately capacity, nine favorable reviews (52.9^ r,) i merger wm letuin lu ^ ^ Rnopiin Hiahfnwpr Marinrip tpU- i — — - ~ at the Lyceum, and one “no opinion"; Arthur PoL ! lock. Compass, on 26 shows caught, 14 favorable hods (53.8%) and two “no bpinions," and William Haw- kins, World-Telegram & Sun, on 24 shows caught, 13 favorable notices (54.2% ) and two “no opinions." For the complete season of 1949- 50, the first-stringers were in the following tough-to-please order; Atkinson. 27.66%; Banies, 30.43%; Watts, 37.5%; Garland, 38.77%; Coleman, 40.81%; Pollock, 44.68%.; Chapman, 45.83%, and Hawkins, 48.94%.. Comparison with the list for the first half of the current season indicates lhat the aisle-sit- ters are pretty consistent in their individual standards, but are writ- ing a much higher average of en- thusiastic reviews in line with the increased proporfion of hit shows.' The above figures do not. of course, have any direct relation to Mfliether the various reviews haye been “right’V or “wrong" by box- office standards, That was the basis Of VARipY’s annual ;boxsGpre of (Continued on page 60> about May 1 to begin details of production and lining up rehearsal .schedules. LONGRANGE EFFECT TOO Rpsella Hightower, Marjorie Tali chief, AndVe Eglevsky, George Ski- bine—and ballet-master John I Taras. Corps de ballet is being I sent home to Paris for dispersal. ; The Marquis, however, will resume ■at Cannes Feb. 1 for a six-week ; engagement, utilizing a smaller 1- . Y. ' Met Opera Huddling On Public Drive for Funds Ballet Theatre, returning toi America next week after a success- Pittsburgh, Dec, 5. U. S., and probably engaging a new Recent record-breaking snow- corps de ballet, storm in Pittsburgh is having a | Several reasons have been given company than he brought to the ful five-month tour of Europe, plans j TY o ....J —u„ui.. —.. ! a special one-night gala pex’form- ‘ long-range as well as an immediate j effect on the legit situation here. Not only did it cost the Nixon aroimd $9,000 in refunds for the Lunts’ show, “I Know My Love" for the sparse biz the Grand Ballet did at the Century. Belief Is that there’s been too much ballet in N, Y. this fall, with Sadler’s Wells, Ballets de Paris, Grand Ballet and ywv dS The Met Opera, which had a ance at the^N? Y7MetTan. record deficit of $430,502 last sea- it starts its season’s tour the next' son (1949-50) and apparently faces night (10) in Philadelphia. Troupe as large a one tliL year, has been (although they gave the final Sat- i N. Y, City Ballet Co. The Marquis’ urday (25) performances there, . only around 200 of the previou.sly- sold 3,.500 tickets came in on ac- troupe came in soon after the Sad- ler’s run and during the Ballet.s de Paris engagement. The N. Y. City' count of the weather) and forced j Ballet opened against the Marquis the theatre to cancel its next show, j in his fourth week. The Marquis “Blossom Time," but there have | had a $4.80 top, as against the N.Y. been other swaps, too. j City Ballet’s $3. For one, “A Streetcar KanVed There were few important new 3 Desire," which opened Monday (4),! productions in the Grand Ballet’s had originally been booked for a | repertoire. There were cohstant fortiiight, but in view of conditions | cbanges of bill, due to illness, etc., it cut the engagement in half. “The . which ; confused audiences.. The Innocents," which was to have re- [ Marquis refused to schedule Sun- plaeed “Lost in the Stars" week of , day performance.s^and Sund'ay is Dec, 18. decided to wait for the j regarded the best h.o. ballet day . J -J ■ r' '4.U_i_ T L-J... _ ^_ Is due at the Met next April 9 for a spring season, and originally wasn’t due to show in N. Y. till then. N. Y, one-nighier will be an ex- pensive booking, Even with the house .sold out. troupe is likely to Ipse $5,000 on the date. There are mulling a public drive for funds, with a $500,000 mark as its prob- able goal. President George A. Sloan has been huddling with Da- vid Church, veepee of John Price Jones Co., top fund-raising org. e.xtra transfers involved, from .ship j Church having counseled the Met to warehouse to theatre to train; ' ^ i orchestra rehearsal and perform-j ^ As financial ance that day; adverti.sing, print-j ing, etc. House will be available ! The Met has had two big furid that night, as the Met vv ill be per- drives in recent years, in 1940, forming, ill Philly. Three U.. S. actors have : been signed I'or the Australian produce tioh of “Brigadoon," which opens under J. C. William.son Thea- city to dig out and postponed its of the week; Instead, there; were visit uhtil late January. -That means j Wednesday riiatinees^lopked on in that the Nixon, which has already . the trade as a Gomplcte wa.ste. had mofC than its share of dark | —— ' : ■— stanzas, will shutter again for two weeks before Christmas, reopening Dee. 25* with the D’pyly Carte r r' Opek Co. After that, things look ire aet,is af i^s Majesty 55, Melr a Rttle rosier for awhile, with Jan- bourne, next Morrh .Tome. .Jnm,- : at any rate, bookcd iiary, bourne, next lyiarch. Janids Jami son, who did the Harry Beaton i ^1-4 acting-dancing role at the City: •. - ' . ■ ..' Center, N. Y., as well as in Lon-; \ . don will repeat the part Down ; RKO Buys Fllltl Rights Under, as well as produce: thp i show, . Peter Turgeon. who, had ! Uie Ici^d comecly role oi’ Jell' at the ! .Screen rights tb/'T,he Man,’’. Mel Private Eye Clerk Scores In Cincy Akins Tryout Cincinnati, Dee. 5 Although the play itself is fig- ured a questionable prospect for Broadway, the femme lead in the Cincinnati Civic Theatre produc- tion of “Another Darling," new European tour of Ballet Theatre has been a steady artistic triumph. Trip has been co.stly, however, its estimated loss being ,$200,000. which Blevins Davis is angeling. Troupe finished' a three-week run in Paris yesterday (5 >, and is due in Berlin for three days (8-9-10). when it raised over $1,000,000 to ' buy the opera house, knd in 1942, j when it raised $350,000. Church’s Outfit \yas retained each time With j a nominal fee for advice. New . drive would be run by a national committee and several local N, Y. 1 groups, with the Church ciutfit again aiding bn nodest retainer [ but not running the campaign. Contemplated fund drive is nee- : m irwit Tilt, y'r aaA ! Akins drama, here last week, To. TnG M-Un for ipZUiUUU t-scored a solid personal click. The - - ... .V/ ; young actre.ss. Nancy Todd, ein- Center. . will , do it again, and Viiv^ Dinelli melodrama presented on ployed in a local private detbetive r,.. agency, may go to New York next Slimmer to work in 'strawliats. Among tho.se present for the Haring Giving Up on His Long Island Strawhatter ! essary. saM sToah yesterday * iTv, Forrest C. Haring, who operated ' ^ Congress the John Di*ew theatre at East I’cinoval of the federal admis- i Hampton, L. L, the last tWo sum- seembd likely ' mers, won’t return to the spot in I’emoval last spring, before the 1951. Although last summer’s op- ' war broke out. Sloan claims ration returned a small profit, in ' t '®, A® budget regu- mtrast to his initial season in : tju’t'e ginia Richard.son (Mrs. . Turgeon) lyill dance ...and act Maggie. Doi^o- thy StewaH, AVilliamson’s N. Y. rep has signed the trio for six months, with another six months’ option. Rest of cast will be recruited from British and Aussie talent. Co.s-: tiimes will come from Scotland and England. I sets Broadway last season by Kcrmii Bloomgarden, have been acquired bv RKO at a reported price of $20:000. That will meaii a return of $8,' amateur .presentation here were er contrast 10 ms iniiiai season m 1949, he . figures that the limited capacity of the spot is Jbo small for the risks .involved. : He’s now looking around for an-, r • other location, where he can op-1 'Yashmgto.n. now thiit vanous sym- erate a strawhat next ‘Ummer. pref- ’ Pu^Mes and other cultural groups erably in the east. Meanwhile Pp^^ ^aue their desperate financial position of the tax, and said the Met could take care of its heeds if the tax w«?re removed. He still sees some hone of- faYorable action in producers Richard Aldrich 8: Rich- he’s continuing as gcmeralinanager federal authorities. 000 to the backers of the .$,50,OOO 1 ard Mye.r.s and their a.s.sociate, lo-' for Dwight Deere Wiman, produce^'• f ^insure its fu- production. There will probably be i cal resident Julius F*lcischmann. i of “Country Ct|rl,’’ at the Lyceum. light of its precarious an. additional payment of 10-15%;; Bc.sides his Broadway production j N. Y., and the forthcoming “Romeo • . state and tax uncertainty ’ - J i - I Several and Juliet" revival, to-star Glivia i ■‘I®fl^^^ussing a pub- from the stock rights and other as-1 actiyities. Aldrich ope summer theatres in J^ew England. i De llavilland. I --- * * vwaiy .10 AOVilOOIM lie drive for funds again.