Variety (March 1953)

LITERATI _ mings mm. L * f J Also, Andre ObeyV"Venus and I tG/OLll Adonis/' Jean Giraudoux’s “Elec- tra,” Francis Fergusson's “The —— — King and the Duke,” Louis Mac- Mg - . White Hou* c May 8 will Pocketbook-size affgur starts with , a ~ r ,, „ ^ Assn. d tiner in D. C. May, afi intr0 by Fred Allen an d winds New Hampshire Weekly Folds definitely have presiaen dictionary. The Newport (N.H.) Guardian- hpwer on hand, for the first ngws up S un, weeWy newspaper estab- dinner in his^ honor. -^ents More 20th N Y. Scribes lished in 1948, has gone out oi A«n ed a ffSir B on ground' P ttat he Literary output from 20th-Fox’s business, but publisher George D. office long enough and N . y. story department continues. Graves Jr., said a new company ^fidn-t afford the time foi? social- Following publication of story edi- would take over the plant and pub- couldn t aitora me rraTesDon( j. jwtram Bloch’s first novel, lish a new weekly, known as the Marquis of Keith’* and.E. E. Cum- mings’ “Him.” Also, Andre Obey’s .“Venus and Adonis/' Jean Giraudoux’s “Elec- tra/’ Francis Fergusson's “The King and the Duke,” Louis Mac- Neice’s “The Dark Tower” and Bertolt Brecht’s “Galileo.” New Hampshire Weekly Folds The Newport (N.H.) Guardian- Sun, weekly newspaper estab- lished in 1948, has gone out of business, but publisher George D. | Graves, Jr., said a new company ents are working with Harry Kal cheim of the William _ Moms Srencv to line up top name talent thaniel Norsen Weinreb, a reader for the 1 affair. P Staging will be in the Fox office, will be published worked in cooperation with D. C. b y Doubleday in May r r i os Orville Crouch, Jack it's been made a June selection LOeW S reps,. ... 4_ u ~ Ttnnlr Plllh tor Bertram Bloch’s first novel, “Mrs. Hulett,” last month, “The Newport-Lake Sunapee Times. Babylonians,” first novel by Na- Graves said the Guardian-Sun ‘ aniel Norsen Weinreb, a reader foldup was due to a suit of undis- the Fox office, will be published dosed nature filed against the Doubleday in May. . newspaper by the Claremont Pub : It’s been made a June selection fishing Co. the People’s Book Club. . —— ' ' Sheilah Back on C-N Page One Awards Sheilah Graham is leaving Daily Page One Awards in journalism . Variety as gossip columnist and FiM and Allan Zee. . by the People’s Book Club. , Proxy has also accepted in vita ■ Sheilah Back on C-N tlon of the White House Photog- % page One Awards Sheilah Graham is leaving Daily raphers Assn, to be guest of nonor p age Q ne Awar d s in journalism Variety as gossip columnist and at their dinner later in May. Pno- and seven other categories _ were returning to the Hollywood Cit- togs, who include the newsreel vo t ed b y the Newspaper Guild of izen-News on April 24. lensers, originally planned a din- n. Y. last week. Federal Judge. ner for the end of February, but Learned Hand won the award in rn ._. postponed and marked time until pubUc affairs « for his h alf century CHATTER Eisenhower gave them a nod last 0 £ outstanding, services to society ~ J. P. McEvoy out and about y)eek. and law and his. humanitarian out- again. — look” Accolades will be presented Jimmy Logan, Scot comedian, Who Wilt Publish Truman? at t he guild's ball at Hotel Astor, penning weekly humor piece in the William Jay Gold, articles edi- N. .Y.. April 17. Scottish Sunday Mail, tor of Life, has been huddling with Frederick Woltman of the N. Y. Steve Strassberg, former film ex-President Harry S. £ruman at World-Telegram & Sun won the flack, joined the David O. Alber his Independence, Mo., home in reporting award for his stories on office in N. Y. as account exec, connection with the weekly s deal police brutality. Features award Bernard Charman, editor-of the for his memoirs. William Hillman, wen t to N. Y. Times’ Jack Gould Daily Film Renter, in Hollywood who did “Mr. President” for Far- fq r his “unbiased reports” on radio to study three-dimentional systems, rar. Straus & Young, may channel and television. Series of stories on Vonne Godfrey signed to write it to that firm, but it is an open- housing conditions won the special a weekly column about Hollywood bidding proposition: Life, which articles award for the Brooklyn for the London New Musical Ex- owns all rights (book,-etc., follow- Eagle’s Dan Noonan and Leslie press. „ ing its own first serialization) has Hanscom. Bob Wendlinger of the James T. Farrell authored ‘The the say on that. „ , N. Y. Mirror .copped the prize for Face of Time,, which Vanguard Simon & Schuster published “pictorial reporting.” • Press is bringing out next Sep- Life’s previous editorial features, other awards were bestowed tember. “World We Live In” and Pic- upon Fred Zinnemann for his di- Malvin Wald wrote an article, IT VJ.AM ’ ’ ^ ' ... i H/r__ fr .m ... « tt-r •• nmL _ T1 ^.1. TV- -..m- --.1 1 ACO and seven other categories were voted by the Newspaper Guild of N. Y. last week. Federal Judge. Learned Hand won the award in public affairs “for his half century of outstanding, services to society and law and his. humanitarian out- look,” Accolades will be presented at the guild's ball at Hotel Astor, N. Y. April 17. Frederick Woltman of the N. Y. World-Telegram & Sun won the reporting award for his stories on police brutality. Features award returning to the Hollywood Cit- izen-News on April 24. CHATTER _ J. P. McEvoy out and about again. Jimmy . Logan, Scot comedian, penning weekly humor piece in the Scottish Sunday Mail. Steve Strassberg, former film flack, joined the David O. Alber office in N. Y. as account exec. Bernard Charman, editor of the went to N. Y. Times’ Jack Gould Daily Film Renter, in Hollywood for his “unbiased reports” on radio to study three-dimentional systems, and television. Series of stories on Vonne Godfrey signed to write “World We Live In” and Pic- upon Fred Zinnemann for his di- torial History of Western Man, rection of the film, “Hjgh Noon”; but may not do the Truman auto- victor Moore, for his performance biog in the legiter, “On Borrowed - ■■■—. Time”; Jacob L. Holtzmann, for Buckley on Holt Board backing a plan for educational tele- legiter. Borrowed Review. press. James T. Farrell authored “The Face of Time,” which Vanguard Press is bringing out next Sep- tember. Malvin Wald wrote an article, “The Best Documentaries of 1952,” for the April issue of Films in — Time”; Jacob L. Holtzmann, for Daniel D. Mich, editorial direc- Buckley on Holt Board backing a plan for educational tele- tor of McCall’s mag, in Hollywood William E. Buckley, v.p. of Henry vision in N. Y. Stage; and Carl for two weeks to study the film Holt & Co. Inc., elected to board Sandburg, for “good writing” in situation. of directors of that company, his novel “Always the Young Garden City (Doubleday subsid) Bucklev joined Holt Oct. 1,.>1949 Strangers.’' • Maureen Connolly, will reprint “The Spice of Variety” as manager of Trade Department, Walter P. Reuther, George Meany (Holt; $3.50), anthology of_ Variety and in December, 1950, was ap- and Linus Paling respectively won pointed v.p. He was previously prizes in the sports, labor and with Doubleday, after four years science fields, in the Navy as a Lieutenant-Corn- Also awarded a special prize, mander. - among others, was ABC’s Elmer ■ - Davis “for his courageous, in- New Yorker’s Peak *52 Biz dependent interpretation of the Despite the “highest volume of news in the spirit of Heywood advertising, advertising revenue Broun.” and kfV'oWation that ’we have ever —■ had,” N€vv Yorker mag prez R. H- * Bates Award Fleischmann told the % firm's 590 Edward W. Bates, newsman in stockholders in his aiinual report Albany, N. Y„ for over 50 years last week, peak costs and taxes in and member of the N. Y. Herald pieces, in a $1.49 edition next fall. Dick Osborne, flack formerly with the Ed Weiner office and Hy Gardner, joined Townsend & Wil- among others, was ABC’s Elmer lis, Inc., Garden City, L. I., public Davis “for his courageous, in- relations firm. dependent interpretation Ivan Black, prez of Publicists news in the spirit of Heywood Guild, finishing his satirical novel Broun.” of the Middle Ages, titled “Fig- T.paf Ovpr thp P!ar " fnr nPYf. win- Bates Award Edward W. Bates, newsman in Albany, N. Y„ for over 50 years and member of the N. Y. Herald 1952 held the year’s net profit per Tribune staff since 1931, has won Leaf Over the Ear/' for next win- ter publication. Herman G. Weinberg, foreign- film title writer, translated Stefane Mallarme’s essay on French paint- er Berthe Morisot for May issue share down to $2.19. Earnings, however, were still 15c better than the $2.04 racked up /the previous year- - From a total of 3,917 pages of ads, gross revenue amounted to $7,212,097, against 3,617 pages and $6,341,618 for the comparable 1951 . period. Average Weekly . circula- tion last year was 369,915 and re- the 1953 alumni award of the Leg- of Gentry mag. islative Correspondents Assn, for Jack Lait and Lee Mortimer will “excellence in reporting legislative uo Hollywood Confidential in» a affairs.” three-part serial for a new Ziff- Bates also moderates a weekly JJSY*? suspense-type mag, still un- panel program from Capitol Hill titled, slated for the fall. over WOKO, Dettmer Chi 11-A Critic Roger Dettmer, who has been HUH 1 CIO Is ji/Oi vr uo ywt/tvAv- * v ivv/gvi. f ttiiv uuu yvwa turned $2,289,533 to the company doing out-of-town music reviews am * -n ■ i _ l • J - m <*_ i i _ *rt -ir tt i .1 m_ • i J__1 coffers. Readership showed a 21,- for the N. Y. Herald Tribune, takes William Murray Jr., whose fa- 384 rise over ’51 and circulation over as drama and music critic for ther was the late head of the Wil- Income likewise increased by the Chicago Herald-American this liam Morris agency’s radio-TV $153,865. Shares outstanding re- week. dept,, has written a satiric novel, mained unchanged at 265,779, ex- Ann Marsters, who has been “The Best of AH Possible Worlds,” eluding 17,868 in the company doing double duty as film and which S&S is reading at the mo- treasury. drama reviewer since the death of hient. . Earl Wilson’s nitery aide on the N. Y. Post, "Blair Chotzinoff, son of music critic and NBC' exec Samuel Chotzihoff, into the Air Force as $ jet pilot soon. William Murray, Jr., whose fa- income likewise increased by the Chicago Herald-American this $153,865. Shares outstanding re- week. mained unchanged at 265,779, ex- cluding 17,868 in the company treasury. Net profit was $581,946, com- Ashton 1 Stevens, July 11, 1951, goes which S&S is reading at the mo- ment. Mike Stern, European correpond- pared with the 1951 take of $543,- back Stressing the mag’s spiraling Charles Buckley, who has been Fleischmann pointed out covering the music beat, leaves the film desk, while ent for Fawcett Publications, whose I _ .1 TT ... _ % « <i%Y T costs, Fleischmann pointed out covering the mus that negotiation of new contracts feature side, “between our printers and their -— employees” recently forced print- Irish Blue-1 ing costs upward by 4.6% and an- . After investiga other hike is scheduled to take ef- 1952, the Irish C feet n,ext September. He also lications Board noted that compensation paid many them, according of the firm’s employees, as well report just issue< as contributors, is pegged to the ty seven out of 1 cost-of-living index. amined were alsi Irish Blue-Pencils Busy After investigating 717 books in 1952, the Irish Censorship of Pub- lications Board banned, 539 of them, according to the' board’s Random House book, “No Inno- cence Abroad,” will hit the stands April 29^ will return from Italy in time to do a spate of radio-TV-per- sonal appearances to plug the hook. Ken W. Purdy, editor of True, authored a shortstory about an auto race, “Change of Plan,” which appeared in Atlantic Monthly last report just issued in Dublin, nine- September. Editor, Martha Foley, . 4 . « . ^ — — — ii. r i i'. ii • as contributors, is pegged to the ty seven out of 114 periodicals ex- J us £ chose it for her forthcoming cost-of-living index. amined were also nixed. anthology, “Best American Short — Appeal Board revoked several of Stories of 1952,” soon to be issued Time, Inc., Hits- Coin Peak the bans, but reported that it could hy Houghton, Mifflin. Time, Inc., hit a revenue peak in not consider 46 appeals which had Tempus fugit dept.: Frank Scul- 1952. with total of $155,786,000, an been made by groups of members ly’s 19-year-old Sylvia and scenarist increase of $7,214,000 over 1951, of the Oireachtas (Congress), be- Manuel Seff’s daughter, who were its annual statement reveals. The cause copies of the books were kids together in Hollywood, now upbeat is mainly the result of in- unobtainable. Authors concerned classmates at Smith but didn’t crease in advertising income. Life, included John Steinbeck, Arthur know it until well into their Time and Fortune advertising rev- Koestler, Somerset Maugham and freshman year. Incidentally, Skip enues were .the highest in history. Marcel Proust Scully, the oldest, has been yanked Time, Inc., Hits-Coin Peak Fly in the blue-ink ointment is the accompanying increase in total costs and expenses (up $7,432,000), which left the operating profit Roeburt’s Whodunit Encore John Roeburt, radio-TV who- dunit scripter, carrying the adven- ($13,453,000) slightly less than last tures of his “Tough Cop,” previous year. ■ mystery meller bestseller, forward ; with another book for Simon & New ‘Paris After Dark* * Schuster later this year, titled Third edition of .Art Buchwald’s “The Hollow Man.” “Paris After Dark” has been pub- — lished in France. This is.a guide Play Series Shift with asides culled from Buchwald’s Publication of Series I and II of column for thtf Paris edition of the “From The Modern ReDertoire.” Scully, the oldest, has been yanked out of Air Force Intelligence into pilot training. Art Buchwald, N.Y. Herald (Par- is edition) columnist, in N:Y. on a quickie huddle with the paper’s head office and’ a possible book deal, visiting his bride’s (the for- mer Anne McGarry) family in War- ren, Pa., as* a stand-in. Mrs. Buchwald was too busy with hOr Paris publicity business to accom- pany her husband to the States. Annual Bob Leavitt awards of the American Society of Magazine lished m France. This is . a guide Play Series Shift Paris publicity business to accom- with asides culled from Buchwald’s Publication of Series I and II of pany her husband to the States, column for thtf Paris edition of the “From The Modern Repertoire,” Annual Bob Leavitt awards of • * yAc? e i? ld Tfibune. First edition by legit-film critic Eric Bentley, the American Society of Magazine in 1950-51 sold 20,000 and second has shifted from the U. of Denver Photographers are scheduled to be in 1952 sold 25,000, with most of Press to the Indiana U. Press, presented tonight (Wed.) at the the turnover among American sol- Second series, recently published, Hotel Vanderbilt, N.Y., to Henri mers in Germany. includes such plays as Christian Cartier-Bresson, Dr. Rowland S. ov.Vf? tW0 edltl0 ? s h ? d 64 9f abba ’ s “ Jest ’ Satire, Irony,” Potter and Roy E. Stryker. Awards ana tne new one has been upped X _ A A . *9 i • at* x - • Hotel Vanderbilt, N.Y., to Henri Cartier-Bresson, Dr. Rowland S. Potter and Roy E. Stryker. Awards on e °Jl e bas been upped Alexander Ostrovsky’s “Easy ’were voted the trio by the Society wltb A hi J ber P rice tag, of Money,” Octave Mirbeau’s “The membership for “outstanding con- 409 francs ($1); Others sold for 300» Epidemic,” Frank Wedekind's “The membership for “outstanding con- tributions; to photography in 1952.” Wednesday, March 25, 1953 SCULLY’S SCRAPBOOK I ’ Frank Scillly +♦♦♦♦♦4 I M +ifr Hollywood. It’s a matter of record (and I’m sure the files of the FBI, where they toss in everything, will back me up in this), that I was the first scribe to say a kind word about the Obolerian version of 3-D. And if you think at this moment that I’m trying to live it down, you're crazy. For $5 anybody can have photostats of. letters which have passed between Arch Oboler and me to prove that we were two great minds floating down a river that not only had length and width but depth. The only difference is that he so far has made $1,750,000 and I haven’t made a. quarter. Oboler must feel like a guy who dropped a pebble into a mill pond, only to be washed up more dead than alive on Redondo Beach in a resulting tidal wave. I’ll bet he never expected to see Three-Dee stam- pede an industry that has lived (and handsomely, too) on one crisis after another for 50 years. You look at the trades, and even the dailies these days, and murder, suicide, dope and divorce have become mighty flatchested news-items compared to three-dimension pix. The only studio not steeped in tri- cornered hat-tricks is Chaplin’s, and that’s because it’s closed. The only consolation I get out of all this is that while I have yet to make my first quarter, Oboler won’t make the most out of 3-D pix either. Some other guy, or combination of guys, will move in and clean up. At the moment I’m inclined to favor (Bill) Pine & (Bill) Thomas, because those Dollar Bills are in the best favored cleanup position. But if you talk to any Hollywood producer, he is sure he has the pic- ture that is headed for $12,000,000 before the year is out. The freres at Warners are sure it’s theirs. Prisoners of Zanuck feel it’s all theirs, because Polaroid will not be in for a piece of their take. Drugstores Loaded Personally, I feel that the wearing of glasses is by no means the hardship a few dissenters claim it will be. Drugstores are loaded with sunglasses, I estimate that the Scully Circus buys 27 pairs a year. They are lost, sat on, spat on and sometimes worn. They are seemingly as essential as halters. Bill Pine believes picturegoers will buy their own and take a cer- tain pride in trying to outdo the dame.in the next seat. “I bought my own,” he said. “Paid $2.19 for them, but by the time they become part of picture-going, they probably will be down to 39c. The paper- framed ones used at ‘Bwana Devil’ cost a dime.” Some people, of course, will not need them. They are probably cockeyed to just the right degree. Then, too, there are some who will see 3-D by self-hypnosis. I wouldn’t be surprised if I were among them. I was invited to Par to see some rushes of “Sangaree,” which was switched from 2-D to 3-D after 12 days of shooting, f was told to go in the studio theatre. I groped my way in the dark, sat down and looked on for 10 minutes before a studio cop came in and hauled me out. Seems I was viewing “Pony Express,” a 2-D Technicolor pic, hut it looked like 3-D to me. I was told the secret stuff was up two long flights of stairs. I was pooped when I reach'ed the rendezvous. After me came not the brass of Par but its 18-carat gold. I nearly passed out (I was podped from the climb, anyway, remember) to see Adolph Zukor hurry in and grab off a front seat. Don Hartmann, D. A. Doran, Bill Pine and Bill Thomas, and in fact everybody of the top echelon, barring C. B. DeMille, was there, * All reached for glasses from a diplomatic pouch, stretched off and swooned at what they saw. Oddly, most people think 3-D is for out- doorers, but what shots were shown that day were mostly interiors. It looked like theatre-in-the-round and gave a grand illusion. Of course, if you tilted your head too far eitheij to the left or right, you found the grand illusion was n.s.g. It looked like an American Weekly illustra- tion where the color plates didn’t quite match but overlapped. But if you sat up and paid attention to your business, it was hope- ful. Moreover, there are no bad seats in a house showing 3-D. Even those seats off to the side and under the screen where Mickey Rooney looks like a giant on stilts show no distortion in 3-D as long as you’re wearing Polaroid glasses. On Guard Though Par’s eminent octogenarians claim they’ve had Paravision for 15 years but saw no reason for introducing it as long as pictures were doing alright in 2-D, the Gunzberg Bros, guard their sole Natural Vision camera at Warners as if it contained the secret of peace in the Far East. Actually, no producer has a secret process. At best, he has a well- guarded improvement over an old process. The Greeks had a word for it. In fact, “stereoscope” comes from two Greek words meaning “to see-solid.” The beauties of stereoscopic sight are, however, denied to the One-Eyed Connellys of this world. You need two eyes to see it, two' cameras to film it, two projectors to show it, and two Polaroid lenses to view it. Zukor, the grand old man of pix, the 80-year-old Alpine guide who climbs those long flights of stairs to see the daily 3-D rushes of “San- garee/' believes plane pix, like plane geometry, are for beginners from now on. Color and 3-D are as vital to the life of tomorrow’s product, he believes, as solid geometry, trig and such are to a mathematician. He even offered to shill for “Sangaree,” and Pine & Thomas, who came into this biz by the backdoors of picture houses, where they be- gan as pressagents, were quick to see this exploitation offer as a nat- ural. So we will get Zukor; in color and three dimensions, telling everybody how lucky he is to see all this and Paravision, too. The present craze illustrates once again that the craze is hot always to the swift, nor the medals to those who establish a beachhead, ex- cept perhaps posthumously. The fact that Pete Smith did a short years ago, that Par had the system gathering dust since 1938, that Al Jolson was pencilled in to star in “The Customer Is Always Right” for Lester Cowan in the first three-dimensional feature in the,then new Polaroid process, does not take away from Arch Oboler the pri- ority of getting there fustest with the mostest. Had the public response been a yawn, that would have been the end of 3-D for another long time. But it wasn’t. So timing once again be- comes a matter of knowing what the public wants when it wants it most. Long before Oboler, Pine & Thomas, Dr. Gunzberg, or any of these latter-day specialists in stereoscopic perspective, were bom. Wheatstone (1833), Brucke (1841), and Brewster (1842), had worked the deal all out. In fact, the Dutch had binocular telescopes in the 17th century. Voitlander, Porro, Greenough, Dove, Czapski, Tscher- ' mak, Fritsch, Zeiss and Wenham all contributed a , measure of en- lightenment to the science of sight. Among them, they long ago per- fected instruments for the observation of three-dimensional objects with two eyev These fellows discovered that a single eye, when moved, surveys 180 degress in a horizontal direction and 135 degrees ill a vertical di- rection. The two fields overlap and a smaller conical space, is formed in which both eyes see simultaneously. Outside of this space you cannot get stereoscopic vision. The shape and size of this “natural vision” is not the same for all nature. Rabbits see only 34 degrees; birds about 15 degrees.. So the field of 3-D is limited, though once a planetoid was dis- covered by binocular means. It’s called Stereoscopia. Where it is, I • have no idea. It’s up to Pine ■& Thomas to find it. Maybe they can hide the profits of “Sangaree” there till tax reductions become a reality. They and 3-D should live that long.