Variety (April 1953)

78 Wednesday, April 29, 1953 Literati Continued from page 76 national conference of arts, re- turned from Europe yesterday (Tues.) on the America. Harry Shaw, formerly with Har- per & Bros, and more recently with Tupper & i«ove, Inc., Atlanta, jom- * 7 n aHltnrinl Orofr I'm ^ ' u ~ i„7*E. P. Dutton's editorial staff this volume hoping that she may ments weren’t made till the last M n in capacity of a senior edi- b» riffht Dowling. minute. His working press status tor / . rlgm ‘ enabled him to track down and in- Walt Kelly negotiating deal on # minr Ovor elude last-minute changes in this transforming of his Post-Hall Syn- Met Opera Going-Over reS pect. Only drawback to the dicated comic-strip, “Pogointo Probably the most important manua i \ s its failure to list spon- an animated film, huddling with longhair book of the season is Irv- gors of t he broadcasts. Inclusion of both ^alt Disney and Stephen ing Kolodin's “Story of the Metro- thig in f orma tion would make it Bosustow of United Productions of politan Opera” (Knopf; $7.50) f a even m ore invaluable to the broad- America. 600-page candid, critical history of cas ting-advertising trade. Chan. May issue of Coronet pays tribute the Met from its "^S^nmgs in to TV, with pieces on Jackie Glea- JL883 to 1950, when RudoM Bing Jrish Ww on Pulps son and /‘The Perry Como Story/* came in as manager. Tome is an 77“ 'nlnsorshiD Board’s and a picture spread on “Studio amazmg compendium of research, The Irish Cens { * s P con ti nueS One.” Also shorts by Kate Smith, trenchlmt^ though witty “uthorlte- wUh tSe'bann^of Detective Po- Ted Malone, Robert Q. Lewis and tive but anecdotal and highly read- lice. Cases and .rounds 1 thaft™? °Anatole Chujoy and P. W. Man- fv b ric theatre 1 ° £ A “ havV d^edVu^dSly l*arg7 fZ Chester, editor and managing edi- Iy ^«| there whh the spar- portion of space to matter about Ide. .It isnt an Cr p?v’ Buries and five other mags the annual Canadian, Ballet Festi- .tow Kolodln sometimes tells. The Plx, Buriesand flve ^ chujoy als0 givlng tw0 lec . SSw wfth ^he Satoda "Review, di- lid,cd matter rated indecent or ob- tures there in connection with the vides his story into sections; pa; scene by the censors irons and purposes; house and home; operas and artists. In the Canadian Longhair Orchs , Illllu .. CICB . aui first segment, he a tears socety Financial• aspects of Canadian, B i anco m Written, especially for fest. A biography of Serge Prokofieff has just' been completed by N. Y. World-Telegram music critic Louis apart, the society that used opera and som e United States, longhair rad j 0 members of the N. Y. Phil- for a toy, 'Shunnmg any ar sic orchestras are harmonic-Symphony Society, book- (or financial! responsibilities, (ine nad ian Business, official magazine j t * called ‘‘Prokofieff and His bitter jibes that sometimes seem of Canadian Chamber of Com- oLhlqtrai Music ” overdone are_ obviously ^ese^e^. merce, April issue. , Ruth Mitchell, author of recently The second part has .. . f . Article Virginia Brasi l lied published t> 0 ok about Gen. Billy revealed, fascinating discussion oi “Music Is Big Business, includes Mitchell "Mv Brother Bill” mul- financial matters. Final portion a table showing figures for some b™™****™, mui (500 of the 60Q pages) is a highly- Canadian and U.S. orchestras for jjng tS^ehscrioted^ bv Art Cohn detailed, thorough and acutely- the 1951-52 season arranged ac- SL« a !? ® cr ffiL Art Colin, professional account of operas and cor ding to deficit as a percentage by napfnrmArc -frAiri the start down to nf gross expenditure. Detroit George Bye, who agented performers, from the start down to 0 f today. * topped the list with 58%; Mon- Kolodin did an earlier survey of treal was in the cellar with 9.9%. the Met a dozen or so years ago sale of Lindbergh story to Satevepost. This is more comprehensive and complete. It’s altogether fasci- nating. Bron . Dr. Sockman’s Aijnl Tome Dr. Ralph W. Sockman, celebrat- CHATTER TV Guide to debut a Cleveland edition May 20. Jay Dratler sold “The Fabulous Oliver Chantry” to Esquire mag. Plays Abroad Continued from page 75 Broadway Crazy — —^ . Bob Hope will follow Bing Gros- .-f direction U S • temers Edward tag Ms 35th year as pastor of New by with a biography In Satevepost. Fieids Leona aJd Yorks Dan Mich, McCalls editor, in Alex Young, with an assist by y? ar 5J speaker on NBC s Hollywood contacting Coast writ- Italian Gilda Marino, do well with al Radio Pulpit, has Witten ers_ . . . their end of the show, while the book, How to Believe, which Eugenia Bedell is in Action r> omnn m rw Orleans Band snotted Doubleday will publish May28. Comics this month with a history of j n two numbers, seems completely Dr. Sockman’s new book, his hats. wasted 15th published,£iy e s Jpterpreta- _ r Fg Songs by Pasquale Fucilli are tion of the Apostles Creed for the Irving Hoffman for the August listensble with & special <4 Besfl - modern average layman. Esquire. . me, Carmen,” standing out. Music € _. ., Chester Morrison in Hollywood a j s0 ig or igi n ^i > rare for present- ly 1 t 9 to round up a story about 3-D for day italo review* Sets and cos- Prince Bart (Farrar .Straus & Look mag. • * tumes are okay for the moderate- Young; $3.95), by former film j ay Dratler’s novel, ‘Dream of budget range. Hawk. scripter - producer Jay Richard \ Woman,” bought by Retfbook for Kennedy, is a novel written in a September, kind of dirty-shirt prose about a Ed Wiener lecturing on public Hollywood star thinly patterned relations at New York U. next after John Barrymore. When it Tuesday (5). Napoleon in New Orleans „ .... Zurich, April 7. isn’t sneering at Hollywood's mores, Lee E. Wells’ latest' novel. . Schauspieihaus production of comedy the plot moves quickly—that is to “Desert Passage,” will be published & kSE m^schfeid.^tsf say, quickly from one starlet s m June by Ballantine. > - cai direction, Ferdinand Lange; lighting, boudoir to the next, to the point Harry Essex’s new novel, “Take Waiter Gross. At Schauspieihaus, Zurich. where .it achieves the impossible i t From Here,” will be published Gloria Derg g al fAnn'eiSe Bltschlrt of making sex a profound bore. by Little, Brown & Co. carotte . Gustav Knuth Book’s phony “inside Hollywood” Satevepost bought Romer Grey’s §“^f®® ous • • ; • • • • Hans-HeimuthDickow vulgarity should transform it into “As I Remember Him,” the story PoUy ..*.* .* .* .*.‘' Eii^abeth HoIbarth paydirt on the bestseller lists, but 0 f his father, Zane Grey. Pepa Lilian. Westphai its chances in films or legit are as Malcolm Stuart Boylan’s “Gold . flimsy as the chemises covering its Pencil,” a novel about Hollywood, This is a posthumous opus by Hollywood doxies. Rask. hits the bookstands this week. once-famous German playwright Julian Miller, formerly associate Georg Kaiser, who died 1945 in ‘Viva Vegas” t editor of Good Housekeeping, now Ascona, Switzerland, in exile. In Paul Ralli, former leading man an editor at the Vanguard Press, an effort to revive his fading for Marion Davies and Mae West, John Bowman’s historical novel, memory for a new generation un- later part of the law enforcement “Aisle of Demons/’ hits the book- familiar with his post-World War I arm of Las Vegas, has done a book stands this week as a Dial publi- celebrity, this tragic-comedy was on the resort called “Viva Vegas, cation. recently world-preemed at Dues- He is an attorney there, specializ- Random House will reissue seldorf, Germany, which is now ing in divorces. James A. Michener’s “Return to followed by the Zurich perform- Ralli is a Greek from Cyprus and p ar adise” to coincide with release ance. However, it looks like a had stage experience in London 0 f the film version. fruitless effort, and New York before heading for Pocket Books, Inc., publishing a “Napoleon” is a weak, uncon Hollywood, where he did Married sma il edition of H. G. Wells’ “War. vincing piece of playwrlting, sooner In Hollywood” for Fox and Show 0 f the Worlds,” to hook up with forgotten than seen. In no way IjaAhI aB f AV% 7VyT-_^«L A T1 n M n VIA *« 1 _ t 1 i . A People” for M-G. House - Warven, publishing. Hollywood, is th $,£ aramount Picture. does it measure up to expectations, Hillman Periodicals publishing neither psychologically nor dra- in late summer a TV fan magazine, maticaUy, nor does it ever come to » JJ rpw wi Munnoi 5 d i te ^ by ^ r ” lt s life. Bringing it out into the open Radio-TV Baseball Manual full-size, with slick format. was a m i s t a ke and U S rhanr»M So widespread and so much a Bobbs-Merrill will publish “Di- are zero de sDite American locale part of the American (and base- rec ting the Play,” a sourcebook on of the story P Amerlcan 10caie ball) scene has radio and televi- stagecraft edited by Toby Cole and The clot concerns a daydream- sion coverage of baseball become, Helen Krich Chinoy, May 13. Ing French K?n New Orleans that at '•long last there’s a special Langston Hughes’novel, “Simple lives wi a h his 1 dauchter in a manual out on the subject, “Radio Takes A Wife,” will be published Zo?id irhS avjr\ Th^^nr^ 1 & TV Baseball—The Major League by Simon & Schuster May 18, in a ° 0 \ coltectin? all ^osslMe Handbook” (A. S. Barnes- 50c). special paper-cover $1.95 edition. Luvenirs of Nanoleon who P at that Written and edited by Hy Turkin, Reginald Whitley rounded up in- Helena sportswnter for the New York terviews on .the Coast with Frank Yll ®’ S f^^® ady ™JP a Daily News, it should prove of in- Lovejoy, Gordon Douglas and Pev estimable value to tradesters. Its Marley for the London Daily Mir- wifeIfivp 6 ? an excellent guide for home view- ror. of crooks who have found a ready- ing and listening. ... First novel by Albert Johnston, S ^ a ^u 11 Book lists stations, TV and radio, “Pablo’s Mountain,” will be pub- i I s t!? e carrying the games of each major fished by Crown May 2. He is east- suddenly gets the league club, along with announcers era story editor for Columbia Pic- °{ v T eein A , and their biographies. In addition, tures. bringing him to New Orleans, and it lists the roster (and uniform Lionel M. Bishop, with Cosmo- ^substituting at St. Helena a man numbers, for TV viewers) of all the politan magazine since 1927 and ^i!L ng t0 sac ^ ifi p® himself, players, along' with info .on the for the last nine years its advertis- The gang decides to make this ■tars and statistics on the ball- ing manager, has been made pub- C0 2f 1 ® ttue. / parks. There's a section on last lisher. Schauspieihaus performance, Mi- year’s World Series and All-Star Clifford Hanley, Scot scribe, reeled, as the Duesseldorf world- Game, some picture highlights of scripted 30-mmute documentary P reem , by Kurt Hirschfeld, helps last year, and an introduction on about Scotland, broadcast from to overcome, at> times at least, the how to watch and listen to ball- Glasgow pver Radio Basle, Swltz- Poor material. Excellent por- games. . erland. f trayals are delivered by Hans Putz •Turkin is no novice at these John del Valle resigned as edi- as the. false Napoleon, and Gustav baseball handbooks, and his craft tor of TV Family, eastern weekly, KnUth and Hans-Helmuth Dickow and knowledge are in evidence all and returned to Hollywood, where as two other members of the gang, the way through. More remarkable he was formerly ad-pub director Rest of the cast is equally satisfac- is his listing'of radio and television for Nat Holt. tory. Teo Otto’s , two sets are good, stations for the (now) Mil- Thornton Wilder, novelist-play- and special credit is due to Walter waukee Braves and the St. Louis wright who is the State Dept/s Gross 1 excellent lighting, especially Browns, whose radio-TV commit- delegate to the UNESCO inter-1 in the last scene. Mezo. TV Helps, Hurts Gab Circuit Continued from page 1 his accent has the modern Chau- tauqua biz been thrown into such a ferment. With the exception of Eleanor Roosevelt (who still com- mands the current top of $2,000), TV has cut down the demands for the $l,000-and-over literary hot- shots; the impresarios did their big- gest trade with the $300-per-en- gagement standards. Because of the prevalence of TV forums, pundits addicted to in- flammation of the vowels were urged to trim their verbosity and devote more time to letting the customers answer back in audience question sessions. Bluebloods, once a drug on the market since Grand Duchess Marie of Russia and the Ranee of Sarawak began to milk the trade, were cashing in again.. Princess Ileana of Romania was in circulation, and there was a brisk demand for Sir Osbert and Dr. Edith Sitwell, if and when they were available, TV still boasts no crowned heads, of course. Since video also permits no color film as yet, gabbers of the Pago Pago- Burton Holmes school with their I films of faraway lands continued to thrive in the hinterlands, and French underseas explorer Capt. Jacques'-Yves Cousteau was flour- ishing with his pic, “Menftsh of the Deep.” Whether singing the blues or the boy-oh-boy, due to the encroaching influence of the competitive me- dium, impresarios this week were losing no time booking ahead for the fall season that tees off in Sep- tember. They're being led by the tycoon booker of the gab biz, wil- liam Colston Leigh, who tomorrow (Thursday), in the Barbizon Plaza, N. Y., will run a dozen of his 100 clients through their lecturing paces in a sample audition before 200 women’s club representatives. Leigh Laughs Off TV Leigh, who reputedly grosses $2,000,000 a year from the over 15,000 service clubs and colleges he caters to across the nation (“I ain’t saying,” he says of his take), isn’t too worried about TV’s in- filtration. He found that business in the closing season was “very good,” and laughed off the Cassan- dras by saying, “When radio was first introduced the same skeptics claimed it would kill off the lecture trade. Instead, radio promoted the reputations of son\e of my star clients, including« Cecil Brown, Robert St. John, Gebrge V. Denny, Jr., and John W. Vandercook.” Chief complaint the 50%er raised against TV was that its long rehearsal periods reduced the availability of some of his gabbers (like Basil Rathbone), who were committed to special video pro- grams. However, TV appearances had enhanced many of his other clients’ reputations, by whetting the appetite of viewers to savor more of their personalities. * Among his gabbers whose sala- bility has been hypoed by TV are Arthur Treacher, on many of the “Philco Playhouse” programs; Vir- gilia Peterson, moderator of Du- Mont’s “Author Meets the Critics;” Ivan T. Sanderson, the video zoolo- gist; Dr. David Dressier, the crimi- nologist whose “Parole Chief” hook has been dramatized on the “Goodyear Playhouse;” Richard L. Tobin, the TV news analyst; com- poser-orchster Meredith Willson, whose Tallulah Bankhead and quiz telecasts have made him a celeb, and novelist Merle Miller, a peren- nial TV panel participator. The Literati Set Loretta Reidy, manager of the 46-year-old Keedick Lee bureau, maintained that the bulk of the 50 gabbers in her stable had al- ready achieved reputations, largely in journalism and literature, like Norman Cousins of the Saturday Review, William Laurence of the N. Y. Times, and Mrs. Alan Kirk, author of “Postmarked. Moscow.” However, there was no doubt that TV had hypoed interest in such literati names as Alistair Cooke, the CBS-TV “Omnibus” confer- encier; Bennett Cerf, the “What’s My Line?” panelist; Marguerite | Higgins, the video war correspond- ent, and Quentin Reynolds, the TV master of all trades. William Wachs, topper for Pro- grams & Lectures, Inc., found that, while radio was continuing to build up gabbers, TV was simply a threat. “Television has cut sharply into the lecture trade,” he said. “People, seated beside their sets in the par- lor, -are becoming satiated with talk. They haven’t as much of an in- ducement to pay to go to a hall and sit through more of it.” Among his clients, John J. Anthony, the radio soother of bleeding hearts, and Estelle M. Sternberger, com- mentator on world affairs over WLIB, N. Y., had been boosted by AM. Louise Eaton, partner of the Pearson & Eaton bureau, expound- ed the notion that both AM and TV, as reputation promoters, helped gild the lily. “Both media,” she said, “serve 'as a preliminary audi- tion. They give the customers an impression* of the voice and per- sonality of our clients.” Those enhanced by air appear- ances in her stable include John K. M. McCaffrey, the WNBT, N. Y., newscaster; Gayelord Hauser, TV exponent of blackstrap molasses and yogurt; Dr. Ralph W. Sockman, Sunday preacher on NBC’s “Radio Pulpit;” Dr. Bernard Iddings Bell, U. of Chicago TV educator; Tom Scott, folk balladeer on both AM and TV, and Lisa Sergio, com- mentator on WQXR, N. Y., for the past seven years. No Threat Yet The thinking among several of the impresarios is that TV for- ums haven’t proved an absolute threat as yet, because the speak- ers, ■can’t become as profound or as controversial as they can on the chautauqua trail. Thus far, no video pundit has stirred the tempests that Rupert Hughes, the writer, once did when, in Town Hall, N. Y., he called George Washington a dissolute, gambling, whiskey distiller; or when' Dr. Morris Fishbein caused 64 mem- bers of a women’s club to resign when he said their husbands came under.his definition of charlatans; or when Edgar Lee Masters began a lecture in Des Moines by saying, “As I stand here and look down into your ignorant and stupid faces . ♦ .” Nor, it’s claimed, can the video panelists inject the ex- citement that Walter Duranty (pro) and H. R. Knickerbocker (con) have done when debating as a teafai on the question, “Can Russia^ Be Part of One World?” Edna Giesen, executive veepee of Columbia, Lecture Bureau, be- lieves the sense of active partici- pation has only been found in such AM-TV shows as “Town Meeting of the Air,” and her clients, including Herbert Phil- brick, Hodding- Carter, and Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., have been en- hanced by appearing on that for- um. TV has also helped such others in her stable as Dr. Roy K. Marshall, who does the science commercials for the Ford video stanzas; Sigmund Rothschild, art appraiser on DuMont’s Thursday “Treasure Hunt,” and veep Alben Barkley. Jack Siegel, manager of Artists & Speakers Bureau, maintains that TV’s most'salutary effect has been in raising the standards of the lecture circuit, and in giving a break to. young Chautauqua talent. Alert for Gimmicks The one overall effect that tele has exerted on the gabbers is to make them more concerned with visual gimmicks. Nowadays, natu- ralist Capt. C. W. R. Knight has become a lecture clicko by the ex- pedient of letting his trained eagle, Mr. Ramshaw,, swoop over the heads of his audience, and South American traveler Herbert Lanks brings the crowd to startled attention by twirling an Argentine bullwhip above his head like a pampas gaucho, whipping off his belt, and. exclaiming, “This belt was worn by the biggest boa con- strictor I’ve ever met.” Stage readings, on the order of Emlyn Williams’ solo- emoting of Dickens’ “Bleak House/’ the Ty- rone Power troupe’s presentation of “John Brown’s Body,” and the Charles Laughton quartet’s recita- tion of the Don Juan ^cene from Shaw’s “Man and Superman,” have paid off in the last couple of sea- sons. However/ the lecture impres- sarios consider -these podium per- formances theatrical ventures, and by and large do* not handle them.