Variety (January 1954)

40 PICTURES Forty&ighth ' ' Anniversary Wednesday, January <>, I9S4 v And All Thi»' Ex-Philly FUclf Want^d Wa* to Anchor In Sunny California By MORGAN HUDGINS more than a dozen other fariioius foreign cities. I’ve lunched with Lana Turner in London and the same, day dined with Mel Ferrer in Ireland. I've lived in a log cabin alongside those occupied by Jimmy Stewart and Janet Leigh in the mountains of Colorado and have introduced Eleanor Parker to crack Air Force pilots at an Arizona base where she was making a film. I’ve escorted Ava Gardner to a party at Noel Coward’s house near Picca* dilly; Sat with Gable, Taylor and Johnson through plays in. Sari Francisco, New York and Paris, and have done the same with Pier Arigeli and both Elizabeth Taylor and Ava Gardner in London. I’ve accompanied Deborah Kerr to a private audience with Pope Pius at the Vatican arid been pres? ent when both Robert and Elizabeth Taylor were presented to the King and Queen of England. | More Roamin’ | It has been exciting to watch Sam Zimbalist and Mervyn LeRoy feed the Christians to the lions for scenes in “Quo Vadis,” and more than interesting to hear Pandro Berman and Richard Thorpe map out a battle of literally hundreds of _ar nioTed-vvarrior s ~f or • “Knights of the Round Table.7 I’ve listened while John Ford patiently explained to the black skinned African natives how he wanted them to hurl spears at Gable and Gard ner in “Mogambo” and heard him read “ Twas the Night Before Christmas” to natives and whites at a Yuletide party deep in the jungle, more than 300 miles from the nearest village. I've looked on ortce | as Gene Kelly . auditioned the top -dreamedabout) but. I’m. practically dancers of -London and Paris and a stranger to my neighbors. then, after making his selection, Just let an M-G-M producer start put them through a graceful ballet planning a film that calls for a long I for “Invitation to the Dance,” location and automatically I start i M-G-M’s all dancing film. I’ve gone packing my bags. It's 1(1-1 I’ll be . shopping with Gene Tierney in on whatever plane or train is tak London and done the same with ing the cast and crew to wherever it is that some big shot has decided this movie must be made “in the interest of authenticity.” California and Hudgins, it would seem, are destined to be married in dreams only. At least until wre both reach a much older age. DUririg eight years of association with the studio “where there are more stars than there are in heaven,” I’ve visited virtually every Cairo, Egypt It all started because of the Philadelphia climate. Why, some wise part of my subconscious kept repeating, suffer through four months of . show, furnaces that won't work, and overcoats, plus four months, of airconditioning, mosquito bite lotion and just plain sweat in order to | enjoy four moriths of decent weather, of which, as ,1 recall, only October thd May might be called ideal; And so I gave up my job on the news staff of the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin (and let it be stated now there isn’t a finer paper in the whole of the USA) and headed for Hollywood. The position offered me by Howard Strickling in M-G-M’s publicity department sounded enticing enough. More fun (if you like motion pictures, which, I’m f rank to admit, I do). Arid more pay. But it was California that really sold me. The chance to bask in that Pacific sunshine .12. out of 12 months' (okay — so maybe it does rain in January occasionally) was more than any self respecting Philadelphian could resist. Or so it seemed to me. 7 •^Following "Cfreeley^ -popular-ad-vice, I headed wekt in 1946. California, I might have sung after my cross-country automobile trek, here I am: And there, I felt like shouting. is where I want to stay. So what happens? . Tat y; made me a Unit Publicity Pepreseniative ana started me travelling. Sure, I touch home, base occasionally. I have my house in California (it practically looks out over the blue Pacific I state in the Union and at least 14 foreign countries. I’ve travelled _an estimated 1 .000,000 miles (arid it’s a conservative guess at that). I’ve ridden across the U.S. by train, plane and automobile. I’ve crossed the Atlantic Ocean. 16 times, not once by ship. Yes, and my job has taken me back to Philadelphia (never, alas; in October or May) almost as many times as I’ve roosted in California. I’ve gone boating on beautiful Lake Michigan with Esther Williams, Jimmy Durante and Lauritz Melchior while making a film on fashionable Mackinac Island. I’ve shared a suite at the surivptuous Del Coronado Hotel near San Diego with Van Johnson and shared a one-room mountain shack high in nUe^Sierra^ witlrtlre^safne Mr. Johnson. | Hudgins’ Travels I I’ve ridden on horseback with Frank Sinatra along mountain trails in the California lode country. I’ve taken Elizabeth Taylor dancing in London’s Mayfair clubs and photographed her feeding the pigeons in Trafalgar Square. I’ve spent Christmas dining at Maxim’s in Paris with Robert Taylor, floated in a gondola along Venice’s Grand Canal with Taylor and Barbara Stanwyck, and strolled the streets of Dublin, Rome and Cairo with the much Travelled Mr. Taylor; lived for a week with Esther Williams amid 1.000 Navy WAVES; slept next to Clark Gable's tent while on a four months safari through darkest Africa. I’ve also chased, autograph seekers from Mr.. Gable while lie was being photographed in front of Buckingham Palace and have done the same while making pictures of him at Versailles Palace and on the Eiffel Tower. I’ve gone with Van Johnson to a reunion of his high school class in Newport, R.I., and assisted Ava Gardner through interviews with the press in Athens . (Greece), Zurich (Switzerland), and ■ Grace Kelly in Nairobi. Ditto with : Bob Taylor, in Paris, Esther Wil liams in Chicago, and Gable in a ; village of 200 on the shores of Lake : Victoria. [ All of this travelling and these • tasks (if they can . be called that) \ have been in connection with mo ■ tion pictures in production. They (have been, it is obvious, interesting ; and indeed, exciting. But probably : none of them can equal in thrills I the assignment upon which I am presently engaged. M-G-M has sent me to Cairo with Robert Taylor (whose visits to California . have been almost as infrequent of late as my own), Eleanor Parker, Kurt Kasznar, Carlos Thompson and Director Robert Pirosh. We are filming, in wide screen and color, "Valley of the Kings” (I’ll be pardoned if, in best press agent fashion, I describe it. as an. exciting adventure romance). During most of the filming we are living at thte Mena House Hotel, in the outskirts of the Egyptian capital, where Roosevelt, Churchill and Chiang Kai-shek met for their historic conference in 1944. And like those great historical figures, IT awake-each morning to find the Sphinx and the Cheops Pyramid practically in my bedroom. They are less than 100 yards from the hotel. After a few days here we move on to the Suez Canal, the tombs at Luxor, the ruins at Sakarra arid the famous St. Catherine’s Monastery at the base of Mr. Sinai. In short* I’m seeing the world — at M-G-M’s expense — when all I wanted to see was California. No complaints, you understand. A guy should know when he's in luck. to Henry Ginsberg returned to the Coast over the ..weekend following confabs with Warner Bros, homeoffice executives relating to the release plans for George Stevens’ production of Edna Ferber’s novel. “Giant.’’ On the Coast, Ginsberg will work on production plans with Stevens, who is scheduled to be in New York late in January. Picture will be directed by Stevens arid produced in association with Ginsberg. WENDELL COREY Sam Katzman Continued from page 12 ; newspaper to complain, they verj) nicely promised that the next .time the producer releases an epic their reviews will read, “Produced by Sani Kui’tzmart.” This mistaken identity bit does have its compensations, however, as when it comes to restaurants. A few weeks ago when my wife and I celebrated our wedding anniversary and I phoned Dave Chasen’s for reservations I was a little surprised “at — ttre*~ giiTs immediately happy tone when I told her my name. Upon our arrival the waiter was extreriiely cordial as he mumbled something about the other Tour would most likely arrive later and seated us at a large private booth. My wife was . quite impressed, On our way. out we jsaw a party of six squeezed around a table for two near the swinging door to the kitchen* and I felt a little sorry for the producer who has a name like a dentist. I don’t always come out on top, however. When I phone an agent or network to discuss a sketch or story idea, instead of letting me speak to a hireling , who handles writers, I am immediately connected with Abe Lastfogel or General David Sarnoff. Naturally, at the moment I am extremely Battered to think that these gentlemen should be personally interested in my selling a five-minute routine to Bob Hope, but the period of elation quickly disappears when it turns out that I am notr^SamKatzman. A glacier covers the telephone wires, arid I feel I had committed grand fraud. Upon investigation I found the cause for the misunderstanding. For some unfathomable reason high class receptionists; telephone Operators arid secretaries cultivate British accents, and just as Deborah Kerr becomes Deborah Karr, Sam Kurtzman becomes Sam Katzman. When my wife reads that Mr. Katzman has interviewed a glamour girl for a part, she stops talking to me for a week. My mother-in-law follows suit, too. When my wife showed her a gold bracelet and told her that she got it from Sam, she asked, “Sam who?” Psychiatrists ire no help. One explained — it as 5 Subconscious" transference of affection, perfectly harmless. Another said it was a deep seated craving for fame. A third just sent a bill. Now, frankly, I have nothing against Mr. Sam Katzman, I have never met the man, I don’t kno> what he looks like. All I know i that he makes good pictures, othei wise my patients wouldn’t be cor gratulating me. All of these e> periences* however, are frustratin, to riie, and I had to get them off m chest. • r ' Besides* I hive heard that ther Is a possibility that producer Ban Katzman is going to be honored b Ralph Edwards; on “This Is You Life.” If and when you see th show and find that the great pre ducer is a disheveled, disgruntled unhappy neurotic, don’t be sui prised. It’ll be me. Billy Keaton Named by Buffal .' Buff ah Variety Cljub of Buffalo, T No, 7,: has elected the following fleers for 1953-54; Chief Bar] Billy Keaton; first assistant bar] Marvin Jacobs; second assisl barker, Arthur Krolick; dough* Robert C. Hyman; secretary, W J. Martin. „ Newly available is popcorn in five flavors, and ‘eight more are cpming up, differently, colored,. Now that the stuff .comes in Tech Tricolor, manufacturer$”are negating to make it In fh^’giant Cinema" Scope size, but they’reworking on a scheme to produce it in 3-d" That third dimension ought td be— Taste. . With , all its miracles, . medicine still has no cure for. the common cold. Film exhibition .Has. an equally baffling problem. It has tviclescreen, three-dimensional visuaP and audio effects, electronic pro jo ction and a brand-new wonder drug to pull people into the theatres something called Marilyn. Monroe. But ihe industry willnevcr feci it’s here to stay until sofhebne invents a crackle-ptoof popcorn bay. With the general introduction of the king-size screen, the old slogan “Movies are better than ever,” should really make way' for “Movies are bigger than ever.” .... ■ Doomed to sure failure is the pitch being made by an Illinois lire, works-maker, whpV sending his 60-page catalog to drive-ins. The drive-ins don’t have to blast the customers out. FOr that matter, many of ’em are doing OK with their films. Here’s a switch: Moravia Productions has been formed to make films with European settings— in Hollywood! Maybe if they keep at it for 18 months/ the producers hope to be declared tax-exeriipt in Inner Mongolia. An indie producer whose recent picture was declared by a critic to be “wholly lacking in taste”, is using the remark in his advertising, along with his switch on a cigaret slogan, “It screens out flavor!” Those cigaret manufacturers needn’t think’ they invented the “filtered” gimmick. . Movies have been filtered for years — right through big cottony wads of censors. Two Iowa juveniles, paroled on a burglary rap, were ordered to repay the. filched $68, attend church every Sunday, report to the police chief weekly and — stay, away from the iriovies for a year. "Could it.be this is a way of building up bigger audiences — by letting 'em hunger for a while. • Any fair investigation of the judge is sure to prove he owns TV stock. Ohio moviegoers, asking the local high school for babysitters, were told the rate was 60c hourly, and 50c in TV homes. * . (a) The kids, no doubt, pick up the extra dime from the local Bijou boys for helping tear ’em away from 4he video sets. (b) Blow a picture tube, ya little brats, ya! A midwest Ohio theatre owner has engaged as manager a woman with no experience — except in bringing up six daughters. This is “no experience?” And now, If they’ll only fix 3-D so it will give depth to shallow plots! While 3-D was just a gleam in an engineer’s eye, the film industry was working on a fourth dimensionr— Boxpffice. It’s not sure what the widescreen will ultimately dg for the film business , but It'll make a lot of doctors richer curing swivel-neck. We know a projectionist who was so thin he’d be a flat failure in 3-D. ; It’s practically a sure thing that a two-dimensional film will ■hereafter be known in the trade as a Cyclops. And one brought into illicit traffic will be Bicyclops. By ROBERT J. LANDRY Back in the old, old era beyond recall, show busine$s was very "personal” and managers and actors judged towns by the quality of the coffee, cleanness of the hotel sheets and redness of the customers’ necks. In the books of traveling show biz, certain towns were semipermanently on the fritz. They were lemon-sour,, busts, faceless .and soulless. They were towns in which you knew the train schedule out the second day. They were lulls in existence. Light a candle and pray not to be stranded. Entertainers were convinced that the adults in certain tough burgs, had been so suppressed as children that they were conditioned not to express • themselves until asked: — :and they only applauded on ■ direct invitation. If a turn didn't know that, they could bow' off in heavy mourning. A prominent citizen in the BibleBelt once met a comic by accident socially and said; “Hey,, you were so. durned funny, I could . hardly keep from laughing.” All this has changed. The hick is gone. The rube is .quaint Amen? cana. East, West, North, South — America now shares the same am* moniated, anti-enzymed culture, complete with Technicolor, 3-D, Cinemascope and back-to-back commercial .announcements on radio and TV. According to the film company gentry who travel about the country setting up premieres, tieups, television spot saturations and so on, there are’ Very .few towns that are real. duds. And even the few that are deserted villages after 6 p.m.— like, for instance, Baltimore— will have an occasional spurt of animation. Here are some flippant capsule summations of various film situations, today, as culled from the salty dialog of travel-weary exploitcers, and about as scientific as most surveys, if you ask us: New. York City— Remains the mostest of the bestest as a show town, but don’t try to gravy up tripe as truffle. .. Chicago — Filmgoing is the second most popular nighttime, winter time diversion still. Philadelphia— It’s the first most popular here. Lqs Angeles — The home of the tWo-theatre, three-theatre, four-tlie? atre d ay ^and -date opening. A big matinee town because they 'Want, to get in out of the smog! San Diegos— A good show town with palmtrees. Bakersfield— A good show town with too many earthquakes. Las Vegas— Where night is superfluous. Portland— Not as bad as Seattle. Denver— Where the Post wants four-to-one on the Rocky Mt. News. Salt Lake City — A Mormon Milwaukee. Topeka— You heaftmo complaints. Oklahoma' City— -Baltimore in the oil country, Montreal— Canadian television is no competition* Detroit-— A town without roots, so they go to the films. M®mPhis— Still the week before Christmas. Cincinnatti — -A tipoff town. If you do big in Cincy, you’re a wow. Baltimore— America’s .seventh largest city and successor to Philadelphia's old early-to-bed motto. .