Variety (October 1956)

Wednesday, October 24, 1956 _ Pffi&IlbfY __ PICTURES _ 7 : WORKADAY FAMILY LIFE ON FILM ROW i: [COMMENTS FROM EXCHANGE CITIES ] Near to Everything, Hub’s Selling District Happy By GUY LIVINGSTON Boston, Oct. 23.' Boston’s Film Row, uniquely lo¬ cated in the heart of the city be¬ tween two railroad stations and a short distance from the theatre belt, nitery sectidn and the big .hotels, looks to continue on for another half century with little change unless the Piedmont- Church-Winchester street area gets involved in the city’s south end redevelopment program. Problems faced by Film Row in other cities seem practically non¬ existent here. For instance, there is no problem of girl workers be¬ ing fearful of dark streets and' geographical remoteness. On the contrary, they are right in the city adjacent to everything. Film exchanges are located, for the most part, in their own mod¬ ern buildings with all modern con¬ veniences. Majority enjoy air con¬ ditioning. Construction has been at a standstill for some time, but right now, Columbia is 'building a new two story plant and Embassy Pictures Corp. has just moved into its own two story brick building next door. There is absolutely no 1 inflam¬ mable nitrate stock. It was out¬ lawed last year. Carrier position could not be better. Distributors have choice of Back Bay station or South Station. Mail pickups are fine wi'h two big boxes installed on Church street, one for out of town mail and one for in town mailings. Film Board of Trade, in existence for many years, called it quits last year shortly after the Supreme Court ruled against prior censorship of films. Screenings are not as well attended now as in yes¬ teryears and several exchanges have given* up their screening rooms. RKO and Paramount abandoned them and Columbia did not include one in its new blue¬ print. On the matter of shipping rooms as against National Screen Service, film row is about equally divided. RKO and six or seven others have gone to NSS, but Em¬ bassy, Columbia, Metro, Republic, Fox, A A, WB and Paramount still have shipping rooms. (Paramount is only major not on Film Row, but on Berkeley Street, some dis¬ tance away. This location^eport- edly has cost company some spot bookings over the years.) Volume print traffic is not what It used to be here following the same'trend as in other cities. How¬ ever, this hasn’t changed the con¬ cept of exchanges here that they should all be clustered along the same streets. Several exchange heads interviewed said that they would only consider moving out to the suburbs, as so many other busi¬ nesses have done, if everybody else did. Nobody indicated any desire to go it alone. Reason-that there would be lit¬ tle impetus for mass.movement to city outskirts and new develop¬ ments is that film exhibitors are not faced with the same problems that most of the commercial busi¬ ness in Boston have, although they share the common parking prob¬ lem. The other business are on a move to the suburbs and outskirts because of soaring rentals. Film Row, on the other hand, is unique In that respect. It is probably the lowest rent and property valuation area in the downtown Hub. • Film Row is in the Back Bay area, which is filled in land. Its narrow crooked streets abound with ancient little houses, many of which have been converted into business establishments. Others have been condemned and many will undoubtedly be torn down. Film exchanges and associated en¬ terprises, garages and eateries make up the entire commercial life of the section. Film Row people like the~loca- tion fine. They are within walk¬ ing distance of practically every¬ thing in the city, accessible for luncheons, dinners and affairs at the hotels, handy to the legit the¬ atres, film houses and niteries and within striking distance of the newspaper plants. Because of its location, Hub’s, Film Row looks to maintain Its statuer instead of, as in some other cities, becoming a relic of historic rather than contemporary mean¬ ing. Film Row’s Human Nature Seems About Standard By JAMES L. CONNORS Albany, Oct. 23. The “changing traits of Film Row” in Albany are not markedly different from a number of those listed (7) by Variety, but there are some variations. As elsewhere, the term “Film Row” no longer encompasses all ex¬ change locations. Paramount moved from the sec¬ ond floor of 1044 Broadway, at the lower end of the Row, to the sixth floor of a downtown office struc¬ ture at 547 Broadway (across from the Union Depot), in July, 1954. United Artists .switched from 443 North Pearl St., in back of Film Row, to the second floor of the Strand Theatre Building, at 110 North Pearl St., last winter. The local office is a sub-branch of the. Buffalo exchange. These changes reversed the sit¬ uation-which prevailed before Film Row was developed, on North Broadway, by the late William W. Farley and the late Patrick W. Mul- derry, in the middle and late 1920’s. They erected a series of brick double-buildings (chiefly one- floor), with vaults, on an acreage that had been used as a circus-over¬ flow plot. Exchanges had been located downtown, principally on Orange St. and on Broadway around Clin¬ ton Ave.—ot far from the present Paramount and UA headquarters. Inflammable nitrate stock, with its insurance, fire department vault facets, was one of the compelling reasons for the trek north. Located on a main artery. Film Row is in a semi-industrial section. Most exchanges have been aircon- ditioned and refurbished—some, at the lessees’ expense, in write-off deals. Of them, a manager commented: “I would say the exchanges are in a reasonably good area and pro¬ vide satisfactory working condi¬ tions. They may not always be the best, or the most completely mod¬ ern but they certainly are far from the worst. There are downtown office buildings with inferior accom¬ modations.” There always was some “turn over” on Film Row, but the per- Dallas Billing in N.Y. Dallas, Oot. 23. Altec Service Corp., has closed its offices here. Hence¬ forth all billing and accounts will be handled out of the New. York office. C. J. Zern will remain in Dallas as division manager and all Altec sound service engi¬ neers will remain at the pres¬ ent local address. -centage “up front” increased after World War II. Whether it is greater than in other business lines can not be easily determined; may¬ be, no. Exchanges are unionized, front and back. The office starting scale, in certain cases, is said to be lower than for comparable posi¬ tions with the State. Is local Film Row morale, low, average or high? Again, the an¬ swer is. difficult to give. There is no question that developments of the past several years—and reports on them, in trade and daily papers —has created uncertainty and per¬ haps apprehension. One source declared, “I am not sure that morale—if you wish to use the word—is high in many fields of endeavor today. With a lot of people, it is a job, seven or eight hours to be worked daily— nothing else. We have some of these on Film Row, but we also have plenty of eager and industri¬ ous people on the payrolls. They do a real good job.” Another branch manager re¬ marked, “I can not see how it would be possible to service about 60 drive-ins of this territory, if the distributors did not maintain local branches.” The spectacular growth of the automobilers has been a boon to Albany exchanges, which now draw around 25% of their revenue from such theatres. Dollar-wise, Albany is one of | Re: Film Row New York. Editor, Variety: I. saw your story on “Changing Traits of Film Row” in today’s issue on Page 7. It’s the best presentation of the problem that I’ve seen and is! an intelligent analysis of the present situation. National Film Service Inc. Chester M. Ross Executive Vice President the smaller exchange centers, al¬ though geographically it Is not. Whether the former makes it vul¬ nerable to “consolidation” is moot. Branch chiefs know and/or sense that certain mergers or elimina¬ tions are inevitable. Could local exchanges operate efficiently with a skeleton crew— perhaps a manager, secretary and | a booker or two? One manager observed, “I would not like to try it, but I suppose it could be done, J if the companies did not insist on the present promptness in records and the like.” Another manager stated: “I would need one more person, aside those in the categories mentioned. Who would that be? Answer, a psychiatrist.” Good Salesmen Scarce: That’s Cincinnati’s Beef By JOE ROLLING Cincinnati, Oct. 23. Cincy’s Film Row, advantageous¬ ly located on the downtown fringe of Central Parkway, shows no sign of giving way to any immediate marketing changes in the industry. Occupying modernly appointed quarters in buildings along a stretch of several blocks, major branch exchanges and offices of in¬ die distributors are following busi¬ ness patterns that have been in effect for years, with minor changes. The help situation is not what it used to be. For instance, stenog¬ raphers now receive $65 a week, compared to half that figure some time back. Scarcity of experienced salesmen is a complaint of several exchanges. They have consolidated some zones for salesmen. But there has been no merging of exchanges. Closest thing in this regard was the shuttering last week by Buena Vista of its local office, which Bill Garner conducted for the past two years. Harris Dudel- son, division manager, will look .after this territory from his Chi¬ cago headquarters. RKO has disposed of its shipping and inspection departments, pass¬ ing the services to States Film Serv¬ ice Inc., which has been doing likewise for several years for Unit¬ ed Artists. This territory, extending over portions of Ohio, Kentucky and West Virginia, has had few theatre Closings in the past year, while drive-ins have increased. At pres¬ ent there are about 500 theatres and 175 ozoners. Changes So Gradual K.C. Hardly Noticing Them JOHN w. QUINN Kahsas City, Oct. 23. Changes along Kansas City’s, Film Row pretty much fit the na¬ tional pattern of gradual and pieced meal alterations whose significance may go unnoticed. Physically, the location and the proportions are the same as they have been for a score or more of years—with 18th and Wyandotte Streets as the center, a locale on the sparse fringe of the downtown shopping area. Warners, Para¬ mount, Metro, and 20th are in es¬ tablished edifices. (It’s the corner cafe which changes hands periodi¬ cally but never ceases operation.) A major change was effected just a couple of years ago by Uni¬ versal which built a new structure at 17th and Wyandotte, and set off a chain reaction of moves as Co¬ lumbia took over Universal’s old quarters, and other shifts followed in Columbia’s wake. This makes the U stand by all odds the most modern on the row. The number of smaller shops on the Row has always been a vari¬ able, but if anything these prob¬ ably have increased in recent years. As the number of produc¬ tions has been reduced by the ma¬ jors, there is somewhat more de¬ mand for the indies and the small distrib is gaining headway, some of them definitely flourishing. There’s little doubt that there are fewer exhibs to be seen on Film Row, either from the city or the territory of western Missouri and all of Kansas. Monday is still the best day for this traffic, but it is noticeably slowed. There are fewer exhibs in existence, of course, and fewer films to buy, with more effort by the distribs to sell the exhib at his own door, min¬ imizing the film row visits. By and large Kansas City’s Film Row would have to be figured quite stable, and well in line with changes mirrored in other cities. San Francisco Film Row Only Slightly Altered By WILLIAM STEIF San Francisco, Oct. 23. Some tightening up on shipping and inspection overhead has taken place in Frisco, but only one major outfit — Paramount — has moved away from the Golden Gate Ave- nue-Hyde Street intersection that is the heart of Film Row. Par moved only a few blocks. In addition to Paramount, RKO has turned over shipping and in¬ spection to National Film Service. United Artists has been using this service for years. The Paramount' and RKO switches took place just a month ago and have given rise to reports of imperfect inspection .and occa¬ sional missed deliveries. Neither exchange, however, will 'confirm any complaints. Switches were made in each case for economy reasons, with close to a dozen in¬ spection and shipping jobs report¬ edly knocked of at each exchange. A rundown on Frisco film row shows: RKO—Shift to National, sublet downstairs part of film row build¬ ing. Paramount—Shift to National, moved quarters to Golden Gate Theatre Building, dismissed three shippers, six inspectors and a phone operator, leaving 19 on pay¬ roll. Office Manager Jack Hurley says “we’ve definitely had no miss-, outs, no trouble along that line . . . move off the row may have affect¬ ed our walk-in business a little, we don’t see so many exhibitors as we usqd to.” 'ufoiversal—“Just signed a new lease, staying where we are with same system.” Republic—“Know they’ve been negotiating in last year to have National do it, but we’re still ship¬ ping and inspecting our own film.” MGM—No changes. United Artists—Switched to Na¬ tional long ago, no other changes contemplated. Warner Bros.—“Those are just phony rumors, not a word of‘truth to 'em. So far as we knoyir, no (Continued on page 16) ‘Backroom’ Print Inspection (UNDER NATIONAL FILM SERVICE)