Variety (January 1961)

SHOWMANSHIP & STATESMANSHIP Moonkam, Mrs. Pat and Bernard Shaw UBy GEORGE MIDDLETON _ _ Moonbeam, a tiny wblt* Peki-f Yea Verilvl jiese, belonged to Mrs. Pat Camp * f . bell, the glamorous English actress whom Bernard Shaw one* loved. * always wondered For years, with lapses, Shaw shared t in her personal and professional Rhlif?,e' . Show Must Go Ufa; she had made iamous his On! ' observes Dean Martin “Pygmalion,” from which some 45 . * finally found out the years later, “My Fair Lady” was bosses~ porn. Yet oddly enough, it was ' Moonbeam who was to play the TT*. | p . decisive part in a crisis during the Virol pff-f|fPA I T1A hleakeast days of her long career. T lLtll JL UlUiU vUC The dog, in fact, is Indexed in the published record of the Shaw | ¥ ’Ti J * Campbell correspondence. The last /lTAJQTrAn* AOnTTIflff jentence of her last letter to Shaw llYTUilCU* IVvdUYliiH refers tenderly to her pet. And In " *3 hi3 last few lines to her he blamed | T rrt* “that wretched animal” for the AflmA nf*A¥1AA I 1A Itraits she was in. jfllllflU“Tl dlltU 1 1C It was during these hard days ^ for her in Hollywood that I was to «v TTA'RnT'n MVUrcc play a small part in her life. When . HAROLD MYERS I was a supervisor at Fox and my London, boss was Winnie Sheehan, I was History is in the making. Somecalled to his office. I then had time in the first quarter of 1961, charge of a dated English drama, cameras are expected to begin “The Dancers.” which we were re rolling on the first Anglo-French making as a talking picture. ' coproduction. It is an event of con “George. I want you to make a siderabje significance which may place in the picture for Mr3. Pat eventually change the pattern of Campbell.” film making in Europe. I gasped. I knew the celebrated This one has been a long time English actress v.as gliding about coming. It was last March when Hollywood, with her Pekinese and the British government finally ap£ quiverfull of poisoned darts she proved the new’ Quota Act which would casually let fly with her gave the greenlight for coproduccharming smil-» Ignoring my sout »io*i v.ith European countries sub Name Stars Plus Bellydancers For Oil-Rich Arabs ‘Marriage Circuit* ’mu v.ith European countries subtering protest. Winnie went on: joct to certain obligations being “Make her somebody's aunt or mot. The labor unions on either something. Two or three scenes side of the Channel were hesitant Will be. enough. It will he her first and needed considerable reassurtContmued on page 290 1 ;a:ue, and it is their caution more than any other single factor that Chicago, With Memories uSSion18 opcration of the Of Film Biz’s Pioneering, ! g illation and consultation, the un n it i p 7 T 1 ftfA ii; Br*ta‘n and France are Kclled Several lo I%0 truing agreement with, their rer> it/'*. nmrtv .su'ethe producing organizations i>y ili.uA.> ;t) get the scheme going on a trial Chicago basis. If it works for the benefit of Was 196d the year that the seed ‘Continued on Page 84 of regrowth was planted? Meaning. TTITTAXJ Q1 WTTCPTCC can Chicago come back as a film iUVmViO Ji fuiLIUJiiJ » and 40 bars swinging is tiie original range of Bronco By EMIL ZUBRYN Billy Anderson. Here began the Tijuana, filmic career of a music hall comic This border town, while on the named Charles Chaplin. Here too surfat“e not as wide open as it has manv another Inter hnvnffte* bet‘f\ in *)ast >'ears-_ Is by no means many another later, boxoffice fig hlueno.se paradise, the local ures like Gloria Swanson and Wal' Chamber of Commerce to the conlace Beery once Mr. and Mrs.) , trary. There are still 40 or so canbegan. Moreover it was in Evans; tinas and bars and 31 night clubs ton, no further away than five | going full blast gallons of gasoline in a Cadillac, While this frontier metropolis the war between the North and the has been labeled both a “tourist South was photographed in a 12 heaven” or “hell." it does not reeLs.IIe,JJ. e,pic known to hi5tory wholly merit the one or the other. asT ‘e Birth of a Nation.” There is, and alwavs will be a Chi’s latterday feature produc There is, and always will be a I driving drug traffic, especially ! tion has little of that early experi-jwith “Dona Juanita” as marijuana mentation and excitement. The is known. You can still pick up the projects here are frankly catch-asstuff without too much difficult^ catch-can. This may be said of : There is, and ahvavs will be the the first couple of ventures shot ; strip joints and vice centers not here m 60— and at this writing | only here but in nearby Santa the only ones available for judg Rosalia and other sucker traps in ment— t hey bear absolutely no kin the vicinity. Here there is a blatant £ up to the new wavers” in France. ! appeal to the “gringo” tourist and New York and other centres. They [so tint the sucker on the prowl (Continuer on page 51) (Continued on page 290 By ABEL GREEN Television being so important, future Presidential losers will con¬ sole themselves with “Well, that’s ; show’ biz!” In other ways politics and show’ business wrere fellow-travelers, ex¬ cuse the expression, in 1960. The influence of showmanship on statesmanship manifested itself in global sectors remote from Nix;on-Kennedy, such as in the inter: nal Turkish and French-AIgerian ! strife; in the new, war-torn Afri¬ can states; and tou jours the Castro-Khruslichev capers. Khrush just about nosed out Castro, and both topped Nixon and Kennedy in the 1960 Passing Show on tv, more than ever substantiat¬ ing the Bard’s prophetic crack. All | the world was truly a stage, thanks to the spreading video medium. It ■j was everything from the Olympics s to Beverly Aadland. | Even before the near-dead heat l results, show biz took solace that ’both Nixon and Kennedy are thea¬ tre fans, in marked contrast to [President Eisenhower who de| pended on tv westerns for his per¬ sonal entertainment when not mak¬ ing with the niblick. The new First Lady has already announced : (Continued on page. 52) W. German Tele: Politics Prevail ; By HANS HOEIIN Berlin. West German television is passing ; through a considerable transition. The medium, a state Institution, has had only one channel for 10 years — but now it Is getting a sec' ond one. Hopes were nurtured that the j second channel would be private, j Industrial interests were supposed I to back it and Federal government j at first approved this intention, j [ Then Chancellor Konrad Ade; I nauer changed Ji i s mind. He j ! founded the Deutsehland-Fern; | selien (Germany Television' with one of his ministers. Fritz Schaef j fer, as managing director. Bonn j government holds 51^ and 49r< j has been assigned the Laender ■ 'districts'. Latter no like, object (Continued on page 290 j Early Press Time Because of its size, this 55th Anniversary Number went to press several days ahead of the normal Tuesday closing deadline. Certain news departments are combined, i.e. Television with Radio, Tollvision with Pictures, and the like; and certain other departments are omitted for this one week only. Subtle Hint When the Orpheum, Lin¬ coln, Neb., played vaudeville regularly back in the '20s, the management had a sign hung prominently backstage as a warning to all the “Artists.” It read: “Please don’t ask for passes for your friends. If they W’on’t pay to see you, who the hell will?” _ Paris’ Noon-to-7 Prod. Schedule’s Okay By Yanks By GENE MQSKGVHTZ Paris. The glory which was and Is France finds It3 supreme sheen in this city of Paris. And to Paris has come many an American lo¬ cation unit to shoot glamorous backgrounds. Oddly enough the same films have often completed their interiors elsewhere, perhaps in Rome, perhaps In Hollywood. But Paris backgrounds are deemed surefire appeal for the vast number of Americans, GI’s and ; tourists, who love right and left banks and Montmartre, too. Part of the reason for ducking j the French film studios when the interiors had to be faced has been | (Continued on page 47) RUSSO ‘BIG BROTHER’ BIT EVEN ON BOOKS? Edinburgh. ; Book readers in Russia who bor; row from public libraries have a ' note made of every volume they ; take out, M. C. Pottinger, librarian i of the Scottish Central Library, ; said in a report on his visit to the Soviet Union. j The Russian reader, according to Pottinger, is issued w’ith a ticket ; on which he records his name, 1 nationality, party-membership, oc : cupation, education, private ad [ dress, place of work, telephone number and identity paper particu ! lars. The inside of the ticket has ! columns for details of books bor ; rowed. Records are periodically analyzed by the librarian. i Commented Pottinger: “To me, ' and I think to most of us, the whole idea of this is repugnant. I don’t want any official checking up ; on the last 50 books I have bor . rowed. What a man chooses to read i is essentially a private and per ' sonal affair, but the Russians think ; otherwise.” He said he had been told these records were an aid to book selec¬ tion and a guide to subjects for l lectures in the library. 1 + By ROGER BOWER Damascus. While the bigtime circuits ar# just a memory, and the acts freV quently subjects for ill-conceived jests on tv, one venerable circuit is still operating in Ancient Arab'y — The Marriage Circuit. The bookings are one-nighters and the jumps are sometimes long, but the money is good. The shows are those staged on wedding nights; the size of the show’ and the stature of the stars is geared to papa’s bankroll. . To give you the background, mar¬ riage is still a business here. They don’t waste much time on prelimi¬ naries — you’ve seen the product so let’s get that contract signed! The divine passion still sparks romances but it runs a poor second in the market and many a lovesick cou' pie doesn’t set up that little vine‘ covered apartment because th© swain couldn’t compete with the high bidders. Wiien the terms are agreed on in principle, the engagement be; gins. The girl gets a simple gold i wedding band which she wears on ; the third finger of right hand until tiie knot is tied, then it gets shifted to the conventional finger. The en: gagement lasts anywhere from six .‘months to hvo years or more. ’ That's supposed to let the eouma ■ get to know each other. That may j (Continued on page 51) Kennedy’s TV Success Bates as Far Back As Cape Cod in 1952 By CHARLES VON FREMI) ( C3S-Nev:3 Corresponds1'; > Washington. j It was a Cape Cod day, sunny hut ; with a cool breeze off the Sound. The waves rolled up on tiie beach in front of the big white frame house which was a part of what the natives call “the Kennedy com¬ pound.” A group of reporters, in¬ cluding this correspondent, were sprawled on the lawn, baking in tiie sun and idly speculating on what the man we were covering was doing inside. Moments later, the familiar, slim figure hounded down the step and we leaped to our feet. Said John Fitzgerald Kenne¬ dy: “i’ve just challenged the Vico President to a series of nationwide radio and television debates.” It was a big story but it's doubt¬ ful many of use knew then just how big it was destined to he. For as Bobby Kennedy said the day after it was all over: “It wouldn’t even have been close without the debates." The President-elect’s after it was all over: “It wouldn’t manager was merely reflecting th© view of almost every political ob¬ server: the debates made tiie dif¬ ference. Had th® two candidate® faced each other under identical (Continued on page 51)