Variety (June 1915)

VAUDEVILLE 5 EXPO WITHDRAWS SUPPORT FROM "ZONE" ATTRACTIONS Assistance Given Certain "Zone" Shows Discon- tinued, With Managements Seeing No Way Out. 101 Ranch Jumping Across Country. Many Exposition Employes Dismissed. San Francisco, June 16. Joe Miller, of the Miller Bros.' 101 Ranch, arrived here Saturday and made arrangements for the 101 Ranch to jump practically intact to Erie, Pa., to strengthen the 101 Ranch show now playing opposition dates with the Ringling Circus. Miller claims his contract with the Exposition has expired and his aggre- gation will leave the engagement ahead financially. Mr. Miller says he is very well pleased with the treatment accorded him by the Exposition ex- ecutives. Following its policy of retrenchment, the Exposition has notified "Toyland," "Our Girls' Frolic," Selig-Robinson Animal Show, "Mysterious Orient," and 101 Ranch shows that they will have to weather it through or close without further financial aid from the Exposi- tion. When business was bad, the Ex- position partly took these shows over, and it was understood at that time that 101 Ranch was to be one of the free shows to draw the people on the "Zone," with the Ranch show arrange- ment to stand until the Exposition fin- ished its run. June 1 a large number of employees were let out and now the shows the Exposition had to help to keep from withdrawing from the "Zone" are forced to go up against what seems to be a tough proposition. The managers of the attractions, excepting the Ranch, declare it will only be a mat- ter of time before they will have to close. Only a very small part of the at- tendance uses the Van Ness entrance to the grounds, near where these shows are located. The bulk of the attend- ance goes through the Fillmore street entrance, which leads past the "Zone," and shows located in this section have a better chance for business. LOEW CUTS OUT "BLANKETS." Joseph M. Schenck, the Loew Cir- cuit general booking manager, has tabooed the "blanket contract" for vaudeville acts. A "blanket" on the Loew Circuit first occurred last sum- mer, when Mr. Schenck was arranging bills for the eastern and western time. With the omission of the western route from the circuit's sheets, leaving but the Loew houses in the east to be sup- plied next season, the "blanket" will go. Through the return of the former Sullivan-Considine Circuit to its first owners, the Loew eastern houses are taking care of the acts returning from the west with "blankets." This is said to cause the cost of several bills in the Loew houses around New York to be excessively high for this season of the year. The Fox Circuit of pop vaudeville houses around Greater New York will reduce the weekly expense of its sum- mer bills through omitting the usual higher priced turns during the hot weather. Edgar Allen, the Fox gen- eral booking manager, explains the move by saying it would be unwise to use up good material in warm weather, when an extra-priced attraction would not be an assured box office card. Be- sides, said Mr. Allen, the summer en- gagement renders useless the same act for the fall, when it would be of full value. HOTEL ASSN. AFTER BALABAN. Denver, June 16. The Hotel Owners' Association has issued orders for the immediate appre- hension of one Edgar Balaban, a vaude- ville performer who played Loew's Em- press theatre in this city during the week of May 3. At that time Balaban is alleged to have jumped a board bill at the Al- bany Hotel and upon the hotel manage- ment making a complaint to the or- ganization, it was learned, Balaban was being sought for an unpaid bill of $200 by the executives of Mercy Hospital, Denver. The same Balaban is alleged to have taken a "run-out" powder on Mrs. Rod- ney's Apartments in New York and also overlooked the usual form of pay- ing the weekly bill at the Hermitage Hotel, New York, and the Hotel Stat- ler, Buffalo. The district attorney's office has been notified and a warrant is about to be issued for his arrest. Balaban is reported to be the son of a Brooklyn doctor. He is a female impersonator and bills himself as "The Sensational Misleading Musical Marvel, Balaban." VAUDEVILLE "FIXERS." James J. Morton, Felix Adler and Bert Leslie have organized as the Cres- cent Promoting Co., with offices at 145 West 45th street, to conduct a general clearing house in handling show mate- rial of all kinds. Each of the principals in the concern is a well-known vaude- villian and recognized comedian, in and out of vaudeville. Their scope will include all branches of the profession, from musical comedy to pictures, with attention given to the disposal of manuscripts, repairing any kind of an act, producing new ones, placing songs and scenarios, writing dialog and giving useful advice to those* applying for it. The concern starts business July 1. S-C'S FUTURE. While the future policy ind direction of the Sullivan-Considine Circuit of Western theatres is being guessed : t by the profession in general, it be- came known this week tha: arrange- ments were being quietly perfected f3r an amalgamation of that circuit with the Hugh Mcintosh string ot houses in Australia, with a possibility that both circuits would be jointly booked from New York through the office of Chri3 O. Brown. Mr. Brown is now repre- senting the American interests of the Mcintosh firm, sending a weekly bill from this country to the Antipodes, but a standing arrangement with John Considine permits the New York agent to place the acts en route to Australia in the coast houses now controlled by Considine, thus breaking the jump by a five or six-week engagement along the Pacific. At the present time John Considine is in San Francisco looking over his office there and endeavoring to make arrangements to permit the material- ization of the new deal. When the Sul- livan-Considine Circuit was taken over by Loew it was in a position to con- tract an act independently for 23 weeks, and while through the dissolution of the Chicago and San Francisco S.-C. offices the route was somewhat re- duced, the circuit proper could be resurrected with at least a 20-week run. The Mcintosh contract calls for a 20- week tour and if the arrangement per- mitted a blanket contract proposition, Brown could offer acts suitable for Australia a 40-week route, while those particular acts that would only classify for American booking could be placed for a season of 20 weeks with the in- cidental time that would naturally he landed added to the regular contract. Several weeks ago it was reported in Variett Hugh Mcintosh was angling for the Sullivan-Considine Circuit to make American connections for his Australian time, but while the matter was pending the Loew people turned the circuit back to John Considine and further negotiations were called off un- til Considine could re-establish his business department and become reac- quainted with his own property. Regardless of the reported connec- tion with Mcintosh, it is understood Considine and Chris Brown have an ar- rangement whereby Brown will resume the booking of the circuit with the opening of next season, when vaudeville will be replaced in the houses on the same basis and policy that existed prior to the Loew temporary purchase. This would not affect Mr. Brown's rep- resentation with Mcintosh, for with the American circuit booked through his office, it would place the Australian time in a better position to select its material through taking the desired acts from the Sullivan-Considine chain as they reached the coast, from where they would sail to take up their Aus- tralian obligations. There seems a likely possibility the Affiliated Booking Co., of Chicago, of which Fred Lincoln is general manager, would make cither a direct or booking affiliation with the Considine circuit proper with Lincoln probably resuming his former position of general manager. The Affiliated firm is thoroughly established and in work- OBITUARY. Warren Frazee, known in the circus world as "Alligator Joe" and appear- ing at the Panama-Pacific Exposition, died May 30 of pneumonia in the Ger- man Hospital, San Francisco. A child survives. Mme. Marie Michailoff, who has been associated with a number of the present day stars and was the friend and companion of the late Mile. Rhea for many years, died May 28 in Roose- velt Hospital after two months' illness. She was buried in Calvary Cemetery Mildred Claire (Mrs. Al. Des Roche) died May 31 at the home of her parents in New York after a prolonged illness. Mother, father, a brother and two sis- ters, Nell and Lillian Claire, survive. R. A. Roberts, director and producer, at one time a member of Minnie Palm- er's company, died last Saturday in St. Vincent's Hospital, New York, follow- ing an illness which he has been fight- ing for several years. Roberts failed to rally from an operation and the end came peacefully. He was married six years ago to Helen Byron. Allan Fawcett, stage manager with Maude Adams in "Quality Street" died suddenly at the Continental Hotel, San Francisco, June 5, after an attack of acute indigestion. Fawcett's body was shipped to New York for burial. He was a member of the Lambs Club. James H. Burton, in vaudeville with a dog act, died in San Francisco June 9 of paralysis. The deceased was 63 years old and is survived by two daughters. Prior to handling animals in vaudeville, Burton was a minstrel man. Elizabeth Hawkins, the mother of Gertie, Kittie and Minnie Hawkins, died suddenly June 8 in her home in Philadelphia. Frank Browne (Three Brownies) married Fannie Greenberg, a non-pro- fessional, last week. CANFIELD VERY LOW. John Can field (Canfield and Carle- ton) is seriously ill at his home in Bensonhurst, L. I. ing condition and would be the prac- tical Chicago stand for the recon- structed circuit. With the San Fran- cisco office set in action again and the general booking department centered around Brown in New York, the circuit would be in a position for any immedi- ate movement and doubly convenient for the proposed connection with the Australian time. Chicago. June 16. The dealings between the Western Vaudeville Managers' Association and John Considine that extended over a period of two weeks have come to naught. It is said the Considine pr >- posal was for money interests to sta.i 1 any losses of the houses on the circuit. The policy of the Sullivan-Considine theatres for next season still remains indefinite.