Variety (May 1919)

;. ■- aa- ; •.. .->^ ■ - - * '•' ■ ■ . ■" ■■ : " . • ..A *' .' | ■ ES-." •■■" ««* •■'■" . - '-" :'■ . : '■■'■■ , .'•■■-- .,j ■- - :,. . \ VARIETY - --:?.v.; ■ :.;-".v ; -' **J K1ETY TnOe M»rk Heglstercd Published Weekly by . VARIETY, Inc. SIKB SILVERMAN, Prraldent Times Square New York SUBSCRIPTION Annual $5. Foreign 90 Single Copies, 16 cents tj ••■ * VtL LIV. No. 13 Willie Edelsten has set June 7 as his next date to sail for the other side. Dr. A. M. Weiss has been, appointed one of the official N. V. A. dentists. is Jfenmie Hussey received his final de- *£* cree of divorce Tuesday. Olive May has replaced Zelda Sears in. the cast of "Tumble In." Leon Langsfield has been appointed resident manager of B. S. Moss' Broad- way Theatre, New York. Harry Singer is back from Chicago. He went West for the opening of the State Lake. Chaa. E. Bray, the manager of the " Orpheum, Los Angeles, is in New York for a short stay. Evelyn Dockion rejoined "Oh What a Night" in St Louis this week after three months' absence due to illness; ** £; Off." Billy At well is now connected with the Joseph E. Shea office, in the Strand. Jay Gould has a business card, read- ing : "Jay Gould, Expert Actor, Laying v. -. El Rey Sister* sail Saturday (May 24) for London. They have just closed at the Hippodrome (Chas. Bornhaupt). Frederick V. Bowers is writing a new show for next season entitled, "I'll Say So," which opens Aug. 20. Mrs. Paula Segal (mother of Vi- vienne Segal) has opened a dramatic agency in New York. Dave Green, formerly at room 324, has moved to room 514, Putnam Build- in e- Edward Bennett, formerly connected with the Abe Feinberg, is now in the Joe Michael office, Putnam Building. The Julian El tinge road show, in Buffalo this week, has started back to the Coast and will probably' end- its tour about July 15 at Oakland, Cal. Louise Farnnm, character lead with the Poli stock at Hartford, has switch- ed to the Poli company in Springfield, Mass. ■ Dooley and Dooley have separated for the. summer. Each will appear in a single act. They will reunite in the autumn. Harry Corson Clarke will try out a new piece on the coast prior to his starting on his world tour in a new comedy, entitled "How About Father?" The Strand, White Plains, N. Y., has changed its policy from pictures to split week vaudeville of three acts. Arthur Blondell will book the house. Helen Jane Cassidy, of New York, and L Thoral Lake, of Syracuse, an- nounce their engagement to wed. Both are with "Chu Chin Chow." Comttock ft Gest have announced their intentions of producing musical- ized versions of "The Dictator" and "Brewster's Millions" this fall. Guy Bolton will make the adaptations. -Laurette Taylor and J. Hartley Man- ners now figure that the run of "Hap- piness" in Boston will terminate in time for them to sail on the Aquitania June 2. Joe Levy, of the Putnam Building, goes to Newport, R. I., for a visit ana week's rest. His last appearance there was as a "gob" in the Naval Training Station. Ziegler Twins and Co. have notified Sam Fallow that they will not open on the Pan time as contracted for June 8. No reason for the cancella- tion was announced. "Butter," a bulldog employed in the act of Jack Dudey and Co., was shot and killed by an unknown party near the owner's home at New Brunswick, N. J., last week. Rose & Curtis have routed the fol- lowing acts for next season: Walter Brower, Frank Gaby, Royal Gascoynes, Georgie Jess el, Krantz and La- Salle, Jimmy Savo and Co., and Harris and Morey. The I. A. T. S. E. officials left May 16 for the Ottawa convention. They were shortly followed by the New York and Brooklyn delegates. Sam Kaplan, Alex. Polin and Sam Goldfarb left New York May. 21. The New York Syncopated Orches- tra,-36 pieces, will leave New York May American turns for foreign bookings as being directly due to the July 1 leg- islation. They assert that acts after playing the South and West are ready for anything "wet," be it England or Egypt. John O'Malley, the Irish tenor, threat- ens to bring an action against Klein & Green, of the 14th St. Theatre, unless they remove his name from the billing on the theatre and through the neigh- borhood. O'Malley claims the theatre people are deliberately capitalizing his prestige by billing him without mak- ing any effort to' engage his services. Morris Rose and Hugo Morris have set a watch upon Harry Spingold, the Chicago agent, now in New York. Mr. Spingold has a car. He drove it to New York and he is going to .drive it back. Rose and Morris have de- cided to go with him. It is .their an- nual vacation. The ride out and walk back. * George Nash has returned -to the cast of "East is West," and it is now announced that he will remain for the remainder of the run at the Astor and will also tour with the show next fall. He recently left the show giving for his reason for not accepting a con- tract to tour next season, that he was a "creative actor." Captain Everett A. Butterfield, A.E.F., formerly of "Johnny Get Your Gun," is sailing for America June 1. He denies the recently published report of his engagement ttx-marry Sydney. Shields. Butterfield is a member, of the Lamb's Club, and war commis- sioned a second lieutenant at Platts- burg in Sept., 1918. IF YOU DONT ADVERTISE IN VARIETY DON'T ADVERTISE 28 to open for A. Chariot. in London. It has not been settled whether Will Marion Cook will accompany the or- chestra. He is its director over here. The purchase of Robert Duke's es- tate at Tarrytown, N. Y., by Joseph Blake will necessitate the immediate removal of Isadora Duncan's school of classic dancing, which occupied the grounds until now. Tex Mcloud will open at Liverpool June 16 and the El Rey Sisters at Brighton June 9. Both foreign book- ings were made through Charles Born- haupt in New York for the Variety Controlling Co. of England. Charles Freeman, one of the bookers in the Western Vaudeville Managers' Association, Chicago, is in New York looking over acts. He will remain here another week or so. Jesse Freeman (Spingold Agency) came into New York Tuesday. Walter J. Hayes, for five years sec- retary to the late Theodore Roosevelt, sails for England on the Aquitania June 2 to arrange for the publication there of a series of Roosevelt anec- dotes by an English newspaper syndi- cate. For the first time since the act split five years ago, the former "Five Co- lumbians" were assembled together. The occasion was a box party at "The Royal Vagabond" last week. The for- mer act consisted of Mr. and Mrs. Caro Miller and their daughters Mari- lyn, Ruth and Claire. Some of the International Booking agents explain the sudden anxiety of Al Darling nearly ruined a dinner at the Criterion, in the Bronx, recently, tendered by Billy Gibson to Irving Crane, the Chairman of the Victory Loan Committee of that district. In the middle of festivities Al made an en- trance escorted by the largest of Gruber's Elephants. Gibson turned white, then threatened to sic Benny Leonard on the invader. Willie Edelsten reports the follow- ing sailings: Frank Marcklay to open June 9, Lady Tsen Mei opens July 7, Budd Schneider and Co., to open July 14. Lewis and Norton, who went abroad with the "Overseas Co.," have been placed by Mr. Edelsten to open in England July 14. Merles Cock- atoos and Wheeler and Moran open July 28. Joe Shea will book the Sunday night concerts in the Star and Gayety, Brooklyn, next season. The Sunday bookings for both burlesque houses were controlled by C W. Morganstern the last two seasons. Billy Atwell, Shea's booking manager will give spe- cial attention to the Star, which will play a much better class of acts than heretofore. Cleaves Kinkead's suit for $5,000 damages against A. H. Woods was amicably adjusted in court early this week, the plaintiff receiving a cash settlement. Kinkead as. author of "Common Clay" claimed some money due him over the screen rights—pro- duced by Astra for Pathe with Fannie Ward. Alfred Beekman, of House, Grossman & Vorhaus, represented the defendant. A. E. Siegel, the general manager of the Timely Films, Inc., producers of the Pathe release, "Topics of the Day," c^l'sg Received a settlement, out of court, last AA: week, in his suit for $50,000 damages against the Fox Film Corporation, in ;: v which he alleged malicious slander and AA defamation of character. The suit..,/;'-w'; which had been pending for several '■■''Afr"- years, was settled by the plaintiff's AA^V counsel, Sid A. Erwin, of Detroit. TheA plaintiff was formerly in thevFox A Film's employ as district manager of AA;? their Middle West territory. AA^J -— .*•■ ■'.' ,' : ::A Nellie Revell is getting to be one of . ; - ; ' our very best little commuters between"' : New York, Philadelphia, Boston and Chicago. The Cort office refers to her :■ as the morale division of their attrac- A tions, and whether the shows and their ■ publicity staffs need it or not, the=-bi--A weekly trips to the attractions are T from the orders of the "big boss." "Fiddlers Three" is playing Phila~A delphia, "Flo Flo" in Boston, and "Glo-A • rianna" in Chicago. The latter show A got top money of the musical attract A tions in Chicago last week. ;~. The appeal by Max Hart from an ' : v interlocutory judgment decreeing the ;A specific performance of an alleged oral contract between him and his wife, Madge Hart, came up before the Ap- pellate Division of the Supreme Court, last week the court reserving its de-AA- cision for the customary fortnight. The nature of the alleged agreement held that the defendant was to give :;-' Mrs. Hart half of his property, half of his future earnings, besides $20,000 cash and $75 weekly, in consideration of her discontinuing two actions then A; pending against him. her condoning of A his adulteries and her resumption of „ .'/-■ marital relations with him.. The plain- tifi* alleged that her agreement was fully carried out, his end of it only A extending to the payment of the $75 weekly. The appellant contended the agreement the plaintiff sought to es- tablish was vague, indefinite, uncer- ' tain, unenforcible and non-equitable; A that the alleged agreement is unrea- sonable and unconscionable, and that its specific performance would work a hardship on the defendant without a . corresponding advantage to the plain- tiff. The respondent, through Herbert -A.. C. Smyth, contended the facts com- pletely sustained the making of the contract and that it would be proved equitable in any court. Louis Wilson and William M. Barrett appeared for the appellant. ".■;..ViA.A ■ The following was written by Fred- erick Donaghey, musical critic of the Chicago Tribune: ... A A "Stravinsky, one of the most eminent composers of the century, is suffering poverty. Actors have'"';? their Fund: musicians have no or-A ganized system of relief for dis- tressed colleagues. Why not?.'~ Editorial in Musical America. If the question be not mere rhetoric and the editor of Musical America really care to know, I should say that Musical America is .".■ high among the reasons, so far as the public performers in the United States are concerned. The money which is spent each season op. false-alarm publicity by musicians would pension all of the necessi- tous among them. Actors long since learned that lesson; that is . why they now have their, flourish- ing Fund. They supported four or five trade-weeklies at one time, buying space to tell each other— for the circulation was exclusively "professional"—how good they were. The one "organ" which mat- ters to them today is Variety; and it is realistic and on the level for all of their requirements. In time, doubtless, the musicians will copy the actors, and stop spending money in the effort to kid themselves. •Their field is completely covered by two good weeklies—the Musical Leader, published in Chicago, and the Musical Courier, in New York. i A,« ■■ : ■ : . -'■■■■ *. ■ ■'...- . '.■ :.?>.• ■-■■ < -■' - •■/■)•■■"< • '.'-V'- - ■■''' ' "''V"V . . -^ M