Variety (November 1921)

ftjfoy.jgggftf r *?* ^ l VA F j E T Y SPORTS The Johnny Buff decision over Jack Sharkey at the Garden Thurs- day night of last week In their 15- uund bout for the bantamweight Ifcamplonshlp satisfied the crowd, tfthough the large majority of the I00U or 10,000 (at $11 top) present w ere Sharkey rooters. Despite the dailies derided Sharkey's efforts he »ut up a fine battle, much better than had been looked for. Sharkey entered the ring with every con- fidence. HeTBctt told friends Thurs- day night would see a new champion in the bantam division. He fought a heady fight, hpwever, holding off until the* seventh round when he commenced to force things slowly forging to the front until the 13th round, when Buff assumed an un- looked for lead he never lost. It was a real fight all the way. one of the best staged at the Garden In a long while, and one of the very, very few down there that looked as though it were on the level. There's so much money in a Garden fight, in bets besides the gate, that one can never be certain. It's almost fool- ish to make a bet, for some time even the wise money is not let in on the frame. There was a quite recent case of this when a championship passed owners. In the crowd Thursday night were many women. One girl alone and in the H section made it eloquently known she was for Buff. A habitual gum chewer, she would shout, "Beat "him, up Johnny," or when Sharkey went to-a clinch, yelled, "Fight, you bum, fight." Otherwise she seemed a nice girl. Joe Tiplltz narrowly got the deci- sion In what should have been a draw with Johnny Drummle In eight rounds. Drummle. 38 years old, bexed rings aroung TiplUz, hitting him on the head and face (when Tiplltz didn't cover up) enough times to have knocked Tip a dozen times, if Drummie had any of his ©Id-tlmc speed. It was only about two or three years ago that Drummie placed a k. o. on Tiplitz. Bert Kolima gave George Shade an awful beating. Both are about the middleweight limit and both are from California. Shade has a couple of brothers, also fighters. Kolima pasted George plenty, and got the decision without a protest. Kolima looked like a Mexican and a comer. He's a nifty boxer with a punch, re- minding some from his style of the eld-time middles. In the Buff-Sharkey bout, oft times the noise of the crowd was so con- tinuously loud the house and the fighters never heard* the bell. The only sign of the round was when the seconds Jumped into the ring. It was Buffs first match since de- feating Pete Herman for the title a few weeks ago. Jabez White, Albany bantam- weight, who recently won the Judges' decision over Jack Sharkey In an eight-round bout in Madison Square Garden, is being boomed -for a match with Johnny Buff, cham- . pion, by upstate sports writers. White boxed a 12-round draw with Buff in New Jersey last Bummer, scoring a knockdown in one of the early rounds. The Albany boy has boxed the best in the bantam class, including Joe Lynch, former champ, three times; Roy Moore, Terry Mc- Hugh, Wee Wee Spencer, Marty Collins and Fete Herman, another former champion. TOMATO K.0/S ANOTHER; CON'S STUFF COPS COIN lightweights ever brought out of Albany, and at one time clamored for a match with Johnny Dundee and other top-notchers. He boxed in New York rings many times, meeting such boys as Walter Mohr, Eddie Wallace and Harry Condon. George Perry is the holder of a unique present—a gold watch and chain of handsome design, with an Inscription saying it is the joint token to Perry in appreciation by the world series members of the New York Giants and Yankees. It is the only present in existence given jointly by the two teams, and wes presented to Mr. Perry the other evening at a gathering of the ball players and sports writers. FAMOUS PLAYERS' NEW HIGH (Continued from page 3) Morlin'e Ron of Trirkc Qf ill I ar 6 ued tna * * h « dividend was sure meriins Dag 01 incus dim and had been dl8COunte d for the Win Heavy Jack on Latest Victory The New York State Basketball league, recognized as one of the strongest professional circuits in the country, has opened its third season, all clubs getting Into action except Troy, which will be unable to start at home until December. Utica and Glens Falls won their home games, while Schenectady, Cohoes and Gloversville managed to get an even break in home and road games. Kingston and Am- sterdam both lost away from home. Charles Solodar of Jersey City has bee. i added to the staff of ref- erees and made a decided hit with upstate fans In his first appearance in Schenectady Saturday night The Albany team, two times win- ner of the New York State Basket- ball league championship, has not entered the race to date. Yale's victory over Princeton seems to indicate that the sons of Eli are about ready to take their place after a two-year wait once more with the leading elevens of the east. In their next-to-closing contest last Saturday at New Haven the Blue showed a driving backfleld fronted by a line Which was capable of holding off the, op- position until their cohorts got (Continued on page 32) SHUBEKT SEEKS (Continued from page 6) his partner he has been attending the executive Committee sessions of the FirsrNational. H. J. Ruben is still in the East and believed to be carrying on the negotiations with the Shuberts. The Palace Theatre here, one of the F.-R. chain, has been hard hit by the opening of the New Henne- pin, a Junior Orpheum house, and it is believed that if the deal is consummated the Shuberts will present their shows at the Palace. There are three pop vaudeville houses operating on Hennepin ave- nue at present, and the Palace has the poorest location of the trio. Ernesto Farina, known in boxing cently stc PP cd circles as Young Maxwell, of Albany, who cut a wide swath in the lightweight division of Northern and Central New York, pleaded not guilty to robbing Joseph Leonard, o Brooklyn, near Snyder's Lake, last July, before Judge Pierce II. Russell at Troy, N. Y., Monday. His bail bond of $10,0(0 was renewed on application of his counsel, Philip Clrillo. Leonard is said to have "been lured to a~7onciy si»»>l !.«.«.'. Snydci's Lake or the night of July 27 by Mabel Cloud, reputed to be an Albany "gold digger." lie was held up and robbed by Maxwell and Moe Koscnstein and left in the roadway. Both Maxwell and Kosen- stMn were indicted nt the October session of the Rensselaer county grand jury. Rosenstein was ar- rested a few day ; after the hold-up and is at liberty in $10,000 bail. Maxwell, it is said, fled to Montreal. where he boxed under an assumed name until he secured enough money to fight the ease and then returned to his old haunts In Albany. He was am sled the first dry he arrived home, brought to - y to face the formal charge, and I. H. Ruben when asked by a Va- riety representative this week whether the leal with the Shuberts had been closed refused to make any comment. Further asked as to whether or not there was any kind of a deal on, he also refused any information whatever. One of the Shubert vaudeville executives stated last week that there had been a deal on whereby the Shuberts were to take over ten of the F.-R. houses, but the gen- eral reports of business in the houses playing Shubert vaudeville as reported in Variety's columns had caused the deal to fall through. Finklesteln & Ruben have re- cently stepped into the musical comedy production field to help the business of the houses they control, and have turned over a string of their houses to playing that class of attraction. Perry Kelly has been made general manager of the cir- cuit. At present there are four houses in the circuit, the New (Jrand, Min- neapolis, which has the Schuster Musical Comedy Company, with Dave. Hurt featured; now in its fourth week" the Majestic, St ."Paul, which lias Jack Crawford's "Ron Ton Follies" in its third week; the New r.rand, Duluth. also in its third week with Billy droves and his "Saucy Baby" company. The New Palace. Superior, is to open on NOV. -0 Willi Jim- I I"'"") VJ.li. OLD TIMERS ^Continued from i>age 6) lit the foots with a taper. Mike Scott was presented with a medal, lie insisted on it before appearing. Mr. Scott was a riot with ids step- ping, offering a challenge to any LTi-ycar-older in the elub to dupli- cate the steps of a particular dance performed bv him. with no accept- Syracuse, Nov. 16. Dear Chick: The brass knucks have been workln like a pair of charms but I pulled a new one the other night for I had a hunch that too much of the knock em dead stuff might hep them up. Tomato has been rfnookin all comers bow legged and I was gettin leary that the peasants would smell a cheese nlbbler. Merlin suggested a stunt to work in Instead of the knucks in the gloves and believe me xantippe it worked like a police card. The egg we was to box was one tough hombre from Lockport named Tim Duffy. Duffy was beltin hail Columbia out of all the northern New York light-weights and had cleaned all the Kellermans in his neighborhood so he picked oh Tomato for his next victim. A special train load of Lockport rooters came along to watch their champ step up another rung on the pugilistic ladder but they never figured that the ladder had rubber steps. They were layin 8 to 6 that Duffy would win on, a decision and write your own ticket that he wouldn't be stopped inside of 12 rounds. Merlin and I grabbed all we could handle at sweet odds bettin that Tomato would take their giboney Inside the limit. I pinned my hopes on Merlin for while I had no worries about Tomato gettin a decision over Duffy, I had my doubls about a knock out unless we had the aces back to back for Duffy was touted to me by Hlghlo Shannon as an- other Joe Grimm when it cum to takin it. However Merlin told me not t:> worry and after what he accom- plished with the switch on the knucks, I didn't have no chance to sqawk. Tomato was breezln along In front poppln Duffy with a left jab whenever he wanted to and shakln him up now and then with a right cross but not slowin him up an av/ful lot with all the beltj he was slippln him. It was a pipe that Duffy would stay the limit so in the middle of the sixth round I told Merlin to slip In the new record as soon as it was over. Just as I finished puttin the works in Tomato stopped a wild swing with his kisser and fell smack on his back. I nearly had heart failure. I looked at Merlin and he was as white as a nurse's apron. Both of us watched with fear and trembiin while the ref. give Tomato the dumbwaiter count that all the home townera get when their battlin In their own back yard. The kid finally moved one leg at Ave so 1 took a chance and threw a sponge full of water over him which done the trick. He climbed Oii his feet at nine and lasted the round out by doing a cor- rect imitation of Strangler Lewis. We worked like mad men over him durin the minute rest and Merlin slipped in the Joker which was to sprinkle his hair full of cayenne pepper. In the next round Tomato walked Into a clinch and rubbed his head all over Duffy's pan. That done it time being around 67. It is market dogma that there Is always a reac- tion on the coming out of good news and this development was looked for on Tuesday when the dividend announcement was due. There was persistent selling all day Monday by holders who sought to take advan- tage of this expected dip as well as by players on the short side. No support came Into the market and the price closed a fraction over 63, close to iU, low for several months. Apparently the pool gave this sell- ing movement every encouragement. It could have checked a decline at any moment, but the weakness at the -ioso would suggest that it did little buying if, indeed, it did. not work on the short side itself in order to accelerate the slump. On Tuesday, against all prece- dent, with the statement out the price opened up 2 points and ad- vanced more than four points on the day to better than 67 at the close. The forward trend contin- ued unabated Wednesday when the new high was established up to the time of writing this report. The Tuesday jump on dealings in more than 16,000 shares, of course, repre- sented pool buying and on top of that a lot of covering and the buy- ing back of stock sold on Monday In anticipation of a reaction. Talk of 80 Insiders have right along been declaring that 70 was the objective of the pool, but, as usual, now that it has touched that level, the tip is abroad that it will go to 80. This, of course, is entirely within the power of the pool, but whether th3 pool will choose to work the common higher is mere guesslc g. One thing appears obvious—while ♦.he pool's speculative operations in and out on one side or the other, in the com- mon stock is for immediate profit, there lies behind the campaign some definite objective in relation to the preferred. Oft Tuesday nearly 2,000 shares of the senior Issue changed hands for a net advance of more than 3 points to 83%, which is a sensational movement in a stock which normally has a turnover of 100 or 200 shares a day and does not fluctuate two points in six months. What the plan behind the movement is is obscure, but it is an important factor in the whole operation. Profit Rste^23 The Income and profit account for the nine months ending Oct. 1 was issued after the close Monday, to- gether with the announcement of the declaration of the dividend for the last quarter, payable Jan. 3 to holders of record Dec. 16. It is the usual consolidated statement, in- cluding the earnings of subsidiary companies in which Famous Players owns 90 per cent, or more of the stock. Net operating profits were $4,- 186,637 for the nine months after deducting all charges and reserves for Federal Income, excess and profits taxes. After allowing for payment of the dividends on the preferred stock, the earnings' are at the annual rate of $23.24 on the 206,849 shares of common outstand- ing. The statement for the corre- sponding period of 1920 Indicated profits at about this rate. The other features of the week were the continued strength of Loew, which maintained Itself at or above 16 and a sudden and un- promlse. Apparently tt has been checked close to 6 after going above 6 on the strength of expected profits from the film, "Theodora." The summary of transactions Nov. 11 to 10 inclusive is as follows: 8TOCK EXCHANGE Thursday— Sales. High. Low.Last. Cbjr. Fam. riuj-L.. C.Ci© -«Vi M'-i 84 — H Do. pf 1,100 81 80 80 — S4 Loew, Inc 4,500 15H 14% in + % 19H 19tf 800 19H Orpheum Boston sold 175 Orpheum at 19KG10%. Friday—Holiday. Saturday— Fam. Play-L.. 1.000 «4\4 03% 04 Do. pf 800 m% 80 80 Loew. loo 2.000 1.V4 IS 15* + £ Boston sold 100 Orpheum at 10%. Monday— Fam. Play-L.. 4.200 04% 03% 08% + % Do. pf 400 80% 70% 80% + % Loew. Inc 1.800 15% 15 10 — fi Orpheum 400 10% 19% 19% — % Boston sold 100 Orpheum at 19%019%. Tuesday— Fam. Play-L. .18,000 07 04% 07* {»f 1.700 88% 80% 89) ne 2.000 15% 15 104 Orpheum 2.900 19% 18 If Boston sold 175 Orpheum at 16%0>19; Chicago sold 800 at 18%#19. Wednesday— Flay-L..19.00f 09% 90 08% 44% Do. pf 8,900 88% 84% 94% -ft Loew. Ine 8.080 15% 15% 15% .. Orpheum 060 19% 1T% 17% — 1 THB CURS Tnursday— Bales. Hlffh. Low.Last. Cn§% Ooldwyn •.... 400 5% 5% 5% .. Friday—Holiday. Saturday— Ooldwyn 800 Orifflth 100 Monday— Ooldwyn 200 Wednesday— Ooldwyn 1.800 at a 5% 6% 8 4% 6% - % 0% .. 0% .. 6 -10 Duffy couldn't sec a yard away and explained slump In Orpheum. The lie is one of the sturdiest l ancea from the young hoofers. every time he opened his yap to sneeze, Tomato would sock him on the Jaw and knock the sneeze back down his throat. Duffy was swingin like a wind mill and nearly tore the referees dome off with wild lunges. Tomato kept drivin his right over until Duff sunk to the floor like a punctured hag. He was through for the night ar.d. knew it. Their wan no st-nsc j i in Ret tini "up for he 'couldh t nave licked Sophie Tucker after the pep- per and those punches on the button had done their work. Merlin and I arc still smokln half buek cigars and flgurin on the next ctim. If we could coax Leonard hero and un« the knucks wc would bo rnanagin a champion the next day. We would fight him nt catch-weights and donate our end to Tally Markus. So you see this fight game is all fl>h cakes. The public only see the guy in their takin it on the mush. They dont know a thing about the Kiiy over in the corner with a towel slick.n out of his pocket. Your old pal, Con. v up Loew recovery is put down to a favorable condition in attendance at the circuit's houses, particularly in New York, which promise a gen- eral clearing up, perhaps more promptly than looked fo- of the difficulties under which the com- pany has been laboring. If this view Is accepted It would appear logical to attribute the Orpheum drop from better than 1914 to less than IS in one hcssion as Indicating c.uiet business at the box office. Mystery in Orj)heum Certainly some major influence is at work. leasing prices In Orpheum have been explained by the com- pany generally on the pressing of «m«M lots In weak hands for «ale. but a turnover in one session of around 3,r>00 shares (as against a normal daily sale of about 200 to 300) disposes of this explanation Small holders do not move with that degree of unanimity. The calcula- tion of 3.R00 includes, of course, the Hoston and Chl< ago markets, as well as the New York exchange. Among the Curb stocks trading was without feature except thai Goldwyn failed to make good its LOCAL 310 (Continued from page 6) who will take office the second Thursday in January, 1922, are: Anthony Mulieri, president; William A. Roche, vice-president; Isaao Rosenberg, treasurer; William A. Dooley r secretary* Those elected trustees are Morris Benevente, Harry Kantor, Leo SIroky. Execu- tive committeemen elected are Charles Gartner, Arthur Glanmme, Jack Goldberg, Jacob Qoldrlng, Henry M. Klrlgast, Jack Rosenberg, Samuel Suber. The next move in the Mutual Musical Protective Union battle, which ended with the election of the conservative board and officers, and which lasted for upwards of a year, will be to form an affiliation with the new local No. 802 of the A. F. of M., the organisation which re- placed 310 as the Now York local, and formed with the backing of Jos. N. Weber, president of the A. F. of M. at the time of the recent strike in the New York vaudeville and picture theatres. The plan of making the M. M. P. U. a holding corporation and dissolving It as a labor union Is already under way. As soon as the new officers and board take office after Jan. 1, 1922, the Anal details of the affiliation will be consummated. This will make No. 802 the working union and will give Its membership control of the $1,000,000 club house property of the M. M. P. U. on 86th street and Lex- ington avenue. New York. . The conservatives almost had their plans upset a week or so be- fore the election, through the flop- ping back of one of the radical board members, who had previously left the radicals and came over to the conservatives. Harry Rosenthal, the board member in question, re- signed from the board, and A. lUuno was elected to serve in his place. This gave the conservatives the necessary majority In the board that prevented the Jamming through of resolutions that might have made it impossible for members of No. 802, also belonging to the M. M. I*. U., to have voted. Samuel Finkelstein, president now of the M. M. P. U., around whom the controversy centered, was not a can- didate for re-election. TERRIBLE TIME (Continued from page 5) members of the censor board who reviewed the show Sunday. Saeh- leben said he talked to Mrs. Kggcrt, another censor, and she said she did not see anything wrong, and told him to do the best he could. Mon- day afternoon Mr. i\eoieit. another' censor, saw the show, lie said the woman was wearing that bareback dress and he did not see any use In wasting time, so went down and tile 1 charges against the manager of tho show. Ho did not go to - • <• S m h- leben. The dress worn by Mis* Sadlier which was barred by lie- censors will be worn the rest of the week, notwithstanding the cen. >rship ob- jection, according to Sacbleben, who made a talk before the audience Monday night following Miss Sad- lier".s act. telling what the ccn-ors bad done. Saebleben wan -:i ri i *•- 1 t'i |» dice hpndiiuariers and booked, but. made $U0 cash bond and was released.