Boxoffice-March.06.1948

: March
US. Seeks Information Film Fund Actors, Writers Seek
WASHINGTON—The State department
wants to spend $4,800,000 for the motion
picture part of the U.S. information program
in fiscal 1949. The house appropriations
committee after studying the request in executive
sessions, approved most of the request.
Following the passage of the Mundt bill,
authorizing an expanded information program,
the State department asked an additional
$34,378,000.
The film fimds would pay for 50 original
documentary reels made by the motion pic-
Expect Large Attendance
At Television Institute
NEW YORK—Between 500 and 1,000 television,
radio, advertising, film, newspaper,
school and hotel executives and tradeshow,
to be held at the Hotel New York, April
19-21. The event is sponsored by Televiser
Magazine.
Eleven panels will meet during the threeday
conference: studio production, station
operation, remotes and special events, network
operations, advertising and sponsors,
films for television, theatre and hotel television,
receivers and antennas, training
panel, demonstration panel, television film
coordinating committee. Panel speakers and
chairmen will be announced shortly.
Televiser has reserved more than 70 display
booths on the mezzanine floor of the
hotel for displays of films, film cameras,
studio equipment, lighting equipment, lenses
and television receivers. Receiver dealers in
the New York, New Jersey and Connecticut
areas will be invited to the tradeshow.
Heineman Shifts Southwest
Eagle Lion Selling Area
NEW YORK—William J. Heineman, Eagle
Lion vice-president in charge of distribution,
has shifted his divisional setup so that Clair
HUgers, southwestern district manager, will
supei-vise a new area to include Oklahoma
City, Dallas, St. Louis, Des Moines and
Omaha. The new district will be called the
southwestern-central district.
Heineman said this was pa.rt of a plan to
realign existing districts and sales department
assignments and to re-zone existing
sales districts.
At the same time he said that Clarence
B. Wilson has been named as a salesman in
the Dallas exchange.
Under the new setup Grover Parsons'
southern territory will include New Orleans,
Atlanta. Charlotte and Memphis.
Lipton's Sets Ad Tieups
On 20th-Fox, WB Films
NEW YORK—Lipton's Tea has made national
advertising tieups with 20th-Fox on
"Sitting Pretty" and Warner Bros, on "Johnny
Belinda."
Forty of the leading newspapers will carry
"Sitting Pi-etty" ads during April, when the
picture is in national release. Pour-color advertisements
on Jane Wyman, star of
"Johnny Belinda," will appear In Ladies
Home Journal, McCall's, Woman's Home
Companion, This Week, Parade, Country
Gentleman, Progressive Farmer and Southern
Agriculturist. This is one of a series of ad
campaigns planned on Warner product.
ture industry, 60 reels acquired and adapted,
and 2,200 reels to be made in 20 foreign
languages, and 32,000 reels of exhibitor
prints. Some 10,000,000 persons monthly
would see the films. Other uses for the
funds would be to acquire 170 new 16mm
projectors and 68 mobile units.
There would be motion picture officers in
Europe, the Near and Middle East, China,
Philippine Islands and Siam to develop exhibitor
circuits for the showing of the films.
Salt Lake City Gets Lead
In Ned Depinet Drive
NEW YORK—The RKO Radio Salt Lake
City branch headed by G. Davison was in
the lead at the end of the tenth week of
the Ned Depinet drive. This was the halfway
mark.
Sioux Falls, Oklahoma City and Denver
followed in that order.
Toronto, with Jack Bernstein as manager,
held first place in Canada, followed by St.
John and Calgary.
The western division, headed by Walter E.
Branson, was in the divisional lead, with
eastern division (Nat Levy) second, and
north-south (Charles Boasberg) third. In the
district division Rocky Mountain, in charge
of Al Kolitz, was out front, followed by
Canadian and southwestern.
Depinet Drive Captains
Visiting RKO Branches
NEW YORK—The three captains of the
RKO 1948 Ned Depinet drive and their lieutenants
are continuing their trips to the
company exchanges during the final phase
of the drive.
Walter E. Branson, accompanied by Sid
Kramer, will conduct meetings in Chicago,
Milwaukee and Minneapolis. Nat Levy, accompanied
by his assistant, Frank Drumm,
will conduct meetings in Washington and
Philadelphia. Charles Boasberg and his assistant,
Carl Peppercorn, conducted a meeting
at the New York exchange March 2
following a trip throughout the south and
southwest.
WB-Savings Bonds Tieup
NEW YORK—A poster showing scenes
from "My Girl Tisa," United States production
for Warner Bros, release, has been sent
to schools and educational institutions all
over the U.S. to stimulate the savings bond
program of the U.S. Treasury department.
It is estimated that the "Tisa" posters" will
be distributed to at least 35,000 educational
institutions under the aegis of Jarvis M.
Morse, director of the savings bond education
section.
Schlaifer Meets Exhibitors
NEW YORK—Charles Schlaifer, director
of advertising, publicity and radio for 20th-
Fox, held a series of meetings with exhibitors
on his way back from the coast for discussion
of campaigns on "Gentleman's Agreement."
First among these was in Salt Lake
City, followed by Omaha.
Help for Writers
NEW YORK—An organization to combat
national and state loyalty investigations and
what the leaders call other forms of censorship
and suppression of artistic freedoms
was formed by a group of actors, dramatists
and wi-iters at a meeting at the Savoy-Plaza
hotel February 24. Among the actions taken
by the 200 attending the rally was a vote
to support, financially and morally, the ten
Hollywood writers charged by the house
committee with contempt.
The meeting made tentative plans to stage
a rally in Madison Square Garden in about
three weeks to raise funds for the assistance
of writers now facing court charges.
Among those who spoke at the meeting
were Christopher LaFarge, who presided as
chairman; John Garfield, Aline MacMahon
and Morris Carnovsky, actors; Donald Ogden
Stewart, Edna Ferber, John Lardner,
John Hersey and Ai-nold Perl, writers; Hudson
Walker, president of the American Federation
of Arts, and Howard Taubman, music
critic of the New York Times. Canada Lee,
Negro actor who is featured in "Body and
Soul," said that the Thomas committee had
condemned the picture as subversive. Lee
declared that this, plus the decision not to
film a picture based on the life of Jackie
Robinson, Brooklyn baseball player, was a
"blow to all Negroes in the acting profession."
The meeting was called by a sponsoring
committee composed of Moss Hart, Walter
Huston, Arthur Garfield Hays, James Thurber,
Oscar Hammerstein II, Cheryl Crawford,
Leon Kroll, Norman Rockwell and
LaFarge.
A continuations committee met February
26 to discuss plans aimed to bring the various
entertainment unions into the organization.
These include Actors Equity, Screen
Guild, American Guild of Musical Artists
and American Federation of Radio Artists.
Live Talent Will Offset
Competition: Finston
NEW YORK—First run showcases should
turn to live talent as an extra audience lure
to counteract the draw of home television
receivers, according to Nathaniel Finston,
president of Symphony Films, producer of
"Song of My Heart." Finston made this state^
ment shortly after his arrival from the coast
He feels neighborhood houses will be able
to offset home television competition by installing
receivers in theatre lounges, but that
first runs must offer live talent. Finston
vaudeville returning.
The producer also predicted that admissions
will be forced to come down as television com
petition increases.
Symphony was organized recently by Fin
ston and Barney Glazer. Both had been con-;
nected in the past with Paramount an(J
MGM. "Song of My Heart," which deals
with the life and music of Tchaikovsky, is'
their first joint offering. Allied Artists
handling release through Monogram.
Finston plans tlu-ee additional films based;
on the lives of famous composers. One featuring
the music of Stephen Foster may
into production by midsummer. Release
these pictures has not been set to date.
BOXOFnCE :
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