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—
JUNE PRODUCTION DOWNWARD;
ONLY 32 STARTERS ON CHART
HOLLYWOOD — Hopes of film colony
toilers that, after months of wallowing in
the doldrums, the production index was
due for a steady climb in spring's early
months were short-lived when a tally of
projected entries in June listed only a
meagre 32 subjects docketed for camera
starts during the period.
The anemic schedule was doubly disappointing,
since it reflected considerable of a
decrease under May's activity, when 40 vehicles
were set for the sound stages. At that
time it had been predicted that studio brass
was embarking on a campaign to increase
celluloid output not only to mitigate the
studios' serious unemployment situation, but
also to meet what some executives have
termed an urgent, worldwide need for the
kind of film entertainment in which Hollywood
specializes.
Represented in June's 32-picture lineup are
26 newcomers and a half-dozen subjects
which first had been announced to start last
month but which, for one reason or another,
failed to get under way.
Subject to change either by cancellations
or additions, the June picture-making chart,
by studios, looks like this:
Columbia
Well under its May mark of seven starters
was this studio, where a total of only four
awaited the gun for camera work during the
month. One. "Song of India," comes from
a sharecropping independent unit, Gibraltar
Pictures (headed by Albert S. Rogell). 'With
Rogell as producer and director, it toplines
Sabu, Tuihan Bey and Gail Russell in a romantic
melodrama tracing the efforts of a
pair of India's princely rulers with western
educations to bring progress an enlightenment
to their country now that independence
has been achieved. From the Rudolph Flothow
umt—but sans director at month's beginning—will
come "Boston Blackie's Honor,"
latest chapter in the venerable cops-and-robbers
series starring Chester MoiTis. Richard
Lane and George E. Stone have their nowfamiliar
supporting roles. The other two
starters are "Quick on the Trigger" and
"Challenge of the Range," both entries in
the "Durango Kid" sagebrush series co-starring
Charles Starrett and Smiley Burnette.
In each instance the producer and director
are, respectively, Colbert Clark and Ray Nazarro.
Eagle Lion
Three subjects toed the starting line on
this lot. considerable of an increase over last
month's schedule—when two were announced
but did not reach the sound stages. Walter
Wanger will kick off his EL slate with
"Tulsa." Technicolor drama starring Susan
Hayward, with Stuart Heisler directing. A
semi-historical subject, it concerns the discovery
of oil in Oklahoma in the 1890s. From
Masque Productions