Boxoffice-11.11.1950

LETTERS
••CHILDREN" LETTER GREAT SER>1CE
To BOXOFFICE;
Your letter, "My Children and the Movies"
from Mrs. Leslie C. Smith, was a great piece
of public relations for this business. What an
impact it would have were it published in
some leading woman's magazine like Woman's
Home Companion or Good Housekeeping!
Another great service would be to have it
copied in Reader's Digest. Could that be accomplished?
Also, what are the chances of RKO taking
a letter like this, turning it over to the producers
of This Is America for a nice piece of
interesting public relations for the movies?
I am sure that if handled right, this could
make a good short subject. We plug everybody's
business in our March of Times and
This Is America shorts and in other ways,
but nary a mention about the movies.
Again, Mrs. Smith's letter deserves great
circulation: we in the movie theatres can do
it by distributing reprints to our patrons,
but the folks we want to reach are the women
who are not now attending the movies.
think every theatre manager should also
I
show the letter to the editor of his paper. I
believe they could get some important points
from it, which might perhaps result in an
editorial. Some papers might print the entire
letter, although it is lengthy.
Resident Manager.
North Carolina Theatres, Inc.
Hickory, N. C.
EARLE M. HOLDEN
ASKS ACTION AGAINST CENSORS
To BOXOFFICE:
We should mark well these recent quotations
by Eric Johnston, and inscribe them
in the foyers of our motion picture theatres,
where all may be reminded of their eternal
truths, even as statements of profound legal
principle are engraved on the faces of our
courthouses:
"... If the motion picture and the radio
had existed when the Bill of Rights was
drawn, they would have been included as
agencies of free expression."
"No one but people with common sense
deserve democracy, and no people without
common sense can preserve it very long."
"The one thing a democracy can't tolerate
for very long is an officialdom that arrogates
to itself the right to say what we shall read,
see and hear."
These statements strike to the heart of
what democracy is all about. They are not
idle Fourth of July speeches, solemnly intoned
but empty of meaning.
They are truths by which our nation lives
—or has lived for a long time, anyway. They
are a vital part of a system on which we are
now staking everything we have, to match it
against a competing system which we think
is inferior. They are truths which aren't as
self-evident these days as they used to be.
There's a lot of nibbling at them going on,
and it's all done in the .sanctimonious spirit
of what is said to be "security" or "decency"
or even—Heaven help us! — "our way of
life."
Now. who's against .security, decency or our
way of life? Heck, nobody. So we all keep
our mouths shut, until we get one of those
shives poked into us right where we livein
the motion picture business. Freedom is
everybody's business—sure. But give it a
small switch, too—everybody's freedom is our
business! It makes even more sense.
Have we, in the film industry, let them
hack away at the freedom of others, thankful
they weren't giving us the business? Well, all
that has done has been to encourage "them"
to get around to us. We should have stopped
'"them" while they were working on the other
guys. Tyranny needs no encouragement to
spread its poison; but it can get discouraged
awfully easy, too. It's kind of late, but not
too late to attack censorship in general
starting at its sorest spots—with some powerful
discouragers.
For meeting heckling censorship at its
WILL
ENHANCE OUR INDUSTRY
7-0 BOXOFFICE:
We should like to order IfiOO reprints
of the article, "My Children
and the Movies," by Mrs. Leslie C.
Smith, in the October 28 issue of
BOXOFFICE.
We intend to mail these reprints
to organizations such as Civic, Veterans,
Churches and Synagogues,
Social Clubs, P.T.A., Fraternal Organizations,
Industry and Trade
Groups, Women's Clubs and other
organizations that would be interested
in this comprehensive digest
of a mother speaking her mind.
A great deal can be accomplished
in the public relations field by this
article y/hich would enhance our industry
in the public's light.
J. R. WEINSTEIN
District Manager,
Century Theatres,
New York, N. Y.
worst, there's no business like the foreignfilm
distributing business, as Irving Berlin
forgot to specify in that song. The foreign
film distributors are the little guys. They
have no central organization through which
their censorship problems are cleared. It's
every man for himself, bucking individually,
and usually in person, every one of the 200
or so censors mentioned by Mr. Johnston.
You'd think the foreign-film distributors,
being for most the vital sort of people they
are, would eventually wear these censors
down. But a lot of them just don't wear
down easily. Putting 'em out of business is
just more than a one-man-at-a-time operation.
Only concerted effort will do it.
229 W. 42nd St.,
New York, N. Y.
NOEL MEADOW
AGAINST FREE KIDDY TRADE
To BOXOFFICE:
As one of the many exhibitors who reac't
your magazine every week, and also anxiousljH
look forward to it, could not but help readinj;
the editorial Ben Shlyen wrote and then thf
rebuttal to it, furnished by the officer of t
circuit theatre in St. Louis. Mr. Shlyen's editorial
dealt with concession stand versus ficf
kid admissions as did the reply by the offic^'
of the circuit theatre in St. Louis. WouU
like to add a little more fuel to the fire, a
it is only through the exchange of ideas, that
progress is made.
First, I sincerely agree with Mr. Shlyen
that the theatre should try to keep utmost
in the minds of the theatregoers that thf
theatre is a place where you look forward tc
having a wonderful time and seeing a wonderful
picture. It is a place where you can gc
and let your imagination run the limit, putting
yourself in the hero's place or the villain's
place whichever you choose. It shoulc
not be a place where the kids are admittec
free and the exhibitor counts on his concession
trade to bring back that lost revenue
As far as the children or kids being salesmer,
for the theatre, I am sure that the kid's tast«
for entertainment, differs very greatly fron
that of the average adult.
The main reason, that the students do not
attend the shows more often, is due to the
fact that from the time they were old enougt,
to remember, till they reached the age of
12, they could always go to a show for IC
cents or 12 cents, or as in the case of thL'
circuit theatre and some of these drive-ir
theatres, they were and are being admittec
free! . . .
Opposes Cheapening Films
If the theatres could get together and raise
the prices of the kids' tickets (we did anc
have certainly noticed no drop in kids' business),
to a point where the children woulc
realize that to be able to go to a show, wat
and is an event to look forward to, the theatres
would be impressing in the minds oi
these children, who in years to come we hope
will be our adult admissions, that a movie if
something, it is a form of entertainment thai'
is worth paying for. My oldest girl is ten:
naturally she gets in the show free. Neithei
my wife nor I can excite her about going tc
the movies, but just mention going to the
amusement park and she gets all wound up'
Why! Because she knows she can go to the
show when she just about pleases: it is free
but to get to go to the amusement park, thai
is
SOMETHING DIFFERENT!
SOMETHING DIFFERENT! That is what
I wish we could get all the patrons of the
theatre to thinking, that the movie is something
different instead of just run-of-themill
entertainment. I sincerely don't see how
this trend of thought can be forwarded, when
all over the country, the drive-ins and alsc
more theatres are beginning to let their future
audience in free. Might add that the
same thing is going to happen to television;
everybody gets a set. everybody can see it all
they want and any time they want to. anc
as soon as everybody gets tired of seeing all
the television they can stomach, they will
begin to look for something different also.
Logan Theatre,
Logan. Iowa.
DON HOWARD
34 BOXOFTICE November U. 195(