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Ikv (1 1.,<br />
S'lA^m<br />
Colorado Drive-In Circuit<br />
Sues Wolfbergs and UA<br />
DP:NVER— Kar-Vue Theatres. Inc.,<br />
headed<br />
by Lem Lee. operatliiK four drlve-lns In<br />
Colorado, filed .suit In U.S. district court Ihl.s<br />
week a-skhiK for $100,000 damage.s under the<br />
antltru.st act. to be tripled If won. against<br />
United Arti.st.s and theatre companies headed<br />
by Harris and John WolfberR. father and .son.<br />
The WolfberR.s operate .six theatres In Denver.<br />
Including the Parumoinit and Broadway, both<br />
first runs, and four drive-Ins.<br />
Lee claims he has been unable to buy a<br />
proper run of United Artists films for tht<br />
Monaco Drive-In here. Lee .says United<br />
Artists refuses to sell them second run. which<br />
means first run as far as drive-ins is concerned,<br />
and Is selling this run to the Wolfberg<br />
drivc-ins and he Is unable to get the films<br />
until a week later.<br />
The Wolfbergs were awarded $300,000<br />
damages from RKO. Loew's and 20th Century-<br />
Fox recently, and have on file another suit<br />
asking over a million dollars in damages<br />
against the same companies.<br />
Motion Picture Academy<br />
Adds 18 New Members<br />
HOLLYWOOD—By vote of the board of<br />
governors. 18 new members have been added<br />
to the roster of the Academy of Motion<br />
Picture Arts and Sciences. They include:<br />
Actors—Philip Sudano. Directors—Henry<br />
Levin. Executives—Evelyn Lane. Producers<br />
—Hall Bartlett. Members-at-large—James<br />
Paris. Arthur Gardner. Yale Gracey. Jules<br />
V. Levy. William C. Park. Associates—Sidney<br />
Barton. George Carillon. Herman Citron. Tony<br />
Duquette. Samuel Gray. Frances Inglis. Ralph<br />
Nelson. John J. Parker. Paul Small.<br />
Additionally. Mervin Houser and Martin<br />
Lewis were reinstated as members of the<br />
public relations branch, and Harry Keller was<br />
shifted from the film editors to the directors<br />
classification.<br />
First Commercial Use<br />
Of Vistascope Device<br />
HOLLYWOOD—The first commercial use<br />
of the Vistascope device, owned jointly by<br />
Sol Lesser and Paramount, was made in connection<br />
with the lensing of several scenes in<br />
Revue Productions' TV subject "Mona Lisa."<br />
The gadget permits the u.se. with live action.<br />
of photographs for motion picture foreground<br />
settings.<br />
• * •<br />
All officers of the Alliance of Television<br />
Film Producers, against which the Screen<br />
Writers Guild launched a strike some weeks<br />
ago. have been reelected. Remaining in office<br />
are Maurice Unger, president; William F.<br />
Broidy. vice-president; Basil Grille, treasurer,<br />
and Richard Morley, secretary.<br />
New Mexico Chain Signs<br />
NEW YORK—Albuquerque Exhibitors has<br />
contracted with the RCA Service Co. for<br />
scheduled and emergeiicy calls and sound<br />
parts replacement plan covering its ten New<br />
Mexico theatres, Francis A. Pelosa, general<br />
manager of the chain, signed the contract.<br />
The theatres covered are the State. Sunshine,<br />
Kimo. Yucca. Lobo. Highland. Chief. Rio,<br />
Cactus Drive-In and 66 Drive-In.<br />
iNDOUBTEDLY the most exciting and<br />
Ill<br />
lil significant news to confront Hollywood<br />
—and probably the rest of the motion<br />
picture Industry— in many months was the<br />
intelligence that Howard Hughes had disposed<br />
of his controlling interest In RKO<br />
Radio to a syndicate headed by Ralph Stolkln,<br />
Chicago Industrialist.<br />
While Stolkin is entirely a newcomer to<br />
the business of making and distributing<br />
films, his phenomenally successful activities<br />
in other fields of endeavor appears Irrefutable<br />
indication that he can and will<br />
be comparably impressive In the motion picture<br />
trade.<br />
As concerns the company itself, no one<br />
will gainsay that there is vast oppportunity<br />
for improvement of its of>erations, most<br />
especially those that pertain to the studio.<br />
From almost any viewpoint the Gower street<br />
film plant has been in a state of confusion<br />
and uncertainty ever since the day Hughes<br />
assumed control, and which had attained a<br />
crescendo during recent months. Such circumstances<br />
are no reflection upon either<br />
the productional savvy or the business acumen<br />
of headman Hughes. The impressive<br />
records established by some of the pictures<br />
he independently made before his purchase<br />
of RKO are inescapable testimony to the<br />
former, while his wide and varied industrial<br />
empire establishes the latter beyond possibility<br />
of argument.<br />
The studio's troubles— and they were manifold—undoubtedly<br />
stemmed from the fact<br />
that Hughes had so many other interests<br />
that he found it physically impossible to<br />
devote the necessary time to operating the<br />
celluloid factory, and that he apparently was<br />
unwilling to delegate complete authority to<br />
anyone else.<br />
Resultantly. production activity had slowed<br />
down to the pace of a paralytic snail.<br />
Further, the morale and the public relations<br />
of the organization—or those of the<br />
entire industry, for that matter—certainly<br />
did not benefit from the parade of luridly<br />
publicized litigation in which the studio was<br />
constantly involved during the Hughes tenure.<br />
Witness; The action lodged against<br />
scenarist Paul Jarrico. and the writer's suit<br />
against Hughes and RKO Radio, after his<br />
name had been removed from the credits on<br />
"Macao" because Jarrico had been subpoenaed<br />
as a so-called "unfriendly" witness in the<br />
house un-American Activities Committee's<br />
probe of asserted Communist infiltration of<br />
the film industry, and the more recent lawsuit,<br />
decided in her favor, wherein actress<br />
Jean Simmons sought a ruling that she was<br />
not bound by an alleged oral agreement<br />
calling for her services on a multiple picture<br />
contract.<br />
As is always the case under such circumstances,<br />
the transfer of ownership started<br />
Cinemania's rumor mill working on a threeshift,<br />
around-the-clock basis. The railbirds<br />
have conjecturally projected virtually every<br />
possible top-bra.ss name as being in line to<br />
head RKO's future filmmaking program,<br />
among them Darryl F. Zanuck. Louis B.<br />
Mayer, David O. Selznick, Henry Ginsberg,<br />
etc. At this writing, however, none of the<br />
guc.s.ses .seem.s to have transcended the tealeaf<br />
status, and the new ownership haa remained<br />
significantly and discreetly silent on<br />
this Important detail.<br />
It would be neither surprising nor Illogical<br />
If the studio chieftain turns out to b« someone<br />
already on the lot: to wit, Jerry Wald.<br />
He, with his then-partner, Norman Kra.sna,<br />
affiliated them.selves with the Hughes team<br />
In August 1930. At that time Wald and<br />
Kra.sna were loudly and widely heralded as<br />
the knights In shining armor who would<br />
rescue already floundering RKO from the<br />
morass of too-Uttle and too-weak product In<br />
which the studio even then was sinking. It<br />
was announced ambitiously they would devote<br />
their proven filmmaking talents to the rtianufacture<br />
of 12 high-budget pictures annually,<br />
for a period of five years, on an over-all<br />
budget of $60,000,000. But. hamstrung by the<br />
studio's over-all tempo and because they<br />
obviously didn't see eye-to-eye with Hughes,<br />
the duo. over a period of slightly more than<br />
two years, turned out only four features.<br />
Last May. Wald and Krasna .severed their<br />
partnership, and Krasna checked out to de-<br />
Vote full time to the writing of a play which<br />
is scheduled to be produced on Broadway<br />
next year. Wald stayed on at RKO to complete<br />
pictures already in the works, while so<br />
engaged, news of his possible continued<br />
association with Hughes was very much of<br />
an on-again-off-again nature. Most recent,<br />
and undoubtedly authentic, report, wa.< that<br />
he was to ankle the organization as of the<br />
end of this month.<br />
Stolkin could do worse than to give .serious<br />
consideration to keeping Wald on the job.<br />
Despite its generally moribund atmosphere,<br />
there ore other spots in RKO's skeletonized<br />
organization that remained basically sound<br />
and effective. One such is the publicity<br />
department, headed by Perry Lieber. Considering<br />
what they had to work with, praise<br />
pundit Perry and his deleted staff have<br />
done an outstanding and praiseworthy job in<br />
garnering for RKO. its pictures and its people<br />
more than their just share of press and<br />
public attention.<br />
So. Stolkin has taken upon himself a<br />
studio and an organization which has plenty<br />
of latent power. The apphcation thereto of<br />
some of the same solid, sensible business<br />
principles and modus operandi that Stolkin<br />
has manifested in his various other ventures<br />
can and undoubtedly will rewin for RKO its<br />
esteemed place in the community of major<br />
motion picture producers.<br />
THAT'S TOO BAD DEPARTMENT<br />
(George Lait Division)<br />
To hand from Columbia, a release informing<br />
that Designer Jean Louis, delving into<br />
Egyptian history to find what Cleopatra wore<br />
when she first met Julius Caesar, discovered<br />
she was "attired in a diaphanous skirt and<br />
was bare from the midriff up."<br />
However, the Laitian communique continues,<br />
"Rhonda Fleming's costume for her<br />
initial scene in 'Serpent of the Nile' will be<br />
completely<br />
different."<br />
BOXOFFICE October 4. 1952 51