Boxoffice-July.04.1960

Brainerd Shopping Center
Gets Miller Bros. Store
CHATTANOOGA — Moses L e b o v i t z,
president of Independent Theatres, announced
that Miller Bros. Co. has signed a
lease for a $1,250,000 store to be built in
the portion of the East Gate Shopping
Center being developed by the theatre
circuit. The new Miller Bros, store in East
Gate will be the largest department store
in the Chattanooga suburban area.
Sharing development of the East Gate
Shopping Center with Independent Theatres
is Osborne Enterprises, the circuit
developing the Brainerd half of the project
and Osborne the Expressway section, with
the investment of each development concern
representing about $4,000,000. The
circuit's part of the shopping center is to
be completed by early fall of 1961.
Lebovitz said that East Gate would be
the largest shopping center in this area
and would be the first and only regional
shopping center in Tennessee. The regional
designation is given to the largest centers
designed to serve a broad area.
About 500,000 square feet of store space
is planned together with off-street parking
for 5,000 automobiles and other facilities
on a 65-acre tract taking in the old Skyway
Theatre site fronting 1,500 feet on
Brainerd Road and extending to the expressway
right of way.
Lebovitz said that Oman Construction
Co. currently is engaged in grading work
on the site and this phase of the project
should be completed in about 30 days.
He announced that the general contract
for building consti-uction has been awarded
to S. S. Jacobs Co. of Jacksonville and
that building will get under way as soon
as plans and specifications are completed,
which is expected to be around July 1.
Felix G. Miller, Miller Bros, president,
said that the two-story building will contain
in excess of 60,000 square feet of floor
space and there will be provision for futui'e
expansion to over 100,000 square feet
when growth of the area justifies it.
He said that the new facility is in
"keeping with the long-range plans of
Miller Bros., keyed to the tremendous
growth of Chattanooga and the surrounding
area" and that "we feel this location
is in an important area."
William Anderson Fills
Disney Board Vacancy
HOLLYWOOD—William H. Anderson,
vice-president in charge of studio operations,
was elected to the board of Walt
Disney Productions as successor to Floyd
Odium, recently resigned.
Anderson, with the studio since 1943, is
the producer of Disney's "The Swiss Family
Robinson."
Larry Market Is Winner
LOS ANGELES—Larry Market, manager
of the United Artists Theatre, Inglewood.
is the winner of the United Artists Theatres
showmanship drive according to announcement
made by Frederick Kmikel,
coast division manager of the circuit. Market
has been with the circuit since 1948.
He will receive as prizes an increase in
salary, added vacation and unspecified cash
awards. A new drive will be started by
the company August 1.
World Premiere of Inherit the Wind'
On Scopes Trial 35th Anniversary
NTS Names R. H. Woelfl
San Francisco Manager
SAN FRANCISCO—R. H. Woelfl has
been appointed local branch manager for
National Theatre
Supply Co. Having
started with the company
in July 1938 in
the stock control department,
he worked
his way up through
the ranks.
Woelfl is well
known in the San
Francisco area. He
has been involved in
sales work with NTS
R. H. Woelfl here for the past 20
years except for three
and a half years spent in military service
during World War II.
New Theatre to Be Built
In Carmel Valley, Calif.
MONTEREY, CALIF.—Construction will
begin the first of next year on a 400-seat
theatre in Carmel Valley, a rustic resort
community 22 miles from the Monterey
Peninsula. The theatre will be of California
ranch design, complete with landscaping
and a lighted parking area. The structure
will be on the edge of the business district.
The house will have stereophonic
sound, widescreen, a fountain and snack
bar next door, opening into the theatre
lobby. All of the seats will be of the rocking
chair loge type, an innovation for this
area. A large lobby with a fireplace and
functional furniture will add to customer
comfort. Another customer comfort will be
a 40-seat cryroom for parents with noisy
toddlers. Construction of the theatre will
be of concrete block, steel, wood and
stucco.
The theatre will be owned and operated
by two local parties. A policy of second run
and some foreign films will open the house
which will be called the 'Village Theatre.
Drive-In Gets Injunction
LOS ANGELES—A temporary injunction
against a used car lot and restaurant adjacent
to the Compton Drive-In, a Pacific
Drive-In operation, for using brilliant
Ughts to the detriment of the ozoner customers
was secured in Superior Court. The
action stated that the defendants installed
the lights after the start of the drive-in to
distract patrons of the latter.
MGM Inks Mike Garrison
HOLLYWOOD—Michael Garrison has
been inked to a producer's contract by
MGM studio chief Sol C. Siegel. For the 18
months prior to the writers and actors
strikes, Garrison was with Warner Bros,
as an executive assistant to vice-president
Steve Ti-illing and later as producer of
"The Crowded Sky" and "Dark at the Top
of the Stairs."
DA'YTON, TENN.—Dayton will be the
scene July 21 of the United States premiere
of "Inherit the Wind," film version
of the play about the Scopes "monkey"
trial.
In a proclamation issued recently Dr.
J. J. Rodgers, mayor of Dayton, declared
the 21st as "Scopes Trial Day." Exactly 35
years ago that day, the decision in the
famous case was handed down.
John T. Scopes, a high school teacher in
Dayton in 1925, taught Darwin's theory of
evolution in his classes in defiance of a
new Tennessee law. He was brought to
trial.
The issue immediately captured the partisan
spirit of the entire globe, fundamentalists
on one side, liberals and free
thinkers on the other. Newspapermen,
legal experts and sightseers overran this
little southeast Tennessee town. Among the
guests was the famous author, H. L. Mencken,
then writing for a Baltimore paper.
William Jennings Bryan entered the
fray for the prosecution. Clarence Darrow
faced him on the defense. The two men
were possibly the country's most famous
orators.
In the movie, Fredric March plays
Bryan, Spencer Tracy is Darrow and Gene
Kelly has the role of Mencken.
Scopes was convicted, but his fine was
set at almost a nominal figure, $100. The
teacher left Dayton for good.
Today he is a geologist for a gas company
in Shreveport, La. In his proclamation,
Mayor Rodgers invited Scopes to return
to Dayton on the 21st and be the
city's honored guest.
The film version is reported to follow
closely the play of the same name by
Jerome Lawrence and Richard Lee, given
by the Chattanooga Little Theatre last
season. It was one of the group's most
successful serious dramas. In fact, "Inherit
the Wind" has become unusually popular
in American community and college theatre
repertories.
Producer-director of the picture is
Stanley Ki'amer, whose past films on controversial
issues include "The Defiant
Ones" and "On the Beach."
Ki'amer will be present at the Berlin
Film Festival for his picture's world premiere
early in July. He is in Germany also
to gather material for a new film on the
Nuremberg trials.
"Inherit the Wind" is not expected to be
released generally until late fall.
Bing Crosby Productions and MGM will
produce "The Great Western Story."
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BOXOFFICE :: July 4, 1960 W-7