The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-11-05
M - Hollywood
BY PAUL HARRISON

(NEA service StAK G0rreSponue"sl Hollywood-The movie industry is simmering in sort of chocolate uuandary It's the candy business, Picture producers are jealous of the profits made by exhibitors from con- lection counters and vending ma" chimes in the Hobbies of theaterS,
 There's no doubt that the corn yrup, glucose, cocoa and other healthful ingredients" sideline Is paving of in millions. Quite often, In complaining letters to film fa2- tories here, theater managers S1aarl: Last week I made more money selling candy and nuts in the lobby than did by showing your latest lousy pisture,"
 A crack like that to Q studio ex- ecutive is likely to set him back two or three months in his fight against stomach ulcers, an oceupa- tional disease here. Even the sight or mention of 6 chosolate-and- pecan-covered rnarShmallow-cara- mel bar Is enough to give some pie ture company officials the burps. CHOMPS FOIL VILLAINS
 There. are many in Hollywood, es- pecially in the creative departments, who believe on purely artistic grounds that the eating of candy and popcorn in theaterS should be discouraged. What happens to real- ism and suspense if, while the es- caping hero Is creeping, past the prison guard in the silly night, somebody near you crumpleS a cracking hunk of cellophaneP What gnawing fear can customer feel if, while watching Q little group Of castaways starving on an island, he munches on fruit and - almond nougat? What vicariouS emotion can he experience if, just as the Surrendering heroine offers her lips In a Soft-focuS closeup, the little boy in the seat behind lunches for ward and asSails him with fumes of melting licorice?
 Of course, anybody who worries about such matters brands himself as a mere esthete-too sensitive to gastronomic and intellectual indi- gestion. The more practical pro- ducers are not trying to take candy away from the cinema. Their anl- bition, echoed by the movie trade papers, is to find some way of wrangling slice of the candy prof Its.
 Many theaterS now screen brief trailers advertising the gooey good- les for sale in the lobhies. Just be- fore showing such a film, a Redon- do Beach theater tempts the GUS toners by blowing through the ven- tilatorS an aroma of cooking candy. A Glendale manager has introduced a giveaway scheme that has upped candy sales: Numbers are pasted on all packages and sacks, and people in the audience who hold lucky numbered wrappers get free boxes of chocolates.
 SWEET PLAN
 What can the picture companies do about all this? If they simply demand a share of the proceeds, exhibitors rightfully will laugh in their faces.
 Obviously the only thing the movie industry can, do is set up subsidiaries to manufacture candy and compete in the open market. Candy could be put into pictures with infinite variety: foreign spies trying to steal the formula for a miraculous, vitamin concentrated, energizing little paStille called the Clark Gobble: funnymen attribut- ing their wit to eating plenty of Charlie Butterscotch; lovers, in a western fadeout, sitting in chummy proximity by a campfire as they toast and praise Hedy La-marsh- mallowS. For Miss Stanwyck's pie lures, there could be a Barbara Bar; for horror flickers, 6 Bar Sim iSter.
 And I can see the sky-stabhing searchlightS, the frantic police lines,