Toledo union journal. [volume] (Toledo, Ohio) 1942-current, 1943-01-29
Hollywood
Lot
BY Ted Taylor

ICSdll LHdL w AAAioLh DolOydH llouN
it to prove he could write and di-
rect movies, you will wonder how
such pointless stuff won him an
order for a full-length MGM pic
ture.
1t is the reminiscing of young
man about the best job he ever had
when he worked in a dingy gro
Gerry and met such interesting peo-
pie. They are dingy people who so
touch his heart that he hands out
merchandise right and left with
never a move toward the cash reg
lister.
The story trails off like speak
er who forgot what he started to
say. If you had to class it you
would guess it was leftover pie-in-
the-sky from the '20's. Don't blame
Saroyan.
The film he made was about a
young gambler who decided to try
something useful, and who got
fired for reckless regard to the
boss profits.
Not wanting to put this in the
Crime Doesn't Pay series and not
seeing how else to use it, MGM fl
nally hacked off head and tail,
took out the bones, and served.
Oscars for the Miniature
Experts, Too
New recognition for the special
effects men is the offer of the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts &
Sciences of a regular gold stream
lined statuet for the best mechani-
cal illusion in last years films. The
Academy used to brush off special
effects with an embossed plaque.
But the limitations on set construc-
ton have made the technical wizard
a very important man.
The battle of an outmoded U. S.
destroyer and big new japanese
battleship in Stand by for Actions
is a thrill the special effects man
gives you. The Hollywood Reporter
reports that Admiral King saw the
picture and commented that the
navy had apparently given it out
standing cooperation. He was as
tonished to learn that the filming
had been on MGM's back lot.
The Battle of the Coral Sea has
likewise been refought at Warmers
studio with a reputed outlay of
100000 lit must be that every
separate miniature counts as set)
for the film Air Force.
Not overlooking the real shoot
ing, the Academy offers special
Oscar for outstanding photography
under fire. Commander John Ford
and the camera crew that filmed
Midway, Col. Daryl Zanuck and
his North Africa cameramen,
Lieut.. John Huston and his lensers
in the Aleutians are among those
up for consideration.
BULLETIN: Hollywood found
it's Stain for Mission to Moscow
in Manart Kippen, stage actor.
TYPED: Ann Harding goes
from the Warner film about Rus
sia to Sam Goldwyn's The North
Star, and Walter Huston may do
likewise. And Ivan Triesault, the
Marshal Tukhatchevsky of Mission
to Moscow, has been signed for
MGM's picture titled Russia.
(Triesault, Russian-born, here
from Broadway, will also play in
Hostages, Paramount film about
the Czechoslovakian underground
and the assassination of Gestapo
chief Heydrich.)
BEFORE DARLAN: There was
a scene in Warmers Casablanca
script in which the Vichy-appoint-
ed prefect was assassinated. 1t was
removed in story conference as
'too fantastic.
WASHINGTON INSIDE: goth
Fox is getting another finger on
the global pulse. Not only is Zan-
uck personally supervising the war
in North Africa photographed
y), but the studio has script
writer in congress.
True, Clare Life -Time-Luce
Boothe's scripting career was one
If Hollywood's briefest. But she
promised to help out further by
ong distance telephone when con-
yressional duties permit.
WHAT SALARY CEILING?
The Warner studio is reported pay
ng a newcomer to pictures $4,000
| day for two days acting in Mis-
ZION to Moscow. He is Dudley Field
dalone, San Francisco attorney,
Who is a double for Winston
Churchill.
NEW YORK-A Conference on