Valley Times from North Hollywood, California • 8

VALLEY TIMES a Monday, April 26. 1948 Film Features Big Clock Two Stories High SCREEN MUSIC drama Joe Brown To Announce Baseball on Television By BOB THOMAS Associated Press Motion Picture Editor Joe E. Brown, the oven-mouthed comic who has conquered nearly every entertainment medium, is now going after television. The GIs favorite clown is currently cavorting with Harvey in Los Angeles. He next takes the six-foot rabbit to San Francisco, where the showi FRED BROOMFIELD, Editor Bennett Fans Should Like 'Smart Woman' By HENRY ARNSTEN Smart Woman, showing at the Four Music Hall theaters, is definitely a smart and enjoyable film if you are a Constance Bennett fan.

If her screen appearances are regarded with elaborate yawns, the Allied Artists picture still may possibly be viewed with absorbed interest, to use the vague language of film critics. She is the pivotal character In N.H. Boy Takes 'Stone Jungle' Coronet Role Rusty Tamblvn, 13-year-old son of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Tamblyn, 6937 Ben North Hollywood, has an important role as Pie-i Paul Peters new play a drama of a reform movement that sweeps out corrupt city administration.

It is a colorful role Miss Bennett has, a woman criminal attorney, and she plays it with vitality. Her portrayal is infinitely better than the camera's viewpoint of political corruption. Starring with her are Brian Aherne and Barry Sullivan. Whle Smart Woman is plausible and realistic with a couple of flaming exceptions its 'State of the Union' Comes To 3 Theaters Frank Capra, one of Hollywoods outstanding directors of comedy-drama brings his latest effort, State of the Union, to the screens of the Egyptian, Wilshire and Los Angeles theater Thursday. The widely-heralded filmization of the Broadway stage hit, winner of a Pulitzer prize for the best play of the year, was produced by Capra for Library Films and is being released by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer.

With a record of directing three Academy award winning films and producing two, Capra should be a contender again this 'year with this comedy drama. The impressive cast Is headed by Spencer Tracy, as an aviation tycoon, Katherine Hepburn as his wife. Van Johnson as his press agent and Angela Lansbury as the woman who tries to guide his career and win his love. Adolphe Menjou and Lewis Stone play important roles supported by other well known Hollywood and Broadway favorites. Butler, 270 pounds, showing little June Haver how to fall down stairs in Silver Lining (he once earned $3 n.

day as a stunt man) Fred Clark tut-tutting the record of Americas champion movie fan, who saw 320 movies last year. I saw 394, says he. Jack Carson Will Address Student Actors Jack Carson of Van Iuys will address student actors of the Ben Bard Players on the subject, The Film Actors Future, Tuesday evening, April 27 at the Bard playhouse North LaBrea avenue. The lecture marks the first in a series to be given to student actors this year by the Warner Brothers star, who is a former member of the Ben Bard Players and who was discovered by talent scouts in the acting groups production of The Greatest Find. Carson, whose current film in production is My- Dream Is Yours, last year established a scholarship fund for promising young actors for study with Bard.

Imobene Burkhart, one of the winners, is a resident of Burbank. will end its run. After that, he plans to go to Chicago for a two-week stint as a baseball announcer on television. The idea should prove a natural, since Joe has ben associated with baseball during most of his career. (Remember Elmer the Great?) Joe feels that he knows the game well enougn to be accurate in his announcing and that he can add life and color to the telecast.

Joe gets his usual summer layoff from Harvey and he is mulling a couple of picture deals. Last summer he did The Tender Years, in which he plays the serious role of a minister. He feels it is an advantage to an actor to change his pace. But he added: The great need today is for better comedy. Going Wrong Way Hollywood is going the wrong way.

The public is begging for entertainment, laughs, escape from their problems. But the film makers have been concentrating on arty efforts. I think the Academy awards are fine. But every film cant be a winner and shouldnt be made with awards in mind. There are too many message films.

Where are the comedians today? There arent many, compared to the comics in films a decade ago. I wish I had five of my old comedies in release today. I believe they would be even more successful now than they were originally. courtroom scenes are the only weaknesses of note. Because such scenes in most films of this type are dull and bleak, there Is no excuse for it being so in this one.

Yet it is. There is monotony due to the director's leisurely pace. Miss Bennett, blackmailed into defending underworld hirelings, encounters raeketbusting Aherne, a special prosecutor who takes to tier romantically. Sullivan is a gangster who takes orders from Otto Kruger, a crooked district attorney. When the law closes in on the gangster, Connie is forced to defend him, bringing the story to a suri rising and dramatic finish.

Hal E. Chester mounted his production with care and assembled a commendable supporting cast, including James Gleason and Michael O'Shea. Edward A. Blatt directed from an original story that, for the most part, was intelligently treated. Fred Clark Loaned Fred Clark, young character ae-tor under long-term contract to Michael Curtiz Productions, hat been loaned to Paramount for a top role in The Dark Circle, which stars Ray Milland, Audrey Totter and Thomas Mitchell.

Locale of The Big Clock, suspense-drama currently showing at the Paramount Hollywood and Downtown theaters, is a fabulous, if fictional, publishing empire. Ray Milland appears in The Big dock as an editor on the staff of Crimeways magazine, one of many editors in the employ of a sadistic publisher who decorates his offices in keepin with the names of his publications. The Clock derives its title from a mammoth timepiece two stories tall which is part of the Crime-ways building and ticks off the thirty-six hours of suspense-filled VV action recorded in the film. Charles Laughton is co-starred as the domineering publisher. Maureen OSullivan, George Ma-cready, Rita Johnson and Elsa Lancaster head the cast of supporting players.

Added at the Paramount Downtown Speed To Spare co-stars Richard Arlen and Jean Rogers. Eagle-Lion Signs Basehart For '29 Clues' Richard Basehart, stage and screen star, has been signed by Eagle-Lion to play the starring role in the forthcoming semidocumentary production Twenty Nine Clues, adapted from an actual case in the files of the Los Angeles Police Department. Basehart will play the role of Irwin Morgan, a killer now awaiting execution at San Quentin who was captured after the weirdest manhunt in the history of the Los Angeles Police department. Basehart, who divides his time between Broadway and Hollywood, is well known for his starring roles in the film Repeat Performance and for his work in the Broadway hit, The Hasty Heart, which won him the New York Critics award. Alfred Werker will direct Twenty Nine Clues, and Robert Kane will produce.

Skelton Enjoys Anonymous Role As Circus Clown Red Skelton is beginning to believe in Santa Claus. He finished his latest M-G-M comedy, A Southern Yankee, just in time. Just before the circus reached town, that is. Red, whose father was a famous circus clown, attended every performance of the Clyde Beatty circus in Los Angeles, most of the time behind the scenes with the performers. On closing night, unknown to the audience.

Red was persuaded one of the clowns to don greasepaint and join them in their zany act. He thoroughly enjoyed but not half as much as the youngsters from a nearby boys home. Red had taken them to the show. The boys had a reserved section to themselves. By GENE HANDSAKER Betty Garrett, the brightest new addition to the movies singing and dancing department, thinks the best thing to be said of her face is that it wears well.

Her studio dramatic coach told her the other day: You know, your face is better looking than when you came here. Or maybe Im just getting used Ills it. Its a cute, pixyish face withliprXSVf bright blue eyes very much alive. Her easy grin opens up a double dimple on Bettys left cheek. Her hair Is a creamy brown.

Good in Big City Betty gives a fine performance as a cafe entertainer in The Big City, her first movie. Does well, too, by a tearful witness-stand sequence doesnt overplay it. Two years ago she was delighting Broadway with her hoofing and warbling in Call Me Mister the performance that brought her a movie contract at three times the pay she had refused, when Hollywood offered it, five years previously. Betty Garrett is the wife of Larry Parks, whom moviegoers know now for his title-role performance in The Jolson Story. They were born about sixty miles apart she in St, Joseph, he in Olathe, Kan.

and Betty thinks it was fated that they should meet. Met at Clover Club They met when she was singing at the Clover Club here. She married Larry while he -was still LOOKING Walter Winter Angeles 'Gallows At The gang in opens its Hollywood Marjory FOR A SNOWSTORM? Angela Lansbury, Pidgeon and Deborah Kerr are starred in If Comes, on the screen at the Egyptian, Los Downtown and Fox Wilshire theaters. RUSTY TAMBLYN The Stone Jungle, which opens Wednesday night at the Coronet Heater. Rusty, a student at the North Hollywood Junior High school, has been active in the theatrical profession for the past three years.

He studied dramatics under Grace Bowman of Hollywood and dancing at the North IIollwood Academy, which is owned and operated by his parents. The talented Rustys aim in life is not only to be a great actor but also a magician, which is his hobby. He also is tops in horseback riding and he is a good acrobat. lie played a part in RKOs, The Boy with Green Hair, which has net been released. Stars of The Stone Jungle are Sheppard Strudwick, Broadway and film star, Peter Klain, Ian MacDonald, William Challess and Allan Nixon.

VALLEY THEATER Tonight Only JOE YULE REINE RIAN0 "JIGGS and MAGGIE in Person Tonight Only Hollywood sights and sounds John Payne and Gloria DeHaven planning to do summer theater work most stars are talking about it now, but how many will do it?) Ida Lupino being tossed around like a meal sack by a 300-pound wrestler in a Road House, brawl Lucille Ball dressing, her hair-dressers hair in her dress- ing room Mickey Rooney sunbathing shirt in front of an M-G-M stage as gawkers walk by the Fighting Four Gene Kelly, Van Heflin, Robert Conte, Gig Young planning a Big Bear lake trip together after their chore as The Three Musketeers (and dAr tag-nan) Bruce Cabot sporting Hollywoods deepest tan, acquired In Florida Gale1 to Open Horseshoe April 28 Gallows Gate an exciting new drama of a family Florida during the early part of the century premiere run at the Horseshoe theater in North on April 28. Stoneman Douglas, well known to magazine dreaders is the author. Twice winner of the OBrien Award for the Gentleman's Agreement ALSO GILBERT REESE This brilliant young California cellist will appear in a recital at the Wilshire Ebell Wednesday at 8:30. He won Hollywood Bowl contest last year and the young artists contest, sponsored by U.C.L.A. Let's Uve Again' Whos Fan Champ Bob Hope climbing in and out of his trousers for a "Sorrowful Jones scene that had to be shot many times Claire Trevor and Bill Bendix having their daily tea together in her Babe Ruth Story dressing room Director David MMMKmSL 'Thieves' in Third Week at El Patio Third week of the limited engagement of Thieves Paradise, thrill packed anti-red play, starts today at the El Patio theater where the Myron C.

Fagan drama has been playing to enthusiastic near capacity audiences. An expose of Communist terror tactitcs currently being used in the Balkanas to gain control of more territory "Thieves Paradise is claimed to have been based on actual happenings. The cast is headed by Michael Whalen, Dian Faun-telle, Marshall Bradford, Ruth Brady, Martha Mayo, Noel Cravat and Helen Wallace. Gentleman's Agreement also The Mating of Millie OPf I 45 Ik ST 5 2731 A I WALK ALGNE ALSO best short story of the year, Mrs. Douglas first wrote The Gallows Gate as a one act play.

The one act version was so successful that she was persuaded to enlarge it into a full-length play. Based on the Ashley Gang, a gang similar to the James Brothers, which terrorized the South during the early 1900s, The Gallows Gate is the powerful story of a mother's attempt to keep her boys straight and good in spite of their fathers offer to show them how to live easy. Presentation of The Gallows Gate is in line with the Horseshoes policy of presenting good new shows with experienced players. Opal Euard, director of the Horseshoe, will play the leading role at the special request cf the author. Rudy Plaskoff, of the Horseshoe acting comcany will play the male lead.

Other important parts will be played by Marshall Reed, well- known Western Motion Picture Actor, Gail Gabard, and Mary Ivy.Jfj Tickets for the opening, which Ijj Joseph Cotton and Cobina Wright Sr. will attend, are still available at the box-office. by it, 85 all in up at playing in pictures. Then she had to return to Broadway for Olsen and Johnsons Laffing Room Only and then Call Me Mister. Betty and Larry have a white cottage in the Hollywood Hills.

On their 50-by-100-foot lot Larry, an intensive horticulturalist, has planted 50 trees ranging from nectarines to dwarf lemons. Bettys an oil and water color painter. Motorists were startled to see her sitting at her easel on a curb-bordered traffic island in the middle of La Cienega boulevard, painting a nearby merry-go-round. Reared In Seattle She was reared in Seattle, and vacillated between being a writer, a dancer, or' an artist. Her poem about the Nativity, when she was nine, won her a scholarship to a girls school in Tacoma.

Her performance in a play there, plus her dancing teacher's recommendation, got her a scholarship at New York Citys Neighborhood Playhouse. Otherwise Betty, instead of being written about, might now be writing pieces for the paper GAY RANCHERO Writes Children's Books Christine Larson, feminine lead Jimmy Wakelys new sage brush drama for Monogram, Partner of the Sunset, would a course in literature last year the Los Angeles campus of the University of California and this far this year has sold two childrens books. She also illustrated them. Before becoming a film actress, she designed costumes. wr ii.vurii1 'i i 'ii iiiii'iiiinii i'll i ili1' I1 II IV fill, 1 iiiil tun NQumoot i I ,5 Sli 1 7711 'I'HIlUM '(MI an AUSTIN PORTRAIT II I II Ml 'ill11' 'I I ill1! mil If' Jiggs and Maggie In Society also South of Tahiti Pete Smiths Dow ling Tricks AlUEO ARTISTS MOWCTICNS.

BtC. pruwti jr 4, SUMrtt1rS 7V2 BtVIJy PARKINS "TAMPICO Rita Hayworth's Riding Excites 'Em Rita Hayworth had not ridden a horse since the early days of her film career when she used to play in Westerns. But the first two days of shooting on location at Lone Pine, for Columbias Technicolor The Loves of Carmen, required her to ride double on a horse with Glenr, Ford and to ride solo on a burro. So as a gag director Charles Vidor had the ompany sign painter draw a phoney rodeo poster with large letters proclaiming Buck Hayworth Rides Again! 'Sitting Pretty' In Fourth Week Sitting Pretty, starring Robert Young, Maureen OHara and Clifton Webb, is now in its fourth record-breaking week at the Car-thay Circle theater. 1 Rated as one of the best laugh pictures of the year, the story concerns a young couple, their three childrerf, and a male babysitter.

Webb is cast in the role of Mr. Belvedere, who sits with the babies. Also playing on the same bill is The Challenge, starring Torr Conway as Bulldog Drummond 'Nicholas Nickleby' At Studio Friday Nicholas Nickleby, Charles Dickens well-known story comes to the screen for the first time at popular prices when it opens Friday night at the Studio theater. Derek Bond, Cedric Hardwicke, Mary Merrall, Sally Ann Howes and Bernard Miles have the top roles in the Michael Balcon production, directed by Cavalcanti. Jean Cocteaus Beauty and the co-starring Jean Marais and Josette Day, continues through Thursday at the Studio.

Von Zell Stays on Job Harry Von Zell, comedy star of Columbia Pictures shorts, today had his option lifted by that company for another year. The formality was handled by Ed Gray of the Monter-Gray agency. Hugh McCollum is the producer of the Von Zell Comedy Series. t' Tr Jx FIRST-RUN theatres a 4 I Brian AHERNE Constance BENNETT. Barry SULLIVAN Michael O'SHEA-James GLEASON isei MouTwooo nrt Cl ill? 1171 POUTWOOO Sin I Ml TUI jinM mm El Cqpitan Plans For Mother's Day Next Sunday will be Mothers Day and it has been the custom since Ken Murrays Blackouts opened at El Capitan in 1942 to provide gift certificates for performances either that day or for future shows.

Blackouts will be seen three times on Mothers Day with matinees at 2:30, 5:30 and the evening performance at 8:30 p.m. Certificates now are available at El Capi-tans box office. Si Massy" Will Open In Five Theaters Jassy, starring two of Englands top actresses, Margaret Lockwood and Patricia Roc, will open this Wednesday at the United Artists, Ritz, Guild, Iris and Studio City theaters. Also booked on the same bill at all five houses is a new Charlie Chan mystery, Docks of New Orleans, with Roland Winters portraying the suave Chinese detective. Jassey, photographed in Technicolor, tells the story of a young Gypsy girl allegedly gifted with second sight.

Art Director Assigned Edward Rou has been assignedjg as art director on The Bastille, a Walter Wanger production for Eagle-Lion release. Ilou last worked on Hollow Triumph. NOW PLAYING SAIGON 1 ALAN LADD VERONICA LAKE olso 1 ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD I ERROL FLYNN Color by Technicolor 1 CASBAH Yvonne DeCorlo Tony Mortin Marta Toren also 'MADONNA of the DESERT' VU'-OV 1 3 OJ 6712 murvoM Hi MAI IICWAKI St Ml in WARNER BROS! new success jj WftiTffiMETIKG JEWS PtGE JAMES PVtS beautiful BRONZE PORTRAITS IF WINTER COMES WALTER PIDGEON DEBORAH KERR also THE HUNTED PRESTON FOSTER BELITA 7 LAS PALMASTlBSTT Mafr resents 07641 ARTHUR MILLER5 N.Y. CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD PLAY 2 30 I 10 days X.IU$!lafrAUMUTUALA6CVlJa rr Mn Fernanfli 8.F. 2124 Mi Premiere April 28 "GALLOWS GATE" Marjory Stoneman Douglas ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD ERROL FLYNN Color by Technicolor tif2LK -'1 HI HilCIif LATE SHOW TONIGHT TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX Presents SCUDDA-NOO! SCUDDA-HAY! JUNE HAVER LON McCALLISTER ELCAPJTANiS K1 USEfl HOORAY Si BLACKOUTS UMI niw It jn MtTC ft.

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