HEAVY SALARY CUTS

Southland Times, Issue 24240, 25 September 1940, Page 8

HEAVY SALARY CUTS

SMALLER BUDGETS IN HOLLYWOOD EFFECT OF UNCERTAIN MARKETS Drastic reductions in Hollywood’s huge salary list are being made. Paul Muni’s £50,000-a-picture deal at the Warner Brothers studio has been cancelled, and other sensational dissolutions are expected within the next few weeks. In secret many leading stars are reported to have agreed to settlements whereby they will receive 50 per cent., and in some cases even 75 per cent., less than original contracts called for. Not only high-salaried players, but directors, and even producers, expect to be affected by the slashing that is in progress. Since the world markets have been reduced to practically nothing, Hollywood has been looking for convenient targets at which to throw its paring darts. The most attractive are the pay envelopes of leading personalities. EXPENSIVE STARS

Recent Treasury Department figures, covering salaries paid to screen personalities during 1938, proved an eyeopener to industrial leaders. When these were closely perused it was discovered that few players in the highsalary brackets gave box office value commensurate with the vast sums poured on them by Hollywood’s lavish hand. In many, cases salaries were all out of proportion to the returns. “The day of the £45,000-a-picture i star is over,” a leading movie-maker J said to a Hollywood correspondent. “We have been paying approximately that sum to a few select stars, but under present conditions it would be suicide to continue such expenditure for a single member of a picture’s cast.” The cancellation of Muni’s deal, I which was regarded as Hollywood’s] first move to slash the salary list, fol-' lowed his’ protest of an assignment to make “High Sierra,” an action film. He wanted to do “The Life of Beethoven,” in the face of his employers’ protests that biographical and “art” films are not box' office at this time. Despite his remarkable flair for screen characterization and the Academy recognitions, Muni has never been looked upon as a financial aid to the Warner Brothers studio.