LIFE IN HOLLYWOOD

New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 395, 17 January 1947, Page 14

LIFE IN HOLLYWOOD

Film Production and the Profit Motive

HEN Ann Mayo, of Hollywood, called at The Listener office the other day, she told us she had worked with the film producer, Darryl F. Zantick, and that she had been secretary

and hostess for J. Arthur Rank when he and his group had visited Hollywood. So we had several questions to ask»her. One was for her definition of a first-class film. "A really good picture," she told us, "should let the people go out feeling that it had solved some problem for them. But after all, ‘it is an industry and a business, and it’s the box-office that actually determines a film’s value. The producers feed the public with what it wants, but every now and then they must produce an ‘art for art’s sake’ picture which, of course, means losing money." J. Arthur Rank had heavy interests in many of the major studios in Hollywood, she said; and when she heard that an an actor like James Mason commented that he was accepting Hollywood film offers in order to break away from the Rank monopoly in England, she "wondered with her eyes wide open." Rank, she said, was a

tall benign-looking man, unassuming in~manner, a_ teetotaller, very charming to all women, but (she thought) wearing a sort of mask to hide his astuteness. Her impression was that he was quite willing to work in with Hollywood whose technicians were much further advanced than their opposite numbers in England. The Worth of a Star "One often hears of the extraordinary salaries paid to American motion picture stars-are they worth it?" she was asked. "The best of them are not worth more than 25 per cent. of what they earn. Their services are bid for and if an actor’s. representative is shrewd he can go to the limit. The player is simply a commodity-a product-to the producer. Salaries are fixed according to box-office returns and it’s really the cash customers who determine these salaries. It takes one good hit to make a star. And no matter how many hits he has made, one bad story can ruin him." "Can the director of a film make anything out of a poor story?" "Yes. Take a man like Robert Siodmak, who is a German refugee. He is capable of taking a weak story and, by clever camera-work, making a film memorable as a great money-getter." Unsung Heroes "It was mentioned recently in Wellington that authors receive poor recognition in the film credit-titles. Why is that?"

"It’s true; the author is the unsung hero in Hollywood’s creative field, while producers and directors get all the credit. But the writers are now banding together, seeking greater consideration. At present, if a writer is working under contract he loses all rights to his story."

There might be 10 writers engaged on a single script, the credit going to those responsible for the greatest percentage of it. Generally speaking a published book or an original story purchased for the screen went through as many as a dozen versions at the hands of as many writers.. More often than not the final draft reached the screen with very little resemblance to ‘the original. Books were bought by studios solely because of an idea they might contain, or because of one special character. Unquestionably a published work was the best medium wherewith to break into the scenario field of motion pictures. Megs Jenkins, the British screen and stage actress, said in a recent interview that "getting on the screen" was something that came the way of very few. Ann Mayo has more or less the same opinion, but she added that there was always a place for the right person, Zanuck: was willing to wait for five years to develop a young woman like Gene Tierney into a competent actress, because her face was worth the investment. After spending a few weeks in New Zealand, Miss Mayo will visit Australia and South Africa. She is writing a book which, she says, is a psychological mystery romance, with a "mother-and-daugh-ter complex."’ When she returns to Hollywood she hopes to take up scenario writing. One of her plays has been . bought by the NZBS.