Word: paramount
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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Left to the generosity of his employer was the sum which Joseph Patrick Kennedy was to receive for writing a report on Paramount Pictures (TIME, June 29). Last week it was learned that the sum would be $50,000, only one-third of the fee the onetime Securities & Exchange Commission chairman received for devising a recapitalization plan for Radio Corp. of America (TIME, Feb. 10). From the mephitic mystery that cloaked Mr. Kennedy's report ever since he handed it in early in June it looked as if Paramount had certainly got its money's worth...
Hushed was any discussion of the report at the annual Paramount meeting last month, though Mr. Kennedy was understood to have urged that a copy be sent to each & every security holder. Finally the company offered to show any of its interested owners a prepared summary, which quoted Mr. Kennedy at length but omitted confidential figures and some of its author's more acidulous opinions of Paramount personalities. This summary was not released for publication but it did not take the Press long to find obliging stockholders who would accompany newshawks to Paramount's inner offices in Manhattan...
First thing discovered was that Mr. Kennedy never got beyond a preliminary investigation of the troubles which have beset Paramount since it emerged from a 77B reorganization a year ago. He made a thorough study of the production department, Paramount's real weakness, took a sharp look at the rest of the business, consulted his staff, then wrote to Paramount's directors...
...time when any well-managed picture business should be making substantial profits, Paramount is not making money and, as now managed, gives no hope of doing so. While current unsatisfactory results are cumulative effects of a chain of incompetent, unbusinesslike and wasteful practices to be detected in every phase of production, this pervading incompetence is directly traceable to a lack of confidence in the management and direction of the company's affairs in the New York office...
...already been shipped to Hollywood to try to straighten out production. President John Edward Otterson was fired, Barney Balaban, an experienced showman taking his place (TIME, July 13). Other showmen were added to the board to replace businessmen directors. Since Mr. Kennedy first looked at it last May, the Paramount Picture has brightened considerably...