Freak Clauses In Contracts

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 207, 2 September 1939, Page 7 (Supplement)

Freak Clauses In Contracts

BOX office reports show that Bing Crosby is one who can always be depended upon to draw customers up to the ticket office. Such people arc known a* stars, yet through the years Crosby has consistently declared he is not a star. He wm so insistent that he procured a clause in hia contract prohibiting his company from starring him—that is, placing his name above the title of the picture—without his consent. This anti-star billing is only one of many "freak" clauses in the contracts of atars, some inserted by themselves and others by the studio. The Crosby clause was due to the conviction of the actor that the story is more important than any player, and that it is the stories that make the stars. ♦ —

When Hank Luisetti, Standford Uni- ( versity's famous basketball star, signed ) a contract to make "Campus Confes- . sions," he wrote into the contract a provision that he would not be required to drink or smoke in any scene. This ' was due to Luisetti's belief that such a scene might, because of his status as an 5 athlete, give immature youths the belief 1 he encouraged youngsters to smoke or 4 drink. > Crosby, Jack Benny, Burns and Allen, 5 Martha Rave, Dorothy Lamour and Bob Hope all have clauses' in their contracts F which provide that they shall not have » to work after noon on the day of their 3 broadcasts. This is easily explainable, r however, as the radio shows must be » rehearsed. t In Gladys Swarthout's contract is a 3 provision that her husband, Frank Chapman, shall not be on the set when she

<3> is playing a love scene. The studio inserted it. Cecil B. de Mille's contract provides that the studio shall provide him with a projectionist and any pictures he may desire to see in his private projection room. De Mille is Hollywood's most insatiable seeker after new talent or for changing the type of existing talent, and he insists that the studio profits by his work and consequently should bear the expense. Every morning Claude tte Colbert spends half an hour going over pictures before she reports for work on "Zaza." Her contract contains a clause which gives her the right to approve or reject all "stills" on her pictures. Whether it is curiosity or merely a precaution, one cannot say, as she rarely rejects pictures. Bob Burns is one of the busiest men in Hollywood with his screen, radio and newspaper syndicate work. Yet he inserted into his contract a clause giving him the right to write all the dialogue on his pictures. At present Burns is busy in "The Arkansas Traveller." It requires many hours to write the dialogue, but Burns insists that he has peculiar twists in words and phrases which are impossible for anyone to imitate. So he does the work himself.