Authenticity Not Wanted

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23275, 18 February 1939, Page 18 (Supplement)

Authenticity Not Wanted

HUNT FOR INACCURACY Hollywood producers often make a point of stressing the extreme authenticity of every detail in sets, costumes and stories. In the case of "Made for Each Other," David 0. Selznick s latest production starring Carole Lombard and James Stewart, the studio 11 making a special point of stressing just the opposite as regards names, addresses and telephone numbers in New York City. One of the biggest headaches to a studio research department is the concoction of fictitious items such as these. It is a reverse process, entailing many hours of work, in which maps, directories and telephone books play an important part. The idea is to find a fictitious name or number that does not, by chance, coincide with a real name, a'ddress or telephone number in any given city. This is necessary if lawsuits are to be avoided, as one studio found out to its sorrow some time ago. TIIO studio turned out a picture in which 0110 of the characters called up the police and said: "Hurry up here. There's been a murder." The address given happened to be that of a well-known apartment house in New York. When the picture was released, a lawsuit was avoided only after the studio made due apolo- | gies. •