(4 of 4)
When Marie of Rumania made her famed U. S. tour (1926), Her Majesty was scheduled to appear over the National Broadcasting Co.'s chain. She was to give one of her many endorsements. Temperamental, she at first attempted to call off her appearance, then arrived at the studio a half-hour before her time, indignantly departed when informed that she could not immediately go on the air. Radio men, including Mr. Sarnoff, followed her to Manhattan's Ambassador, argued earnestly, then acidly. When it was pointed out that Her Majesty was accustomed to having her will accepted as law, Mr. Sarnoff replied: "From our standpoint, Her Majesty is merely a paid entertainer."
With Emerson's* famed precept about the world's beating a path to the door, however remote, of the best mouse-trap maker, Mr. Sarnoff does not agree. Having seen and exploited many an invention, he says: "While the sylvan mouse-trap maker is waiting for customers and his energetic competitor is out on the main road, a third man will come along with a virulent poison which is death on mice and there will be no longer any demand for mouse-traps." Pointing to the manner in which phonograph makers adapted their products to the radio, he says: "The pre-radio phonograph is absolutely dead. . . . The modern phonograph industry is alive and flourishing. . . . They [the phonograph makers] did not try to sell mousetraps when mousetraps were out of date."
The first feature Radio picture, Street Girl, with Betty Compson, was given a private showing in Manhattan last week. Meanwhile, Rio Rita, the Ziegfeld musical comedy, was made into cinemusic in Radio's Hollywood studio. Radio has $50,000,000 to put into pictures this year.
Other Radio pictures scheduled for this year include Side Street with Owen Moore; The Delightful Rogue with Rod La Rocque; and Hal's Married with Olive Borden. Musical specials will include Hit the Deck, by Vincent Youmans, and Vagabond Lover with Rudy Vallee and band.
*Not to be confused with Maj.-Gen. Robert Lee Bullard, U. S. A., retired cigaret endorser.
*Of course, as everyone knows, Emerson did not mention mousetraps in his essay; but the idea that the man who made the best product would attract the most customers was his. It was the Chicago Tribune, which first used mouse-trap in parodying the Emerson thought.