"Selznick Presents"

"Selznick Pictures Make Happy Hours" was, in 1919, the best-known slogan in the amusement industry. Lewis J. Selznick, a onetime Pittsburgh jewelry salesman, had got his start as a cinema producer six years before by walking into the office of

Universal, putting on an abandoned desk a sign labeled "General Manager" and sitting down behind it. Three years later, overexpansion had put Selznick Pictures out of the industry but not the Selznick name which was carried on by two of Lewis Selznick's sons.

Myron Selznick became a thriving agent whose firm now handles more actors, writers and directors than any other in Hollywood. His younger brother David Oliver Selznick worked up to be Producer Ben Schulberg's assistant at Paramount, left Paramount to be production chief at RKO, married a daughter of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Louis B. Mayer, left RKO in 1932 to become an independent producer at MGM. In the last year, David Selznick has been itching to leave M-G-M to form a company of his own. Last month, when Twentieth Century Pictures quit United Artists to merge with Fox, Hollywood speculated on whether this would be the signal for Selznick to step into Twentieth Century's shoes at United Artists. Last week, the speculation ended when David Selznick announced that he was forming his own producing company to distribute pictures through United Artists, starting when his M-G-M contract expires in August.

Except for Carl Laemmle Jr. of Universal Pictures, David Selznick is the only able producing son of an able producing father in Hollywood. In an industry filled with jittery peewees, he is distinguished by being large, placid and affable. At M-G-M his most successful ventures were Viva Villa and David Copperfield, two of the most expensive pictures of last year. Of United Artists' 1935-36 schedule of 30 pictures, Producer Selznick will probably make six. The company which next autumn will revive the legend, obsolete for 13 years, "Selznick Presents" will be called David O. Selznick Productions, Inc. It will have no slogan.

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