Theater Owners Hit On-Screen ABC Promos

Moviegoers may be surprised when a new type of advertising pops onto the screen later this month. Beginning July 28, viewers at nearly one-third of the country’s movie screens will be shown not only trailers for upcoming movies, but also one for upcoming ABC television shows.

Marketing experts are praising the ingenuity of the idea, but some theater owners are crying foul.

“I think it’s ludicrous,” said Greg Rutkowski, vice president of West Coast operations for the 1,614-screen AMC Entertainment chain. “I don’t think we should in any way, shape or form be encouraging our patrons to stay home and watch TV. Let’s face it, if they’re sitting at home watching ABC’s fall lineup, they’re not in the theaters. Television and the theaters really are not complementary businesses. It’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard of.”

The ABC ad will be shown through Aug. 24 via Screenvision Cinema Network, the nation’s largest independent broker of cinema advertising. With more than 5,700 screens nationwide, Screenvision handles such advertisers as Kodak, Mitsubishi, Dr Pepper and Toyota.

Metropolitan Theatres, which has 80 screens in Palm Springs, Santa Barbara and downtown Los Angeles, is the only chain with a large number of California theaters that contracts with Screenvision. But despite the contract (which is limited to Metropolitan’s Los Angeles and drive-in theaters), Metropolitan President Bruce Corwin said that his chain has “great concerns” about the ABC ad.

“By encouraging people to stay home,” Corwin said, “it keeps them away from the movies. Our major job is to get people to go out to the movies.”

According to Mark Zakarin, ABC’s vice president of marketing, the network’s 60-second spot will advertise two prime-time series--the returning comedy “Anything But Love,” starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Richard Lewis, and a new show about the Pony Express, “Young Riders.”

“We did ‘Young Riders’ because it is a show that we feel will have teen and young adult appeal (in addition to) the production value and action that will make it look really good on movie screens,” said Zakarin, who described the program as a “new- age Western” with rock music and teen-age stars.

The network selected “Anything But Love,” he said, because of Curtis’ following with movie audiences after starring in such hit films as “A Fish Called Wanda.”

Zakarin said the ad will be targeted at teen and young-adult audiences, who in the summer are “out doing things, like going to the movies” and are therefore hard to reach through regular on-air promotion.

Although Zakarin and Alex Szabo, Screenvision’s executive vice president, maintained that the ABC ad is based on entertainment values and takes a “soft-sell” approach, the spot has sparked off a whole new round in the continuing debate over whether advertisements of any kind have a place in movie houses.

“It’s an awkward position for us,” said Bob Selig, president of the Theatre Assn. of California. “We have some of our members who favor advertising and use a great deal of it in their theaters, and others who are extremely opposed to it (and) firmly believe you do not have the right to impose (an ad) upon your theater patron.”

Spokesmen at several chains, including United Artists Theatres, SoCal Cinemas, Pacific Theatres and Landmark Theatres, spoke out flatly against screen ads, saying that they antagonize people who go to the movies in part to escape the barrage of ads on television.

“No matter how good the production values are, it’s overwhelming when (a commercial) is up there on the screen,” said Gary Meyer, Landmark’s executive vice president. “They’re shoving it down your face, and you can’t leave, because it only lasts a minute or two and the movie starts before you’re even out of the theater.”

Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Assn. of America, agreed. “I’m opposed to all advertising in theaters,” he said. “I just don’t think that people who spend $5, $6, $7 to go see a movie should be bombarded with advertisements.”

Nor does advertising revenue necessarily offset potential costs, Landmark’s Meyer pointed out.

“You want to get a certain number of showings (of a film) in each day,” he said. “When you add up all (the trailers for) coming attractions, you lose a show a day, and when you add on commercials you can lose another show or two a day.”

On the other hand, Toronto-based Cineplex Odeon, which has 1,300 screens in the United States and an additional 575 in Canada, takes the pro-advertising stand.

“Screen advertising has been practiced and accepted in Europe for decades,” said Lynda Friendly, the chain’s executive vice president. “Am I opposed to the concept of advertising at the movies? No--especially if it’s done right and if it has artistic and redeeming qualities.”

Although Cineplex Odeon does not contract with Screenvision and won’t be running the ABC spot, the chain has run ads for such companies and products as Club Med, Coca-Cola, Nike, Dentyne, American Express, Chex Cereal and First Chicago Bank.

Although several of the major studios refused to comment on the issue, Barry Reardon, president of distribution for Warner Bros., agreed with those who are againstmovie screen ads. “We don’t condone running commercials with our movies,” he said. “We think it belittles our features and is an annoyance. We are definitely opposed to it.”

But Charles Glenn, Orion’s executive vice president of marketing, said he would be concerned only if the ads interfered with the time usually alloted for what he called the “traditional type of screen advertising”--promos for upcoming movies.

Malcolm Green, chairman of the National Assn. of Theater Owners, said that while deciding whether to accept advertising was up to individual theater owners, the issue of television being in competition with the movies was “not meaningful.”

“We’re having a terrific summer,” Green said. “TV is there--it’s a fact of life. But movies advertise on TV at least once an hour or more, and there’s all kinds of programs geared at bringing people movie news.”

Said Screenvision’s Szabo: “ABC’s . . . competition is NBC and CBS, not theaters. Movies certainly advertise on TV, and the two are really complimentary advertising mediums.”

(According to the New York-based Television Bureau of Advertising Inc., motion picture advertising on television totalled $383 million in 1988, with $183.9 million of that spent on network ads.)

Orion’s Glenn agreed that the two were not in competition, and was full of praise for ABC’s ad idea: “They’re going to be advertising to a captive audience and one that’s heretofore unused to advertising (of that sort). It’s a clever and interesting thing to do. . . . It’s very resourceful on their part.”

Glenn did say, however, that he hoped the ad would make clear to viewers that it was for a fall TV show and not an upcoming movie.

So what should moviegoers expect when that ABC ad hits their screens?

According to ABC’s Zakarin: “Viewers won’t know it’s anything but a trailer for a movie until the last three or four seconds. It’s as soft a sell as you can have. It just says ‘coming this fall’ and shows the ABC logo. There’s no night or time announced on the spot--it’s that soft. . . . The spot just makes you more aware of both of these shows, their appeals and charms.”

Zakarin said ABC would do follow-up studies on the ad’s effectiveness after its monthlong run, and said that while “summer seems to be the most natural time to do movie screen advertising for TV shows . . . another time we could conceivably do this would be at Christmas.”

“But for now,” Zakarin said, “we’re sort of making this up as we go along.”