New Act on Stage

Impish Charles MacArthur had done famously as a police reporter for McCormick and Hearst, playwright (The Front Page), screenwriter (The Senator Was Indiscreet) and husband (to Helen Hayes).

But he had never been an editor. Last week he got his chance. Hungarian-born Alexander Ince, onetime publisher of Stage magazine, bought Theatre Arts (circ. 30,000), a Variety for highbrows. He invited MacArthur to run it. O.K., wired Mac, on 20 conditions (samples: get me twelve geniuses, move the office to Palm Springs, get Lana Turner as my secretary). He settled for a block of stock.

Ince had been planning to revive Stage (with backers that included Doris Duke and Real Estater William Zeckendorf) when he heard that Theatre Arts was on the block. He figured that it was cheaper to buy it (for about $40,000) and merge it with Stage than compete with it. When her magazine was sold out from under her, Theatre Arts' able Editor Rosamond Gilder, who had been combing Manhattan for a buyer herself, resigned. The new magazine, out in April, probably would be called The New Theatre Arts.

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