Kerner

Defendant Hughes Tool Company (now Summa Corporation) doing business as Frontier Hotel appeals the judgment in favor of plaintiff Lewis Kerner in an action for breach of contract. The trial court found that defendant repudiated an agreement for plaintiff to produce “My Fair Lady” in the main showroom of the Frontier Hotel in Las Vegas for 26 weeks at $75,000 per week. The court assessed damages from loss of profits of $10,000 a week at $260,000.

Facts

The evidence, viewed in a light most favorable to the judgment (Crawford v. Southern Pacific Co., 3 Cal.2d 427, 429 [ 45 P.2d 183 ]), shows:

Plaintiff Lewis Kerner had spent his life in show business, first as entertainer, then as producer, agent, and talent director. He helped bring the first motion pictures to television, produced religious short subjects for television, and later produced the motion picture, “Never on Sunday.”

Frank Sennes had been a hotel entertainment director in Las Vegas since 1950. He handled the booking of entertainment and had the responsibility for presentation of million-dollar spectaculars, some of which ran for more than a year. In 1968 Sennes was entertainment director of the Frontier,…