Playing the Percentages

How Film Distribution Made the Hollywood Studio System

Add to my list

by Derek Long

Type: Studies
Subject: Economics
Keywords: distribution, United States
Publishing date: 2024 (April 16, 2024)
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Language: English

Relative size

Physical desc.

Hardcover • 296 pages
6 x 9 inches (15 x 23 cm)

ISBN

978-1-4773-2894-1

User Ratings

(0 vote)

Average rating:

0	rating	= We can do without
0	rating	= Good book
0	rating	= Excellent book
0	rating	= Unique / a reference

Your rating: -

Report incorrect or incomplete information

Book Presentation:
A history of film distribution in the United States from the 1910s to the 1930s, concentrating on booking, circuiting, and packaging marketing practices.

Told not as a “golden age” narrative of films, stars, or individual studios but as an economic history of the industry’s film distribution practices, Playing the Percentages is the story of how Hollywood’s vertically integrated studio system came to be. Studying the history of distribution during the growth of Hollywood, Derek Long makes a case for the domination of the studio system as the result of struggles over distribution practices.

Through a combination of archival research, critical surveys of the film industry trade press, and economic analysis, Long uncovers a complex and ever-shifting system of wrangling between distributors and exhibitors. Challenging the overemphasis within scholarship on “block booking” as a monolithic distribution mode, and attending to distribution practices beyond simple circulation, Long highlights the crucial changes in film distribution brought about by live theater, the rise of features, and the transition to sound. Playing the Percentages is a comprehensive history of film distribution in the United States during the silent era that illustrates the importance of power struggles between distributors and exhibitors over booking, pricing, and playing time.

About the Author:
Derek Long is an assistant professor of media and cinema studies at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign. He is the creator and developer of Early Cinema History Online (ECHO), a filmographic database of credits for over 35,000 early American films.

Press Reviews:
An exhaustively researched exploration of Hollywood distribution, and the impact of the studio system.
— The Film Stage

One of the most valuable aspects of the book is Long's discussion of the impact of vaudeville and legitimate theater entertainment distribution on the fledgling industry...This is an important study for those interested in the history of the motion picture industry.
— CHOICE

See the publisher website: University of Texas Press

> On a related topic: