The Hollywood we know today is completely different from the one that existed in the early years of the 20th Century.  In 1905, the year that nickelodeons appeared on the scene, Hollywood was just a town in California.  Film studios were centered largely in New York, Philadelphia and Chicago, and were producing silent movies that appealed mostly to immigrants and the working class.

             During the early years of the 20th Century, America’s workers were beginning to enjoy shorter work weeks.  As their time at work decreased, their salaries were beginning to increase and they began to search for ways to spend this new time and money. The large and impersonal factories they spent their time in turned work into a means to an end.  The working class wanted more fulfillment out of life and turned toward entertainment. 

Nickelodeons

            The nickelodeon came along at a time when class identities were being reshaped and the lines between classes were starting to blur.  The first site dedicated exclusively to motion pictures was opened in Pittsburgh in 1905, by cultural entrepreneur and Vaudeville magnate Harry Davis.  His nickel theater was essentially a storefront with opera chairs and a screen.  This new form of entertainment caught on quickly.  Marcus Loew borrowed the idea and started opening Nickelodeons in Cincinnati and New York.  They were cheap and easy to operate due to low overhead and no need for special technical skills. 

            Early audiences were largely comprised of blue collar workers and their families, because for a mere nickel, they could enjoy three reels of film and an illustrated song.  According to Steven J. Ross, author of Working Class Hollywood:  Silent Films and the Shaping of Class in America, “the appeal of movies was simple:  they were cheap, convenient, easily understood, and, most important, fun”.[1]  Immigrants were also drawn to films because the medium did not require them to understand English.  It also taught them about life in The United States and how to be an American.

            Movie theaters quickly became the living rooms of the working class.  They were able to escape tenement life and the hardships of work for several minutes or several hours.  Public space was transformed by the explosion of nickelodeons, allowing women to enjoy the same entertainment men did.  Theaters were crowded with people laughing, singing, talking and sometimes fighting.  Critics of film worried about the respectability of the atmosphere but were also concerned with what was on the screen.  Images of violence, they thought, would corrupt children.  Images of sexuality were deemed scandalous.  But cultural conservatives found class danger to be the biggest threat.  Movie houses were becoming increasingly politicized and these conservatives began to worry about the potential of radical films.         

Elegant Movie Houses

            In an attempt to make movies more respectable, film producers and theater owners listened to their critics.  Producers began by creating a better class of movies by adapting novels and plays and making them into feature-length films.  Elegant movie houses started to compete with the neighborhood theaters and by 1914, opulent movie palaces like The Strand Theater in New York appeared.  White collar and middle class patrons took notice and were attracted by the improved material and theaters.

            When the United States emerged from World War I, class conscious productions became more prevalent.  The perceived threat of Communism, political pressure applied to filmmakers by state censors, heightened labor militancy and major changes in the structure of the film industry all affected what the American public saw on movie screens.   Conservative, rather than liberal films, became the dominant genre.

            The birth of Hollywood came in the wake of World War I.  Film production had stalled in Europe, shifting the center of the industry to the United States.  Adolph Zukor, one of the pioneering studio executives, came up with a plan to secure greater control over the business.  By combining production, distribution and exhibition into a single company called Paramount, Zukor had control over the types of movies made as well as what audiences would see at their local theaters.   He also employed big stars and imposed elaborate sets, both of which made movie making more complicated and expensive.

Opulent Movie Palaces

                The appearance of opulent movie palaces like The Roxy in New York City (1927) signaled the rise of cross-class fantasies of luxury and consumption.  These theaters welcomed all classes and offered extravagance to the working and middle classes who were able to live like the rich if only for a few hours.  The movie palaces offered fantasy on the screen as well.  Filmmakers were stressing class harmony and consumer fantasies to attract cross-class audiences.