Film Weekly Year Book of the Canadian Motion Picture Industry (1954)

added in those two years, which brought the year-end total to 182. In fact, more drive-ins were opened in 1952-53 than in the six years before that, there having been 82 in operation at the end of 1951. Recently the DBS released its Motion Picture Theatres, Exhibitors, and Dis¬ tributors, 1952. Although the report gave no consolidated figure for seating ac¬ commodation, the various totals reached 1,106,316, which compares with 1,084,037 in 1951, and shows a gain of 22,279 in 1952. In 1952 the 1,843 "regular” theatres, which included 172 with 16 mm. equip¬ ment, had 954,813 chairs — a “regular” theatre being one that is not a drive-in, community enterprise or hall serviced by an Itinerant operator. To the 954,813 must be added 1,309 “walk-in” seats in Canada’s 104 drive-ins, and the 150,194 to be found in 657 community enter¬ prises. The community enterprises, inci¬ dentally, are made up of 505 with 16 mm. equipment and 152 with 35 mm. A community enterprise is a situation operated in a very small centre by a local non-profit organization, such as the Can¬ adian Legion or board of trade branch. Its aim is to keep the local shoppers at home, instead of going to a nearby town, where they combine theatre-going with shopping. What’s the seating picture in 1953? Naturally, DBS records won’t be avail¬ able until almost 1955, so those kept from week to week by this publication may serve at this time. By the end of year there will have been opened for the first time about 45 standard — or “regu¬ lar” theatres — in the 35 mm. category. The average number of seats per theatre seems to be about 350, so this can mean an increase of 15,750 in this section of exhibition over 1952. But 1953’s major progress in patron capacity was in the drive-in field. Cana¬ dian Film Weekly records show that 78 new ones were opened in Canada. This compares with 22 new ones in 1952. Since the average drive-in accommodates about 450 cars, this should add about 35,000 to the national car capacity, which stood at 50,497 in 1952. This, anyone who knows this business will admit, is an amazing rate of pro¬ gress. Since some provincial departments apply the seat tax to drive-ins on a basb of two-and-a-half persons per car, this measure could be borrowed for these purposes and its use gives us roughly accommodation for about 85,000 peopb. To summarize: the number of new 35 mm. situations in 1953 amounts to 123 and they have patron accommodation for about 100,000. For a two-year total of patron accommodation the 1952 gain over 1951 of 22,279 seats and the drivein increase of about 25,000 in 9,977 cars must be added to the 1953 figures. It comes to something like an increase of about 145,000 in patron capacity. Seating of halls serviced by Itinerant exhibitors is not included in these sum¬ maries, since there are no figures. In 1953 158 Itinerants used 812 halls to play to 1,487,420 paid admissions. Two of these had 35 mm. equipment. In the 14 years up to and including 1952 448,142 theatre chairs were added to Canada’s total, the 1938 figure having been 658,174. It should be understood that this figure, although an impressive one, is not as big as it sounds. Starting in 1946 the Dominion Bureau of Statis¬ tics made a distinction between 16 mm. operators who move their equipment from place to place and those who re¬ main in one location. Prior to 1946 all 16 mm. operators were classified as Itin¬ erants but that year and after permanent locations were classified as theatres and their chairs added to the Canadian total. The DBS 1952 report, referring to the 1,843 “regular” theatres, says: “Both the seating capacity and poten¬ tial capacity in Canadian theatres were slightly over one per cent higher in 1952 than in 1951. Potential capacity is com¬ puted by multiplying the number of seats in each theatre by the number of per¬ formances and cumulating the results. Only 31 per cent of a potential capacity of 804,597,070, was utilized in 1952. Capacity utilization was highest in New¬ foundland at 38 per cent and lowest in Quebec at 29 per cent. “Forty-one per cent of the 1952 busi¬ ness went to theatres in Ontario, which also had 37 per cent of the total seating capacity. Quebec theatres, with 24 per cent of total seating capacity obtained slightly over 25 per cent of the total business. As was the case in 1951, British Columbia had approximately the same ratio of receipts as seating capacity while all the other provinces had lesser per¬ centages of receipts than of seating capacity.” 57