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A NEW FORM OF THEATER 33
While a few producers organized themselves, with studios in loft buildings or large stables or warehouses or unused churches, to meet the requirements of the long films, other manufacturers continued with short subjects — episodes, comedies, and the like — of approximately three hundred to five hundred feet, and, depending on the momentary inspiration of the director, persisted in shooting wherever camera work was quickest and least expensive.
Numerous ambitious individuals, or small companies, attempted the production of pictures in and around New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and a few other cities. Usually these projects lived for a brief period, some times making only a few films before disappearing. But as soon as one passed from the scene another popped up.
The capital needed to become a movie producer was not increased much beyond the requirements of the first years of screen shows. When cameras became available — brought over from Europe or made in American machine shops — a producer could buy one, or occasionally he could hire a camera operator who owned his own instrument. The cost of scenarios did not advance materially, ten, fifteen, or twenty-five dollars remaining the standard price, and clever newspaper men could turn out more of them than they could sell readily. Some players were engaged by the week and received twenty-five to fifty dollars; the best of those employed from time to time were paid ten dollars a day, the rank and file getting Rwe dollars, and "extras" — the men and women who appeared in "mob scenes" — two or three dollars.
The majority of the concerns were so casual, random, and unstable that orderly business methods were impossible. Each producer and each exchange fought lustily and unceremoniously to obtain for itself a big share of the golden flood; and commercial morals and ethics, as well as the laws of city, state, and nation, were forgotten by some of the contestants in their anxiety to secure and retain a foothold in this marvelous game of getting rich quickly.