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86 A HISTORY OF THE MOVIES
Mary" quickly became popular, and people would ask ushers and ticket sellers, "When will you show another Biograph picture with that girl in it?" Those who wanted westerns called for "Broncho Billy" and Selig's thrillers, and those pleased with Vitagraphs learned to identify Maurice Costello, Florence Turner, and other favorites. Interest in personalities was followed by expressions of approval or disapproval of stories or certain types of stories, and presently people began to select one theater in preference to others because certain classes of stories were advertised on its posters.
Although this development was noticeable to acute exhibitors and exchange men, the heads of the patents company refused to accredit it. They were unable to believe that the populace was capable of any important progress toward appreciation of merit in cheap entertainment, and they dismissed as foolish and impracticable all suggestions that more expensive films would be welcomed by show-shop customers. Such notions were incompatible with their system of mass production and equalized distribution of standardized product; and, anyway, if carried out would prove too expensive for the movie trade to endure. Who would pay the price of better films ? Surely screen patrons would not, because they could not; motion pictures were the poor man's show, and if admittance ever rose much above a nickel the business would quickly perish because of the public's inability to buy the output.
Audience interest in personalities did not definitely manifest itself until after the methods of the trust had become established and set. Favorable expressions regarding this pretty girl or that handsome hero were heard from time to time prior to 1908, but were not taken seriously by producers or exhibitors. "Little Mary's" films began to stir audiences definitely in 1909, and it is probable that she was the first player ever to register deeply and generally in the minds of screen patrons. The star system had operated on the stage for more than a