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PREFACE
of how their enjoyable evenings are planned and achieved. Operators have often featured such information in their house publicity ; and I for one am confident that the theater has nothing to lose and much to gain from audiences that know the trend of things and appreciate new and improved methods.
Leaders of other industries, knowing well that the basis of commerce is everywhere the same, will nevertheless have an opportunity to see how the superstructure has evolved in the new line that has prospered so swiftly. The advance of the film has profited by examples taken from older enterprises. Perhaps the favor can now be returned.
The group I address mainly, of course, is the legion of those young men who will shortly be in charge of our houses. They may be individual entrepreneurs about to join the ranks. They may be promoted employees, risen from the ranks. They may be undergoing preparatory training in such institutions as Columbia University, or the Publix Theatres Managers' School. Even younger, they may be no more than wishful of the day when they shall achieve managerial status. Whoever or whatever they may be, I have for them this word of caution : A book like the present one is no mere collection of words. The thoughts presented herein are the fruits of a very real tree. There are roots of reality behind what I say — roots that go down deep into business, art, and life itself. A great many men have devoted their youth and maturity to the establishment of the facts that crowd these pages. Most of those men groped and struggled long and hard before they were able to grasp this or that principle. Many of them never did learn, never survived. Their successes — and their failures, too ! — have made possible the lessons they turn over to successors; but the process of learning still needs time and effort. You wouldn't expect to learn to play the violin just from reading a book through once. You won't be a manager on the same basis, either. But musical lore has shortened and simplified the violinist's path. Undoubtedly, theory can pave the way to practice in the motion picture business as in others.
Although this book deals with a subject that has its touch of romance, it should not be galloped through, like a novel.