Note on the Shift from Live Acts to Filmed Entertainment

Note on the Shift from Live Acts to Filmed Entertainment

The development of film culture in Columbia from 1904 to 1919 witnessed an increasing interest in film as something different from live performances. Once a novelty overshadowed by forms of entertainment like minstrel shows and plays, films rose to the top to become the primary source of commercial entertainment in the city. This led to a dramatically increased demand for movie theaters in Columbia over a span of about fifteen years. In 1904, was impossible to encounter a film execpt as part of a live performance. The city was receiving traveling exhibitioners who showed a fixed set of films based on what the exhibitioner had with him. Films presented were non-fiction for the most part—examples include news or current event reels like scenes of San Francisco after the earthquake and the Russo-Japanese war, as well as travelogues of exotic places like Italy ("Columbia Theatre"). More theatres were established by 1910 (Sanborn Map) but advertisements for the local theaters had plays and minstrel shows dominating advertising. Newspaper writers devoted more lines to discussing plays and minstrel shows than films ("At the Lyric"). By 1912, however, advertisements show films had displaced plays and minstrel shows as the most popular form of entertainment in Columbia. There was such a demand and interest in motion pictures by 1919 that the city of Columbia alone had seven theatres and the county of Lexington also had its own (Sanborn Map). Gradually over the years motion pictures found their place along with Columbia’s newly created film culture: interest in the actor/actress (the making of a celebrity) highlighted by advertisements, increased number of movie theaters with many being separate altogether from live theatrical performances, and the ever sophisticating tastes of the audience.

Daniel Brunjes

Evelyn Simental