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P ENNIES

F OR

EAVEN
H

Two generations have grown variety shows, vaudeville and
up not knowing the fun of a traditional theatre?
Saturday matinee. As prices The world's first presentation of
projected pictures to a paying audience percent of her weekly wage for a seat
creep up, is cinema leaving
is generally believed to have taken in the stalls.
behind those who were once its
place in the Grand Cafe in Paris on 28 Tracing cinema history through
core supporters? December 1895. The show was changes in admission prices is only
Roger Seccombe investigates organised by the cinema pioneers Louis part of the story. The wage rates of the
and Auguste Lumiere. One of the films time, economic ups and downs, social
in this program was Arrival of a Train mores and the cost of other
verything has its price - it's
at La Ciotat Station. This item ran 49 amusements have all influenced the
E certainly true of entertainment.
seconds! We don't know just how much community’s love affair with cinema.
If it costs too much the public won't
the Parisian audiences paid to attend, This article will consider some of these
buy it. Of course, it's got a lot to do
but we do know word of mouth rapidly issues.
with how you sell the product: As the
encouraged ‘full houses’. The Cinematographe was promoted
slogan said: ‘Can you afford not to
Much later, Louis Lumiere had just like other theatrical events: it
have it?’ When the first movies
second thoughts about his part in the offered a range of prices and seating
reached the screens of the world in
invention of the movies, doubtless comfort. Perhaps the assertion that it
1895 it didn't take long for the public
brought on by years of litigation and was ‘the poor man's theatre’ was true
to be convinced that they had to see
patent wrangles with America and and did help it become widely popular.
them. The new marvel generated a
Britain. He remarked, in 1930: "Oh, I From the first appearance of
‘must-see’ reaction and audiences
never go to the cinema. If I had known movies in Australia there was strong
happily opened their wallets to pay.
what it would come to, I would never competition amongst entrepreneurs
Moving pictures brought fame and
have invented it!" from Europe and from America.
fortune to many entrepreneurs yet
Despite the long sea voyage that Thomas Edison's salesmen were
ironically, the British pioneer William
separated Europe from Australia, the quickly in Australia promoting his
Friese-Greene was to die in poverty
Lumiere Cinematographe was soon Vitascope, one of America's answers to
with no more than the price of a
unveiled here. A machine had been the French Cinematographe. They also
cinema admission ticket in his pocket!
brought to Australia by the Lumiere undercut the Lumiere prices! At the
Expectations for the long-term
salesman Marius Sestier in 1896. unveiling of the Vitascope in 1896 at
popularity of moving pictures varied.
When the Lumiere program was Melbourne's Athenaeum Hall, one-
Skeptics did not see a long life – how
advertised at Sydney's Criterion price seats were offered for one
could a novelty compete against the
Theatre on 24 November it shilling for adults and sixpence for
included highlights of the 1896 children. Was this a case of
Melbourne Cup. Adult undercutting the opposition or had it
admission prices were an cost the promoters less to hire the
astronomical two shillings (20 Athenaeum than the Criterion? We'll
cents) for the Reserved Dress never know, although both were
Circle and one shilling (ten distinguished locations for early film
cents) for the Stalls, sixpence presentations.
(5 cents) for the Family Circle The majority of regular film shows
while children were half price. in the next ten years were often
(Further price comparisons in presented in converted shops,
this article will be expressed in Mechanics Institutes, in tents, on
the currency of the time.) football grounds or wherever the
The change dispenser from the St.James/Metro Audiences must have been pretty showmen could afford to set up their
Bourke St. How many pennies tumbled down this keen to pay prices like these! A primitive projection equipment.
chute? Fred Page Collection. housemaid would have paid 10 Pioneer Melbourne projectionist, the
10 2003 CINEMARECORD