For cinema owners, 2020 was clearly a watershed year, with many wondering about the long-term future of moviegoing. So a Nov. 2, 1953, guest column by Walt Disney, “The Crucial Year for Pictures,” is a reminder that theaters have survived other crises, and presumably will again.
“The motion picture industry stands once more on the verge of a new era,” wrote Disney, adding that it was “a crucial time, certainly, but one of many it has survived with little impairment of its progress or its health. And certainly without occasion for alarm or defeatism.”
He referred to it as a time of “growing pains which must come periodically to every vital institution which deals with masses of people.” But in the entire column, he never mentioned the source of anxiety: television. In 1950, only 20% of American homes had a TV set. Only two years later, in July 1952, Variety reported that one out of three U.
“The motion picture industry stands once more on the verge of a new era,” wrote Disney, adding that it was “a crucial time, certainly, but one of many it has survived with little impairment of its progress or its health. And certainly without occasion for alarm or defeatism.”
He referred to it as a time of “growing pains which must come periodically to every vital institution which deals with masses of people.” But in the entire column, he never mentioned the source of anxiety: television. In 1950, only 20% of American homes had a TV set. Only two years later, in July 1952, Variety reported that one out of three U.
- 12/21/2020
- by Tim Gray
- Variety Film + TV
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