Page "Billing (filmmaking)" Paragraph 2

From the beginning of motion pictures in the 1900s to the early 1920s, the moguls that owned or managed big film studios did not want to bill the actors appearing in their films because they did not want to recreate the star system that was very prominent on Broadway at that time.

They also feared that, once actors were billed on film, they would be more popular and would seek sky-high salaries.

Actors themselves did not want to reveal their film careers to their stage counterparts via billing on film, because at that time working in the movies was deplorable and unacceptable to stage actors.

As late as the 1910s, stars as famous as Mary Pickford and Charlie Chaplin were not known by name to moviegoers.

According to Mary Pickford's biography Doug and Mary,