Page "Paramount Pictures" Paragraph 15

In 1940, Paramount agreed to a government-instituted consent decree: block booking and " pre-selling " ( the practice of collecting up-front money for films not yet in production ) would end.

Immediately Paramount cut back on production, from sixty-plus pictures to a more modest twenty annually in the war years.

Still, with more new stars like Bob Hope, Alan Ladd, Veronica Lake, Paulette Goddard, and Betty Hutton, and with war-time attendance at astronomical numbers, Paramount and the other integrated studio-theatre combines made more money than ever.

At this, the Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department decided to reopen their case against the five integrated studios.

Paramount also had a monopoly over Detroit movie theaters through subsidiary company United Detroit Theaters as well.

This led to the Supreme Court decision United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. ( 1948 ) holding that movie studios could not also own movie theater chains.

This decision broke up Adolph Zukor's creation and effectively brought an end to the classic Hollywood studio system.