1910s To 1951
The roadshow format had been used since the days of silent films, but the rise of widescreen and stereophonic sound in the 1950s made it especially attractive to studio executives, who hoped to lure audiences away from television by presenting films in a way that an audience at that time could never hope to see at home. Possibly, the first film ever shown in a roadshow engagement was the French film Les Amours de la reine Elisabeth in America in 1912, a 53-minute motion picture which starred the legendary stage actress Sarah Bernhardt. Films shown in roadshow format before 1953 included silent epics such as The Birth of a Nation (1915), Intolerance (1916), The Covered Wagon (1923), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923), The Ten Commandments (1923), Ben-Hur (1925), The Big Parade (1925), and other films such as the first Oscar winner Wings (1927), the very first feature length part-talkie The Jazz Singer (1927), the silent film Chicago (1927) (based on the play that inspired the Kander and Ebb Broadway musical and Oscar-winning film), Show Boat (1929) (a part-talkie based not on the 1927 stage musical but on Edna Ferber's original novel from which the musical was adapted), The Desert Song (1929), Rio Rita (also 1929), Howard Hughes's World War I drama Hell's Angels (1930), Cecil B. DeMille's The Sign of the Cross (1932), the all-star Oscar winning Grand Hotel (1932), the Oscar-winning biopic The Great Ziegfeld (1936), the classic films Lost Horizon (1937), Gone with the Wind (1939), Fantasia (1940), For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943) and The Song of Bernadette (1943), the wartime tear-jerker Since You Went Away (1944), Samuel Goldwyn's Oscar-winning postwar epic The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), the flamboyant Western Duel in the Sun (also 1946), and the biopic Joan of Arc starring Ingrid Bergman (1948), as well as some other DeMille epics, such as Samson and Delilah (1949). British films that were shown as roadshow attractions included the Olivier Shakespeare adaptations Henry V (1944 in England and 1946 in the U.S.) and Hamlet (1948), as well as the ballet film The Red Shoes (1948). Warner Brothers' A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935), the first sound film version of the Shakespeare play, was also given a roadshow release, as was the 1951 religious epic Quo Vadis. The theatre exhibitors of Quo Vadis, however, took the unusual step of opening the film in two New York theatres simultaneously, where it was shown in roadshow format in one theatre, while the other one ran the nearly three-hour film in the more conventional, "continuous performances" manner.
In a roadshow release, an often large-scale epic film would open in larger cities in an engagement much like a theatrical play or musical, often with components such as an overture, the first act, the intermission, the entr'acte, the second act, and the exit music. The overture should not be confused with the main title music. The overture, recorded without a picture, on film (and years later on tape), was always played before the beginning of the film, while the lights were still up and the curtains were still closed. (Most movie theatres until the 1980s had curtains which covered the screen, and which would open when the show actually began.) As the lights dimmed, the overture ended, the curtains opened, and the film began with its main title music and opening credits. Likewise, the exit music should not be confused with the end title music. The exit music, also recorded without a picture on film, was always played after the end of the film, while the lights were up and the curtains were closed. As the lights came on, the end title music ended, the curtains closed, and the exit music began.
An early example of this was Gone with the Wind (1939). Running almost four hours in length, the film was divided into the above components, so that the film patron can experience the film as if they were seeing an actual play in a theater.
The original theatrical release of Walt Disney's Fantasia, presented in Fantasound in selected large cities in the U.S., never had an overture, intermission music, or exit music. Still, Fantasia was first released in the roadshow format, included an intermission in its first run, and was originally presented without on-screen credits to perpetuate a concert-going experience—the printed souvenir program, given out to patrons as they entered the theater, presented the film's credits.
The original New York run of the English-language film Cyrano de Bergerac (1950), starring Jose Ferrer and based on Edmond Rostand's 1897 French play, was likewise presented in a roadshow format (that is, one or two performances a day), although the film is only two hours long, was not produced on a large budget, and does not contain an intermission.
Read more about this topic: Roadshow Theatrical Release, History