ABSTRACT
When war was declared on Sunday 3 September 1939 it looked as if the film industry would be the first casualty. A few weeks earlier, cinema managers had received a Home Office circular warning them that ‘during the initial stages of a war all theatres, music halls, cinemas and other places of entertainment shall be closed throughout the country’.2 A radio announcement following Chamberlain’s broadcast confirmed the order. On Monday, cinema staffs, uncertain of their future, set about spring-cleaning and carrying out black-out precautions; by the end of the week they were fearful for their jobs.
