ABSTRACT
John Spraos points to 1955 as the year of 'dramatic expansion of television among the working class', and the fact that this class, a majority of all filmgoers, had formed the wealth and strength of the cinema in it palmiest days made its defection to television all the more damaging. Each closure of a cinema could mean the loss for good of the audience it created and every absentee filmgoer spread defection to others. The drift away from films, it was argued, may have been the cause of the closures, or the closures may have been the cause of the drift. The structure was as rigid as ever, as the Plant report had complained, and the success or failure of a film still depended on the fiat of two men who booked films for the two major circuits. The lines of demarcation between film and television were becoming so blurred it was difficult to recognise them as separate entities.
