*Excerpted primarily from Take One’s Essential Guide to Canadian Film, edited by Wyndham Wise and published by the University of Toronto Press, 2001.

1896: First public screening takes place in Montreal. Later, Toronto’s first screening is at Robinson’s Musee on Yonge Street

1898: Vancouver’s first screening

1903: Leo-Ernest Ouimet opens film exchange to distribute movies in Montreal

1906: Ouimet opens 500-seat nickelodeon in Montreal

Jule and Jay Allen open storefront theater in Brantford, ON

1907: Ouimet opens Montreal’s Ouimetoscope, North America’s largest movie palace, with 1,200 seats and air-conditioning

1908: The Allens create the Allen Amusement Corporation film exchange

1911: Allens open 800-seat Allen Theatre in

Calgary

1912: Adolph Zukor forms Famous Players within Famous Plays Film Company in New York

1916: Zukor and Jesse Lasky form Famous Players-Lasky and begin to acquire theaters all over North America

American ex-pat N.L. Nathanson buys Toronto’s Majestic Theatre. He will go on to build U.S.-based Paramount Theatres’ chain of venues in Canada

1918: The Allens establish themselves as the biggest chain in Canada, with an output deal with Goldwyn and Famous Players-Lasky

1919: Zukor demands partnership with the Allens, who refuse

1920: Zukor buys into rival chain Paramount, and incorporates Famous Players Canadian Corporation

Allens expand in the U.S.

AMC Theatres is founded by former traveling showman Edward Durwood, with one theater in Kansas City, MO

1922: The Allens fold after overextending themselves in a bid to compete with Zukor and FPCC

1923: FPCC acquires all 53 Allen theaters

U.S. Federal Trade Commission says ‘Famous Players-Lasky Corporation now possess and exercise a dominating control over the motion-picture industry… [and] is the largest theater owner in the world.’ They own about 400 of an estimated 18,000 theaters in North America (2.2%), but command 67% of box-office revenue, as up to 6,000 theaters show only Paramount product at any one time

1930: Zukor acquires direct control of FPCC, which owns 33% of theaters in Canada

Report commissioned by Ottawa says that FPCC is a combine and ‘detrimental to public interest.’ FPCC is taken to court by Ontario, Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C.

1932: FPCC found not guilty on three counts of conspiracy and combination

1935: Nat Taylor forms Independent Theatres Association of Ontario

1941: N.L. Nathanson leaves FPCC to found Odeon Theatres, which will be headed up by his son Paul

1946: Paul Nathanson sells interest in Odeon to Rank Organization of London

1948: Minister of trade and commerce meets with the Motion Picture Association of America. Result is Canadian Cooperation Project. Hollywood promises to make films in Canada, distribute more National Film Board shorts, cut down on the gangster fare it exports north and mention Canada in its feature films. FPCC’s profits are not restricted, and the idea of a screen quota for domestic features is abandoned

1968: The Canadian Film Development Corporation opens for business in February with a budget of $10 million. However, because no effort is made to affect the distribution and exhibition of films in Canada, the films financed by the CFDC are seen by few Canadians.

FPCC is dissolved and replaced by Famous Players, 51% of which is owned by Gulf+Western (Canada), which itself is wholly owned by Gulf+Western in the U.S.

1972: The Ontario Ministry of Industry and Tourism appoints producer John Bassett to head a task force to study the Canadian film industry. Bassett concludes that ‘a basic film industry exists. It’s the audiences that need to be nurtured through theatrical exposure. The optimum method of accomplishing this is to establish a quota system for theatres’

1975: Secretary of State Hugh Faulkner negotiates a voluntary quota agreement with Famous Players and Odeon Theatres: the chains are to guarantee a minimum of four weeks per theater per year to Canadian films and invest a minimum of $1.7 million in their production

1976: The Council of Canadian Filmmakers, representing ACTRA, the Directors Guild and the Toronto Filmmakers’ Co-op, is granted a hearing before the Royal Commission on Corporate Concentration. However, no federal inquiry is called to investigate charges that Famous Players and Odeon work in collusion to block the exhibition of Canadian films. Famous Players responds by attacking the voluntary quota system, stating, ‘Clearly the people of Canada do not appreciate the works of most current Canadian filmmakers’

1977: Odeon Theatres is bought by Canadian interests headed by Michael Zahorchak. The federal government gives up on voluntary quotas, which were not working

1978: Empire Theatres, an exhibitor based in Nova Scotia, is formed by Empire Company

1979: Veteran studio owner and producer Nat Taylor and producer Garth Drabinsky open Cineplex, an 18-theater complex in Toronto’s Eaton Centre. The small theaters play 16mm specialty films, European art films and Hollywood second-runs

1983: Drabinsky receives a hearing before the Restrictive Trade Practices Commission, but hours before the hearing begins, six major American distributors issue a joint statement saying they will change their practices and ensure competition in the distribution and exhibition of films in Canada

1984: Cineplex buys Odeon, and once again the competition for first-run Hollywood movies is effectively reduced to two major chains. Drabinsky launches a major buying spree in the U.S., setting up Cineplex to become the second-largest theatrical chain in North America

1986: Drabinsky sells 49% of Cineplex Odeon to MCA, the parent company of Universal Studios, effectively putting Cineplex under American control

The MPAA signs an agreement with the province of Quebec (Bill 109) by which only Quebec distributors will be allowed to distribute foreign films in the province. This effectively bars English-Canadian distributors from operating in Quebec

1987: Ellis Jacob begins working for Cineplex Odeon Corporation. He will go on to serve as VP – finance, CFO, executive VP, and ultimately, COO, until leaving in 1998

1989: Drabinsky attempts to buy back Cineplex Odeon from MCA, but loses in a much-publicized corporate struggle

1994: The federal government approves the takeover of the Canadian assets of Paramount Communications (formerly Gulf+Western) by New York’s Viacom; these assets include the Famous Players theater chain and Blockbuster Video. In turn, Viacom promises to exhibit more Canadian films and spend more money in the marketing of Canadian films in Famous Players theaters

1998: Sony, which owns Loews Theatres, buys the chain of U.S. and Canadian Cineplex Odeon theaters – of which Seagram has gained control – and merges operations, forming Loews Cineplex Entertainment. The Canadian distribution division, Cineplex Odeon Films, is sold to Alliance Atlantis Communications and remains a standalone company, now known as Odeon Films

1999: Jacob and former Cineplex Odeon CFO Steven Brown found exhibitor Galaxy Entertainment. They create a partnership with Onex Corporation, which holds a majority share, in addition to Robert Lantos and Victor Loewy, president of the Motion Picture Distribution Group for Alliance Atlantis. Norman Stern, president of the Ontario Theatre Group, is also a partner

2000: Famous Players and Alliance Atlantis invest in the Galaxy partnership

Heritage minister Sheila Copps launches the Canadian Feature Film Fund, to be administered by Telefilm Canada, increasing feature film funding to $100 million a year. The objective is to boost the audience for Canadian films, noting that they account for only 2% of annual box-office revenue. She sets a target of 5% in five years

2002: Canada’s Onex and Oaktree Capital Management acquire a restructured Loews Cineplex Entertainment, which had suffered due to economic recession

2003: The Canadian assets of Cineplex Odeon are merged with Galaxy to create Cineplex Galaxy LP, with Jacob as its chief executive

2004: Onex and Oaktree sell their interest in Loews Cineplex to U.S.-based Bain Capital, The Carlyle Group and Spectrum Equity Investors, but maintain control of Cineplex Galaxy

Empire Theatres acquires four theaters from Famous Players

2005: A report on the first five years of the CFFF cites that while box-office share for domestic films in Quebec was a remarkable 21.2% in 2004, English-Canadian films languished at 1.6%

Cineplex acquires Famous Players for $500 million and now controls 60% of Canadian screens and a majority of box office revenue. The Competition Bureau requires the divestiture of 34 theaters from B.C. to Ontario; Empire buys 27 of them and is now Canada’s second-largest exhibitor

Loews and AMC Theatres, which entered the Canadian market in the 1990s, announce a merger. AMC is currently the third biggest player in Canada

Cineplex Galaxy changes its name to Cineplex Entertainment and takes on Famous Players’ media arm. It plans to build at least eight new theater complexes by the end of 2006