The Dramaturgical Revolution of the 20th Century

(source) Bette Davis as Margo Channing in All About Eve, directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz, and produced by Darryl F. Zanuck.

It is valid to consider Pop Culture as a great mutual entanglement of narratives (and meta-narratives).

Narratives involve human characters. Pop Culture draws its characters principally from the three arenas of fame: entertainment, sports, and politics. The narratives directly produced by Pop Culture itself include television series, seasonal sports, and election cycles, etc. But those are only the basic layer of narrative threads.

In late Postmodernity, the narrative of Pop Culture had shifted more and more to include the "backstage," which are the stories about the real lives of the participants. On this level, the narrative threads of Pop Culture blend into a one single continent of threads, in which all participants of any arena of fame are included. This can be considered the canon of Pop Culture.

As a non-famous person, one participates in Pop Culture not simply by viewing or consuming the productions of Pop Culture within the canon, but moreover by forming and sharing commentary on the narratives and meta-narratives, as an internal dialogue during one's other activities, and also with others in one's real life, and lately on social media.

This is the reason why the Twentieth Century was the dramaturgical century. It is the Postmodern Revolution at its core. Essentially we all became participants in theater culture, which up until the mid Tweniteth century was confined to a very small subset of society. Postmodernity was in essence the takeover of mainstream culture by this subculture. That theater culture itself is highly skewed towards the feminine relative to previous mainstream culture has been much of the reason why the Twentieth Century has felt like the "female revolution."

Many great Hollywood motion pictures actually make direct commentary on this transition to what we call Pop Cutlure, in which we all participate. Among my favorites in this regard is All About Eve, which was released in 1950 by 20th Century Fox, exactly at the mid point of the Twentieth Century.

Almost all the characters in that movie are involved in the theater. They all lead miserable lives, in which no one can really trust each other, or be intimate with other without wearing some kind of mask. At least that's how audiences back then would have seen it. Back in 1950 this supposed to be seen as abnormal. In late Postmodernity, because we have a dramaturgical mainstream culture now, we hold as axiomatic that everyone lives that kind of life. 

(source) A young and then-unknown Marilyn Monroe as Miss Casswell in a scene with Anne Baxter, Bette Davis, and George Sanders.

1950 (Oct 13) All About Eve released by 20th Century Fox.

1949  The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce begins a contract with the City of Los Angeles Parks Department to repair and rebuild the Hollywood sign. The contract stipulates that "LAND" be removed to spell "Hollywood" and reflect the district, not the "Hollywoodland" housing development.

1935  20th Century Fox is formed by the merger of Twentieth Century Pictures with Fox Films.

Twentieth Century Pictures' Joseph Schenck and Darryl F. Zanuck left United Artists over a stock dispute, and began merger talks with the management of financially struggling Fox Film, under president Sidney Kent. Spyros Skouras, then manager of the Fox West Coast Theaters, helped make it happen (and later became president of the new company). Aside from the theater chain and a first-rate studio lot, Zanuck and Schenck felt there was not much else to Fox, which had been reeling since the founder William Fox lost control of the company in 1930. The studio's biggest star, Will Rogers, died in a plane crash weeks after the merger. Its leading female star, Janet Gaynor, was fading in popularity and promising leading men James Dunn and Spencer Tracy had been dropped because of heavy drinking.

After the merger was completed, Zanuck quickly signed young actors who would carry Twentieth Century-Fox for years Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Carmen Miranda, Don Ameche, Henry Fonda, Gene Tierney, Sonja Henie, and Betty Grable. Also on the Fox payroll he found two players who he built up into the studio's leading assets, Alice Faye and seven-year-old Shirley Temple. Favoring popular biographies and musicals, Zanuck built Fox back to profitability.

1932 Twentieth Century Pictures, an independent Hollywood motion picture production company,  is created y Joseph Schenck (the former president of United Artists) and Darryl F. Zanuck from Warner Bros.

1930 William Fox loses control of Fox Films following the stock market crash.

1928 Fox Films begins distributing Fox Movietone News, continuing to 1963.

1926 Fox Films buys the patents of the Movietone sound system for recording sound on to film.

1923 HOLLYWOODLAND sign is erected by H.J. Whitley to advertise the name of a new housing development in the hills above the Hollywood district of Los Angeles. 

1917 William Fox sends Sol M. Wurtzel to Hollywood, California to oversee the studio's new West Coast production facilities where a more hospitable and cost effective climate existed for filmmaking.

1915 Fox Films is created by William Fox with its first  studios in Fort Lee, New Jersey