"The Ten Commandments"

The Famous Players-Lasky Corporation has evidently believed in the commercial value of the Ten Commandments. It spent almost $2,000,000 in making this great feature film-the largest sum ever spent in producing a cinema. Its excessive costliness was one of the reasons for the company's capital difficulties last Fall and Winter, and upon its returns will largely depend much of its success this year. The company believes that the picture will prove very profitable, but that the full returns from it will not be obtained for two or three years. Inventories of the company increased from $13,211,508 in 1922 to $15,338,482 last year-just about the cost of the "feature film." Another item in this 1923 inventory is the successful film, The Covered Wagon, which cost $850,000 originally; it has been playing for almost a year in the big cities, and has not yet been released to the small town picture houses from which the bulk of the film income is received. The company's policy, however, is to write down its films mostly in their first year, and The Covered Wagon is now carried at about one-eighth of its cost.

The Covered Wagon is now being shown in the large theatres of 15 cities, and is producing between $40,000 and $50,000 weekly for the Famous Players The Ten Commandments is being shown in four cities, and in its fourth week produces about $32,000.