Theatrical Syndicate
Starting in 1896, the Theatrical Syndicate was an organization that in the United States that controlled the majority of bookings in the country's leading theatrical attractions. The six-man group was in charge of theatres and bookings. The Syndicates power would peak in 1907. Beginnings Charles Frohman, Al Hayman, A. L. Erlanger, Marc Klaw, Samuel F. Nirdlinger (Nixon), and Frederick Zimmerman met for lunch at the Holland House in New York City in the early months of 1896. All of them were theatrical managers or booking agents with national influence. Frohman and Hayman owned theatres in New York and the surrounding area, Erlanger and Klaw worked as booking agents for practically all of the big theatres in the South, and Nirdlinger and Zimmerman ran theatres in Ohio. Frohman also controlled a chain of movie theatres that stretched all the way to the West Coast. The men talked on the state of American theatre over lunch. The Theatrical Syndicate had effectively been created by these men. They believed that in order for the Syndicate to flourish, it needed to establish a monopoly. The men had united all of the theatres they owned or represented into a national network within weeks of their lunch meeting, marking the commencement of the Theatrical Syndicate. Operation Theatre companies in America thrived through touring in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The Syndicate just required key theatres between the big touring cities to gain control of the situation. The Syndicate did not require control of the city's theatres. It just had to keep track of theatres on the highways leading into the city. The group would achieve this by 1900. Because to Nixon and Zimmerman's influence, Philadelphia was the first city completely taken over by the Syndicate. The Syndicate started out with 33 first-class theatres. Frohman, Klaw, and Erlanger became the organization's booking agents. Company managers were no longer negotiating with individual theatre managers to plan their tours. Instead, they had to go through the Syndicate, who orchestrated their tour. They would go on to have control of the activities of around 1500 theatres. Through Frohman they would also have control or be actively managing lead actors, such as, William Gillette, John Drew, Annie Russell, Maude Adams, Henry Miller, and many more. Praise In other circles, the Syndicate was praised. The establishment of the Syndicate is described by Daniel Frohman, Charles Frohman's brother. "They determined that its only economic hope was in a centralization of booking interests, and they acted promptly on this decision," he says, after addressing the developing turmoil in the theatre sector. Those who praised the Syndicate claimed that by standardizing bookings, they had rescued theatre. Routing of road-based enterprises was regarded as chaotic prior to the founding of the Syndicate. Due to fierce competition, smaller travel companies found themselves in debt. Klaw, who acted as spokesman for the Syndicate, was quoted as saying, "The Theatrical Syndicate has brought order out of chaos, legitimate profit out of ruinous rivalry." Criticism Managers, agents, and