Life after Divorce.

To find the origins of today's conglomerate-dominated industry, we need to look further back in history than the corporate takeovers of the 1960s. This trend began in the years following World War II and was stimulated by the separation of exhibition from production and distribution. The leader in this trend was Paramount Pictures. Paramount sought to take advantage of changing economic conditions, rather than clinging to outmoded operating procedures and limiting its concept of its own business. The paper discusses Paramount's fiscal position at the beginning of the decade and its corporate strategy of reducing its outstanding stock, expanding into virtually every aspect of television, diversifying into growth industries, and establishing a plan of motion picture production and distribution which would ensure its survival through the 1950s and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]