Will Krupp
Senior HTF Member
The excellent book The Genius of the System has some great inside history based on original records of movie production at the various studios from around 1930 to the late 1950s. The author details, among many other things, how the costs of A-features were climbing in the late 1930s and into the 1940s.
I think this is one of the "great books" about the historical movie business and one that every film lover should have in their library!