When the old studio system is brought up nowadays, it often gets rejected in its entirety as an evil, unfair relic of a time when big Hollywood studios tried to control everything. While it did have some negative aspects, its positives are often over looked.
For example, nowadays, lesser known actors and actresses (including the character actors) typically have to hustle for each role they take. In old Hollywood, all actors and actresses were full time employees of the studios. They would make a set amount of money each week, get a pension and full benefits package and never had to worry about finding their next job. In fact, the burden of finding work would fall to the studio, who had to pay out an actor's salary regardless of whether he had actually worked that week. This made acting at the lower levels of Hollywood a steady, middle class option. Often, if MGM didn't have something for a particular actor or actress, they might "loan" them out to another studio for the week. Sometimes the actor or actress might get paid for doing nothing.
So if this was the case, why would some actors and actresses fight against this system? It would actually be the big name stars who would find this system to be unseemly. While they could command huge weekly salaries that would easily dwarf those paid to the lower level talent, they hated being stuck at one studio, forced to make pictures they might have hated. If, for example, Gene Kelly wanted to make a film at Warner Brothers, he had to get permission from MGM to do so. Even if MGM was willing to permit it, they still had to negotiate a price with Warner Brothers. If no agreement was reached, the coveted role would go to someone else. Thus, the bigger names in Hollywood would get freedom and much better deals if they could pick and choose their projects. Unfortunately, the lesser known character actors would not have this luxury and would have to go begging for roles.
