fourwall v. to pay for the right to entertain at a theatre or on a stage. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Trivia time! Where in the United States can you visit Soda City? If you answered Columbia, South Carolina, you’re right! This nickname apparently derives from an old practice of abbreviating Columbia as Cola. The locals then referred to the town as...
The truth as it regards “Four Walling”. Four Walling began in the early 1900’s by black filmmakers who were shunned and unable to get their films into theaters. The idea was that if they had a project and a projector, all that was needed was four walls and advertising to sell their tickets to see the movie that they had created. The most famous “Four-Waller” of them all was the great “Oscar Micheaux” who took the business of four walling and turned it into a highly profitable way of doing business. It was an highly successful technique until the studios decided to desegregate the theaters in the south. This temporarily killed the practice of “four walling” until it began to reemerge again through filmmakers and theatrical producers determined to get their productions before an audience and turn a profit at the same time.