149-549: Paramount Stations Group, Inc. (sometimes abbreviated as PSG) was a company that controlled a group of American broadcast television stations. The company existed from 1991 until 2001. Paramount Communications , the then-parent company of Paramount Pictures , formed the Paramount Stations Group in 1991 after buying out the remaining stake in TVX Broadcast Group that it did not already own. At
298-500: A fourth commercial network . Paramount Pictures purchased the Hughes Television Network (HTN) including its satellite time in planning for PTVS in 1976. Paramount sold HTN to Madison Square Garden Corporation in 1979. But Diller believed strongly in the concept, and so took his fourth-network idea with him when he moved to 20th Century Fox in 1984, where Fox's then freshly installed proprietor, Rupert Murdoch
447-583: A 1956 remake of his 1923 film The Ten Commandments . DeMille died in 1959. Like some other studios, Paramount saw little value in its film library and sold 764 of its pre-1950 films to MCA Inc. / EMKA, Ltd. (known today as Universal Television ) in February 1958. By the early 1960s, Paramount's future was doubtful. The high-risk movie business was wobbly; the theater chain was long gone; investments in DuMont and in early pay-television came to nothing; and
596-587: A 21st birthday present. Universal already had a reputation for nepotism —at one time, 70 of Carl Sr.'s relatives were supposedly on the payroll. Many of them were nephews, resulting in Carl Sr. being known around the studios as "Uncle Carl". Ogden Nash famously quipped in rhyme, "Uncle Carl Laemmle/Has a very large faemmle". Among these relatives was future Academy Award-winning director/producer William Wyler . "Junior," Laemmle persuaded his father to bring Universal up to date. He bought and built theaters, converted
745-416: A Lesser God and The Accused . During this period, responsibility for running the studio passed from Eisner and Katzenberg to Frank Mancuso, Sr. (1984) and Ned Tanen (1984) to Stanley R. Jaffe (1991) and Sherry Lansing (1992). More so than most, Paramount's slate of films included many remakes and television spin-offs ; while sometimes commercially successful, there have been few compelling films of
894-467: A Paramount network from 25 years earlier. In 1999, Viacom bought out United Television's interests, and handed responsibility for the start-up network to the newly acquired CBS unit, which Viacom bought in 2000 – an ironic confluence of events as Paramount had once invested in CBS, and Viacom had once been the syndication arm of CBS, as well. During this period the studio acquired some 30 TV stations to support
1043-508: A Time , The Jeffersons , The Facts of Life , and Silver Spoons which premiered on NBC that same fall. At this time, Hal B. Wallis , who had recently worked as a major producer at Paramount, moved over to Universal, where he produced several films, among them a lavish version of Maxwell Anderson 's Anne of the Thousand Days (1969) and the equally lavish Mary, Queen of Scots (1971). Although neither could claim to be
1192-524: A bid for a merger with Paramount Communications; this quickly escalated into a bidding war with Barry Diller 's QVC . But Viacom prevailed, ultimately paying $ 10 billion for the Paramount holdings. Viacom and Paramount had planned to merge as early as 1989. Paramount is the last major film studio located in Hollywood proper. When Paramount moved to its present home in 1927, it was in the heart of
1341-465: A big financial hit, both films received Academy Award nominations, and Anne was nominated for Best Picture , Best Actor ( Richard Burton ), Best Actress ( Geneviève Bujold ), and Best Supporting Actor ( Anthony Quayle ). Wallis retired from Universal after making the film Rooster Cogburn (1975), a sequel to True Grit (1969), which Wallis had produced at Paramount. Rooster Cogburn co-starred John Wayne , reprising his Oscar-winning role from
1490-521: A box office for hours, counting patrons, and calculating the day's takings. Within weeks of his Chicago trip, Laemmle gave up dry goods to buy the first several nickelodeons . For Laemmle and other such entrepreneurs, the creation in 1908 of the Edison-backed Motion Picture Patents Company (or the "Edison Trust") meant that exhibitors were expected to pay fees for Trust-produced films they showed. Based on
1639-600: A co-production arrangement with producer Walter Wanger and his partner, director Fritz Lang , lending the studio some amount of prestige productions. Universal's core audience base was still found in the neighborhood movie theaters , and the studio continued to please the public with low- to medium-budget films. Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce in new Sherlock Holmes mysteries (1942–46), teenage musicals with Gloria Jean , Donald O'Connor , and Peggy Ryan (1942–43), and screen adaptations of radio's Inner Sanctum Mysteries with Lon Chaney Jr. (1943–45). Alfred Hitchcock
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#17327732750591788-565: A contract with Universal ensuring three more years of Oswald cartoons. However, after Mintz had unsuccessfully demanded that Disney accept a lower fee for producing the films, Mintz took most of Walt's animators to work at his own studio. Disney and Iwerks would create Mickey Mouse in secret while they finished the remaining Oswald films they were contractually obligated to finish. Universal subsequently severed its link to Mintz and formed its own in-house animation studio to produce Oswald cartoons headed by Walter Lantz , which would later result in
1937-535: A contract with Universal in the presence of its vice president, R. H. Cochrane. Mintz's company, Winkler Pictures, was to produce 26 " Oswald the Lucky Rabbit " cartoons for Universal. Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks created the character and the Walt Disney Studio provided the animation for the cartoons under Winkler's supervision. The films enjoyed a successful theatrical run, and Mintz would sign
2086-700: A five-month battle with QVC , and completed the merger in July. At the time, Paramount's holdings included Paramount Pictures, Madison Square Garden , the New York Rangers , the New York Knicks , and the Simon & Schuster publishing house. The deal had been planned as early as 1989, when the company was still known as Gulf and Western. Though Davis was named a member of the board of National Amusements , which controlled Viacom, he ceased to manage
2235-676: A foot in the door at the networks, the newly reincorporated Paramount Television eventually became known as a specialist in half-hour situation comedies. In 1968, Paramount formed Films Distributing Corp to distribute sensitive film product, including Sin With a Stranger , which was one of the first films to receive an X rating in the United States when the MPAA introduced their new rating system . In 1970, Paramount teamed with Universal Pictures to form Cinema International Corporation ,
2384-533: A hit, the arrangement would become the rule for many future productions at Universal and eventually at other studios as well. In the early 1950s, Universal set up its own distribution company in France . In the late 1960s, the company also started a production company in Paris , Universal Productions France S.A. , although sometimes credited by the name of the distribution company, Universal Pictures France . Except for
2533-684: A label within the Universal Music Group. The following year, G. P. Putnam's Sons was sold to the Penguin Group subsidiary of Pearson PLC . Matsushita provided a cash infusion, but the clash of cultures was too great to overcome, and five years later, Matsushita sold an 80% stake in MCA/Universal to Canadian drinks distributor Seagram for $ 5.7 billion. Seagram sold off its stake in DuPont to fund this expansion into
2682-432: A lively history, has been turned into a post-production and music-scoring facility for Warners, known simply as "The Lot". For a time the semi-industrial neighborhood around Paramount was in decline, but has now come back. The recently refurbished studio has come to symbolize Hollywood for many visitors, and its studio tour is a popular attraction. In 1983, Gulf and Western began a restructuring process that would transform
2831-412: A movie factory, turning out sixty to seventy pictures a year. Such were the benefits of having a huge theater chain to fill, and of block booking to persuade other chains to go along. In 1933, Mae West would also add greatly to Paramount's success with her suggestive movies She Done Him Wrong and I'm No Angel . However, the sex appeal West gave in these movies would also lead to the enforcement of
2980-480: A new company that would distribute films by the two studios outside the United States. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer would become a partner in the mid-1970s. Both Paramount and CIC entered the video market with Paramount Home Video (now Paramount Home Entertainment ) and CIC Video , respectively. Robert Evans abandoned his position as head of production in 1974; his successor, Richard Sylbert , proved to be too literary and too tasteful for Gulf and Western's Bluhdorn. By 1976,
3129-512: A new, television-trained team was in place headed by Barry Diller and his "Killer-Dillers", as they were called by admirers or "Dillettes" as they were called by detractors. These associates, made up of Michael Eisner , Jeffrey Katzenberg , Dawn Steel and Don Simpson would each go on and head up major movie studios of their own later in their careers. The Paramount specialty was now simpler. " High concept " pictures such as Saturday Night Fever and Grease hit big, hard, and fast all over
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#17327732750593278-498: A niche for the studio, beginning a series of horror films which extended into the 1940s, affectionately dubbed Universal horror . Among them are Dracula (1931), Frankenstein (1931), The Mummy (1932) and The Invisible Man (1933). Other Laemmle productions of this period include Tay Garnett 's Destination Unknown (1933), John M. Stahl 's Imitation of Life (1934) and William Wyler's The Good Fairy (1935). Universal's forays into high-quality production spelled
3427-497: A remake of its earlier 1929 part-talkie production, and produced as a high-quality, big-budget film rather than as a B-picture . The new film featured several stars from the Broadway stage version, which began production in late 1935, and unlike the 1929 film, was based on the Broadway musical rather than the novel. Carl Jr.'s spending habits alarmed company stockholders. They would not allow production to start on Show Boat unless
3576-430: A return on some of the expenditure by launching a sensational ad campaign that attracted moviegoers. Character actor Lon Chaney became a drawing card for Universal in the mid-1910s, appearing steadily in dramas. However, Chaney left Universal in 1917 because of a salary dispute, and his two biggest hits for Universal were made as isolated returns to the studio: The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and The Phantom of
3725-454: A rich partner. He located Japanese electronics manufacturer Matsushita Electric (now known as Panasonic ), which agreed to acquire MCA for $ 6.6 billion in 1990. On December 9, 1996, the new owners dropped the MCA name; the company became Universal Studios, Inc. and MCA's music division, MCA Music Entertainment Group, was renamed Universal Music Group . MCA Records continued to live on as
3874-719: A second channel, the Sci-Fi Channel (now known as Syfy ), in 1992. As its name implied, it focused on films and television series within the science fiction genre. Much of the initial programming was owned either by Paramount or Universal. Paramount bought one more television station in 1993: Cox Enterprises ' WKBD-TV in Detroit, Michigan, at the time an affiliate of the Fox Broadcasting Company . In February 1994, Viacom acquired 50.1% of Paramount Communications Inc. shares for $ 9.75 billion, following
4023-518: A series of Jack London movies. Paramount was the first successful nationwide distributor; until this time, films were sold on a statewide or regional basis, which had proved costly to film producers. Also, Famous Players and Lasky were privately owned while Paramount was a corporation. In 1916, Zukor engineered a three-way merger of his Famous Players, the Lasky Company, and Paramount. Zukor and Lasky bought Hodkinson out of Paramount, and merged
4172-520: A spin-off of the studio's 1947 hit The Egg and I and the inexpensive Francis (1950), the first film of a series about a talking mule, became mainstays of the company. Once again, the films of Abbott and Costello, including Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), were among the studio's top-grossing productions. But at this point, Rank lost interest and sold his shares to the investor Milton Rackmil , whose Decca Records would take full control of Universal in 1952. Besides Abbott and Costello,
4321-424: A stable of exclusively-contracted film personnel (outside of Eddie Murphy ); this effort proved unsuccessful and studio president Dawn Steel decided to shut down the department on July 30, 1986. In 1987, Paramount Pictures, MGM/UA Communications Co. and Universal Pictures teamed up in order to market feature film and television product to China, a response to the 25-billion admission tickets that were clocked in
4470-475: A stage director with virtually no film experience, Cecil B. DeMille , who would find a suitable site in Hollywood. This place was a rented old horse barn converted into a production facility with an enlarged open-air stage located between Vine Street , Selma Avenue, Argyle Avenue and Sunset Boulevard . It was later known as the Lasky-DeMille Barn . In 1914, their first feature film, The Squaw Man
4619-492: A star on the logo. In 1967, the number of stars was reduced to 22 and their hidden meaning was dropped. In 2014, Paramount Pictures became the first major Hollywood studio to distribute all of its films in digital form only. The company's headquarters and studios are located at 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, California. The most commerciay successful film franchises from Paramount Pictures include Transformers , Mission: Impossible and Star Trek . Additionally,
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4768-558: A stock-swap merger deal between Time and Warner Communications. This caused Time to raise its bid for Warner to $ 14.9 billion in cash and stock. Gulf and Western responded by filing a lawsuit in a Delaware court to block the Time-Warner merger. The court ruled twice in favor of Time, forcing Gulf and Western to drop both the Time acquisition and the lawsuit, and allowing the formation of Time Warner . Paramount used cash acquired from
4917-526: Is an American film production and distribution company and the flagship namesake subsidiary of Paramount Global . It is the sixth-oldest film studio in the world, the second-oldest film studio in the United States (behind Universal Pictures ), and the sole member of the "Big Five" film studios located within the city limits of Los Angeles . In 1916, film producer Adolph Zukor put 24 actors and actresses under contract and honored each with
5066-607: Is the last major film studio still headquartered in the Hollywood district of Los Angeles . Paramount Pictures dates its existence from the 1912 founding date of the Famous Players Film Company . Hungarian-born founder Adolph Zukor , who had been an early investor in nickelodeons , saw that movies appealed mainly to working-class immigrants. With partners Daniel Frohman and Charles Frohman he planned to offer feature-length films that would appeal to
5215-419: Is the oldest surviving film studio in the United States and the fifth oldest in the world after Gaumont , Pathé , Titanus , and Nordisk Film , and is one of the "Big Five" film studios . Universal's most commercially successful film franchises include Fast & Furious , Jurassic Park , and Despicable Me . Additionally, the studio's library includes many individual films such as Jaws and E.T.
5364-462: The Bankruptcy Act . On June 4, 1935, John E. Otterson became president of the re-emerged and newly renamed Paramount Pictures Inc. Zukor returned to the company and was named production chief but after Barney Balaban was appointed president on July 2, 1936, he was soon replaced by Y. Frank Freeman and symbolically named chairman of the board. On August 28, 1935, Paramount Pictures
5513-599: The Independent Moving Pictures Company (IMP), with studios in Fort Lee, New Jersey , where many early films in America's first motion picture industry were produced in the early 20th century. Laemmle broke with Edison's custom of refusing to give billing and screen credits to performers. By naming the movie stars, he attracted many of the leading players of the time, contributing to
5662-702: The Kaufman Astoria Studios , and Hollywood, California ), and became an early investor in radio, acquiring for the corporation a 50% interest in the new Columbia Broadcasting System in 1928 (selling it within a few years; this would not be the last time Paramount and CBS crossed paths). By acquiring the successful Balaban & Katz chain in 1926, Zukor gained the services of Barney Balaban (who would eventually become Paramount's president in 1936), his brother A. J. Balaban (who would eventually supervise all stage production nationwide and produce talkie shorts), and their partner Sam Katz (who would run
5811-655: The Latham Loop used in cameras and projectors, along with other patents, the Trust collected fees on all aspects of movie production and exhibition and attempted to enforce a monopoly on distribution. Soon, Laemmle and other disgruntled nickelodeon owners decided to avoid paying Edison by producing their own pictures. In June 1909, Laemmle started the Yankee Film Company with his brothers-in-law Abe Stern and Julius Stern . That company quickly evolved into
5960-614: The Paramount Publix Corporation . Eventually, Zukor shed most of his early partners; the Frohman brothers, Hodkinson and Goldwyn were out by 1917 while Lasky hung on until 1932, when, blamed for the near-collapse of Paramount in the Great Depression years, he was also tossed out. In 1931, to solve the financial problems of the company Zukor hired taxi/rental car magnate John D. Hertz as chairman of
6109-607: The Paramount Stations Group , while KECO was renamed to Paramount Parks . Paramount Television launched Wilshire Court Productions in conjunction with USA Networks, before the latter was renamed NBCUniversal Cable , in 1989. Wilshire Court Productions (named for a side street in Los Angeles) produced television films that aired on the USA Networks, and later for other networks. USA Networks launched
Paramount Stations Group - Misplaced Pages Continue
6258-710: The Production Code , as the newly formed organization the Catholic Legion of Decency threatened a boycott if it was not enforced. Paramount cartoons produced by Fleischer Studios continued to be successful, with characters such as Betty Boop and Popeye the Sailor becoming widely successful. One Fleischer series, Screen Songs , featured live-action music stars under contract to Paramount hosting sing-alongs of popular songs. The animation studio would rebound with Popeye , and in 1935, polls showed that Popeye
6407-639: The United Paramount Network (UPN). Four of PSG's original six stations, along with several acquisitions such as WSBK-TV in Boston , and WTXX in Waterbury , which Viacom operated through a LMA with WVIT, became charter affiliates of the network when UPN launched in January 1995. PSG sold off three of its original six stations as well; WLFL, KRRT, and WTXF were sold to other companies, with
6556-677: The 13th slasher series, as well as joining forces with Lucasfilm and Steven Spielberg to create the Indiana Jones franchise. Other examples are the Star Trek film series and a string of films starring comedian Eddie Murphy like Trading Places , Coming to America and Beverly Hills Cop and its sequels . While the emphasis was decidedly on the commercial, there were occasional less commercial but more artistic and intellectual efforts like I'm Dancing as Fast as I Can , Atlantic City , Reds , Witness , Children of
6705-686: The Bandit (1977), Animal House (1978), The Jerk (1979), The Blues Brothers (1980), The Four Seasons (1981), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), The Breakfast Club (1985), Back to the Future (also 1985), An American Tail (1986), The Land Before Time (1988), Field of Dreams (1989), Jurassic Park (1993) and Casper (1995), but the film business was financially unpredictable with some films like The Thing (1982), Scarface (1983), Dune (1984), Howard
6854-531: The Duck (1986), The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) or Waterworld (1995), which turned out to be big box office disappointments despite their high budget, however, fortunately, these films became cult films in later years. UIP began distributing films by start-up studio DreamWorks in 1997 due to the founders' connections with Paramount, Universal, and Amblin Entertainment. In 2001, MGM dropped out of
7003-562: The Extra-Terrestrial , both of which became the highest-grossing films of all time during their initial releases. Universal Pictures is a member of the Motion Picture Association (MPA), and was one of the "Little Three" majors during Hollywood's golden age . Universal was founded by Carl Laemmle , Mark Dintenfass, Charles O. Baumann , Adam Kessel, Pat Powers , William Swanson, David Horsley , Robert H. Cochrane and Jules Brulatour . One story has Laemmle watching
7152-543: The FCC that Paramount controlled DuMont. Both DuMont and Paramount Television Network suffered as a result, with neither company able to acquire five O&Os. Meanwhile, CBS, ABC, and NBC had each acquired the maximum of five stations by the mid-1950s. When ABC accepted a merger offer from UPT in 1953, DuMont quickly realized that ABC now had more resources than it could possibly hope to match. It quickly reached an agreement in principle to merge with ABC. However, Paramount vetoed
7301-551: The Golden Age of Hollywood had just ended, even the flagship Paramount Building in Times Square was sold to raise cash, as was KTLA (sold to Gene Autry in 1964 for a then-phenomenal $ 12.5 million). Their only remaining successful property at that point was Dot Records , which Paramount had acquired in 1957, and even its profits started declining by the middle of the 1960s. Founding father Adolph Zukor (born in 1873)
7450-511: The Hedgehog film series. On August 25, 1983, Paramount Studios caught fire. Two or three sound stages and four outdoor sets were destroyed. When Charles Bluhdorn died unexpectedly, his successor Martin Davis dumped all of Gulf and Western's industrial, mining, and sugar-growing subsidiaries and refocused the company, renaming it Paramount Communications in 1989. With the influx of cash from
7599-582: The Jackal (1973). It was only involved in approximately 20 French film productions. In the early 1970s, the unit was incorporated into the French Cinema International Corporation arm. By the late 1950s, the motion picture business was again changing. The combination of the studio/theater-chain breakup and the rise of television saw the reduced audience size for cinema productions. The Music Corporation of America (MCA),
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#17327732750597748-704: The Laemmles obtained a loan. Universal was forced to seek a $ 750,000 production loan from the Standard Capital Corporation, pledging the Laemmle family's controlling interest in Universal as collateral . It was the first time Universal had borrowed money for a production in its 26-year history. The production went $ 300,000 over budget; Standard called in the loan, cash-strapped Universal could not pay, and Standard foreclosed and seized control of
7897-677: The Madison Square Garden properties (which also included MSG Network ), a 50% stake in USA Networks (the other 50% was owned by MCA / Universal Pictures ) and Simon & Schuster, Prentice Hall , Pocket Books , Allyn & Bacon , Cineamerica (a joint venture with Warner Communications ), and Canadian cinema chain Famous Players Theatres . That same year, the company launched a $ 12.2 billion hostile bid to acquire Time Inc. in an attempt to end
8046-548: The Opera (1925). During the early 1920s Laemmle entrusted most of Universal's production policy decisions to Irving Thalberg . Thalberg had been Laemmle's personal secretary, and Laemmle was impressed by his cogent observations of how efficiently the studio could be operated. Promoted to studio chief in 1919, Thalberg made distinct improvements of quality and prestige in Universal's output in addition to dealing with star director Erich von Stroheim 's increasing inability to control
8195-766: The Paramount-Publix theatre chain in New York City from the thirty-five-story Paramount Theatre Building on Times Square ). Balaban and Katz had developed the Wonder Theater concept, first publicized around 1918 in Chicago. The Chicago Theater was created as a very ornate theater and advertised as a "wonder theater". When Publix acquired Balaban, they embarked on a project to expand the wonder theaters, and starting building in New York City in 1927. While Balaban and Public were dominant in Chicago, Loew's
8344-701: The Sunset and Vine lot to the new building. At present, those facilities are still part of the Paramount Pictures headquarters. Zukor hired independent producer B. P. Schulberg , an unerring eye for new talent, to run the new West Coast operations. On April 1, 1927, the company name was changed to Paramount Famous Lasky Corporation . In September 1927, the Paramount Famous Lasky Corporation studio in Astoria (New York City)
8493-526: The UIP venture and went with 20th Century Fox 's international arm to handle the distribution of their titles, an ongoing arrangement. UIP nearly lost its connection with Universal Pictures in 1999 when Universal started Universal Pictures International to take over the assets of PolyGram Filmed Entertainment and wanted UPI to distribute their films starting in 2001. Only a small handful of films were released theatrically by Universal Pictures International, up until
8642-524: The UPN network, also acquiring and merging in the assets of Republic Pictures, Spelling Television and Viacom Productions, almost doubling the size of the studio's television library. The television division produced the dominant prime time show for the decade in Frasier , as well as such long running hits as NCIS and Becker and the dominant prime time magazine show Entertainment Tonight. Paramount also gained
8791-726: The West Coast. The Chicago station got a commercial license as WBKB in 1943, but was sold to UPT along with Balaban & Katz in 1948 and was eventually resold to CBS as WBBM-TV . In 1938, Paramount bought a stake in television manufacturer DuMont Laboratories . Through this stake, it became a minority owner of the DuMont Television Network . Paramount also launched its own network, Paramount Television Network , in 1948 through its television unit, Television Productions, Inc. Paramount management planned to acquire additional owned-and-operated stations ("O&Os");
8940-455: The advent of sound, these productions were made in the German language or, occasionally, Hungarian or Polish. In the U.S., Universal Pictures did not distribute any of this subsidiary's films. Still, some of them were exhibited through other independent, foreign-language film distributors based in New York City without the benefit of English subtitles. Nazi persecution and a change in ownership for
9089-615: The artistic acclaim the Fleischer brothers achieved under their management. In 1940, Paramount agreed to a government-instituted consent decree: block booking and "pre-selling" (the practice of collecting up-front money for films not yet in production) would end. Immediately, Paramount cut back on production, from 71 films to a more modest 19 annually in the war years. Still, with more new stars like Bob Hope , Alan Ladd , Veronica Lake , Paulette Goddard , and Betty Hutton , and with war-time attendance at astronomical numbers, Paramount and
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#17327732750599238-614: The comic adventures of infant Baby Sandy (1938–41); comedies with Hugh Herbert (1938–42) and The Ritz Brothers (1940–43); musicals with Robert Paige , Jane Frazee , The Andrews Sisters , and The Merry Macs (1938–45); and westerns with Tom Mix (1932–33), Buck Jones (1933–36), Bob Baker (1938–39), Johnny Mack Brown (1938–43); Rod Cameron (1944–45), and Kirby Grant (1946–47). Universal could seldom afford its own stable of stars and often borrowed talent from other studios or hired freelance actors. In addition to Stewart and Dietrich, Margaret Sullavan and Bing Crosby were two of
9387-517: The companies were separate, the FCC ruled that Paramount's partial ownership of DuMont meant that DuMont and Paramount were in theory branches of the same company. Since DuMont owned three television stations and Paramount owned two, the federal agency ruled neither network could acquire additional television stations. The FCC requested that Paramount relinquish its stake in DuMont, but Paramount refused. According to television historian William Boddy, "Paramount's checkered antitrust history" helped convince
9536-597: The company applied to the FCC for additional stations in San Francisco, Detroit, and Boston. The FCC, however, denied Paramount's applications. A few years earlier, the federal regulator had placed a five-station cap on all television networks: no network was allowed to own more than five VHF television stations. Paramount was hampered by its minority stake in the DuMont Television Network. Although both DuMont and Paramount executives stated that
9685-543: The company's subsidiaries. Its sugar plantations in Florida and the Dominican Republic were sold in 1985; the consumer and industrial products branch was sold off that same year. In 1989, Davis renamed the company Paramount Communications Incorporated after its primary asset, Paramount Pictures. In addition to the Paramount film, television, home video, and music publishing divisions, the company continued to own
9834-456: The company. During this time period, Paramount Pictures went under the guidance of Jonathan Dolgen, chairman and Sherry Lansing , president. During their administration over Paramount, the studio had an extremely successful period of films with two of Paramount's ten highest-grossing films being produced during this period. The most successful of these films, Titanic , co-produced with 20th Century Fox and Lightstorm Entertainment , became
9983-435: The company. The company remained under the control of trustees for more than a year in order to restructure the debt and pursue a reorganization plan. On December 3, 1934, the reorganization plan was formally proposed. After prolonged hearings in court, final confirmation was obtained on April 25, 1935, when Federal Judge Alfred C. Coxe Jr. approved the reorganization of the Paramount-Publix Corporation under Section 77-B of
10132-477: The corporation from a bloated conglomerate consisting of subsidiaries from unrelated industries to a more focused entertainment and publishing company. The idea was to aid financial markets in measuring the company's success, which, in turn, would help place better value on its shares. Though its Paramount division did very well in recent years, Gulf and Western's success as a whole was translating poorly with investors. This process eventually led Davis to divest many of
10281-584: The country (as Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: The Next Generation were). Paramount Pictures was not connected to either Paramount Records (1910s–1935) or ABC-Paramount Records (1955–66) until it purchased the rights to use the name (but not the latter's catalog) in the late 1960s. The Paramount name was used for soundtrack albums and some pop re-issues from the Dot Records catalog which Paramount had acquired in 1957. By 1970, Dot had become an all-country label and in 1974, Paramount sold all of its record holdings to ABC Records , which in turn
10430-427: The country in 1986. Worldwide Media Sales, a division of the New York-based Worldwide Media Group had been placed in charge of the undertaking. That year, Paramount Pictures decided to consolidate its distribution operations, closing a number of branch offices that were designed for the studio and relocating staff and major activities in an effort to cut costs and provide for a more efficient centralization; this decision
10579-501: The creation of Woody Woodpecker in 1940. In February 2006, NBCUniversal sold all the Disney-animated Oswald cartoons, along with the rights to the character himself, to The Walt Disney Company . In return, Disney released ABC sportscaster Al Michaels from his contract so he could work on NBC's recently acquired Sunday night NFL football package . Universal retained ownership of the remaining Oswald cartoons. In 1928, Laemmle Sr. made his son, Carl Jr. , head of Universal Pictures,
10728-493: The creation of the star system . In 1910, he promoted Florence Lawrence , formerly known as " The Biograph Girl ", and actor King Baggot , in what may be the first instance of a studio using stars in its marketing. The Universal Film Manufacturing Company was incorporated in New York City on April 30, 1912. Laemmle, who emerged as president in July 1912, was the primary figure in the partnership with Dintenfass, Baumann, Kessel, Powers, Swanson, Horsley, and Brulatour. The company
10877-508: The deal closing in March 1994; Viacom's existing group of CBS - and NBC -affiliated stations continued to be run separately from the Paramount stations until December 1995, when they were folded into PSG. Viacom also included its part-time LMA with WVIT , that of WTXX . Shortly afterward, Viacom entered into a joint venture with Chris-Craft Industries , which owned several television stations as part of its United Television subsidiary, to launch
11026-583: The decade was primarily a television studio. When Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer purchased United Artists in 1981, MGM could not drop out of the CIC venture to merge with United Artists overseas operations. However, with future film productions from both names being released through the MGM/UA Entertainment plate, CIC decided to merge UA's international units with MGM and reformed as United International Pictures . There would be other film hits like Smokey and
11175-435: The earlier film, and Katharine Hepburn , their only film together. The film was only a moderate success. In 1983, Universal Pictures launched an independent film arm designed to release specialty films, Universal Classics, and the division has sights on separation. In 1987, Universal Pictures, MGM/UA Communications Co. , and Paramount Pictures teamed up to market feature film and television products to China. Consumer reach
11324-487: The early 1970s, Universal teamed up with Paramount to form Cinema International Corporation , which distributed films by Paramount and Universal outside of the US and Canada. Although Universal did produce occasional hits, among them Airport (1970), The Sting (1973), American Graffiti (also 1973), Earthquake (1974), and a big box-office success which restored the company's fortunes: Jaws (1975), Universal during
11473-403: The end of the Laemmle era at the studio. Taking on the task of modernizing and upgrading a film conglomerate in the depths of the Great Depression was risky, and for a time, Universal slipped into receivership . The theater chain was scrapped , but Carl Jr. held fast to distribution, studio, and production operations. The end for the Laemmles came with a lavish version of Show Boat (1936),
11622-419: The expense and length of his films, eventually firing Stroheim on October 6, 1922, six weeks into the production of Merry-Go-Round (1923) and replacing him with Rupert Julian . Louis B. Mayer lured Thalberg away from Universal in late 1922 to his own growing studio, Louis B. Mayer Productions , as vice-president in charge of production, and when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was formed in 1924 Thalberg continued in
11771-487: The few women directing films in Hollywood. Starting in the mid-1920s, Universal branded its most expensive and heavily promoted feature films as "Super-Jewel" productions. These included films such as Erich von Stroheim 's Foolish Wives (1922), Clarence Brown 's The Acquittal (1923), Hobart Henley 's A Lady of Quality (1924), Harry A. Pollard 's Uncle Tom's Cabin (1927), and Edward Sloman 's Surrender (1928). Despite Laemmle's role as an innovator, he
11920-570: The film community. Since then, former next-door neighbor RKO closed up shop in 1957 (Paramount ultimately absorbed their former lot); Warner Bros. (whose old Sunset Boulevard studio was sold to Paramount in 1949 as a home for KTLA ) moved to Burbank in 1930; Columbia joined Warners in Burbank in 1973 then moved again to Culver City in 1989; and the Pickford-Fairbanks-Goldwyn-United Artists lot, after
12069-511: The finance committee in order to assist vice-president and treasurer Ralph A. Kohn. However, on January 6, 1933, Hertz resigned from his position when it become evident that his measures to lift the company had failed. The over-expansion and use of overvalued Paramount stock for purchases created a $ 21 million debt which led the company into receivership on January 26, 1933, and later filing bankruptcy on March 14, 1933. On April 17, 1933, bankruptcy trustees were appointed and Zukor lost control of
12218-496: The group's independent stations began in late December 1993 testing Video Games Challenge , interactive via the phone game show produced by Invisible Cities of Los Angeles and Big Band Productions of Sweden. In February 2000, Paramount Stations Group and ACME Communications reached an agreement. In 2000, PSG acquired Chris-Craft's stake in UPN, shortly thereafter, Chris-Craft exited broadcasting and sold most of its stations to News Corporation 's Fox Television Stations unit. PSG
12367-626: The highest-grossing film up to that time, grossing over $ 1.8 billion worldwide. Also during this time, three Paramount Pictures films won the Academy Award for Best Picture; Titanic , Braveheart , and Forrest Gump . Paramount's most important property, however, was Star Trek . Studio executives had begun to call it "the franchise" in the 1980s due to its reliable revenue, and other studios envied its "untouchable and unduplicatable" success. By 1998, Star Trek television shows, movies, books, videotapes, and licensing provided so much of
12516-415: The independent company International Pictures , and producer Kenneth Young. The new combine, United World Pictures, was a failure and was dissolved within one year. However, Rank and International remained interested in Universal, culminating in the studio's reorganization as Universal-International; the merger was announced on July 30, 1946. William Goetz , a founder of International along with Leo Spitz ,
12665-515: The job for eight years, restoring Paramount's reputation for commercial success with The Odd Couple , Rosemary's Baby , Love Story , The Godfather , Chinatown , and 3 Days of the Condor . Gulf and Western also bought the neighboring Desilu Productions television studio (once the lot of RKO Pictures ) from Lucille Ball in 1967. Using some of Desilu's established shows such as Star Trek , Mission: Impossible , and Mannix as
12814-465: The kind that once made Paramount the industry leader. Around the end of 1981, Paramount Pictures took over fellow Gulf and Western subsidiary Sega from the company's manufacturing division in an effort to get into the video game business. Paramount would go on to sell Sega following the Video Game Crash of 1983 , and the two companies would later work together on the live action/CGI Sonic
12963-668: The late 1920s and the early 1930s, talkies brought in a range of powerful draws: Richard Arlen , Nancy Carroll , Maurice Chevalier , Gary Cooper , Marlene Dietrich , Charles Ruggles , Ruth Chatterton , William Powell , Mae West , Sylvia Sidney , Bing Crosby , Claudette Colbert , the Marx Brothers , W.C. Fields , Fredric March , Jack Oakie , Jeanette MacDonald (whose first two films were shot at Paramount's Astoria, New York , studio), Carole Lombard , George Raft , Miriam Hopkins , Cary Grant and Stuart Erwin , among them. In this period Paramount can truly be described as
13112-498: The late 1930s was Destry Rides Again (1939), starring James Stewart as Destry and Marlene Dietrich in her comeback role after leaving Paramount . By the early 1940s, the company was concentrating on lower-budget productions that were the company's main staple: westerns, melodramas, serials, and sequels to the studio's horror pictures, the latter now solely B pictures. The studio fostered many series: The Dead End Kids and Little Tough Guys action features and serials (1938–43);
13261-493: The latter becoming a Fox-owned station. To make up for the loss of its Philadelphia-owned station, PSG acquired Philadelphia independent station WGBS-TV and its call letters were changed to WPSG-TV , and the UPN affiliation was moved there. The company eventually divested itself of the CBS and NBC stations it held and purchased more UPN affiliates as the 1990s continued. Airing since 1992 in Sweden and other European countries, 4 of
13410-470: The loss of the theater chain, Paramount Pictures went into a decline, cutting studio-backed production, releasing its contract players, and making production deals with independents. By the mid-1950s, all the great names were gone; only Cecil B. DeMille , associated with Paramount since 1913, kept making pictures in the grand old style. Despite Paramount's losses, DeMille would, however, give the studio some relief and create his most successful film at Paramount,
13559-420: The lucrative non-theatrical field, buying a majority stake in home-movie dealer Castle Films in 1947 and taking the company over entirely in 1951. For three decades, Castle would offer "highlights" reels from the Universal film library to home-movie enthusiasts and collectors. Goetz licensed Universal's pre–Universal-International film library to Jack Broeder's Realart Pictures for cinema re-release, but Realart
13708-414: The major names that made a couple of pictures for Universal during this period. Some stars came from radio, including Edgar Bergen , W. C. Fields , and the comedy team of Abbott and Costello ( Bud Abbott and Lou Costello ). Abbott and Costello's military comedy Buck Privates (1941) gave the former burlesque comedians a national and international profile. During the war years, Universal did have
13857-442: The melodramas directed by Douglas Sirk and produced by Ross Hunter , which were critically reassessed more positively years later. Among Universal-International's stable of stars were Rock Hudson , Tony Curtis , Jeff Chandler , Audie Murphy , and John Gavin . Although Decca would continue to keep picture budgets lean, it was favored by changing circumstances in the film business, as other studios let their contract actors go in
14006-616: The middle class by featuring the leading theatrical players of the time (leading to the slogan "Famous Players in Famous Plays"). By mid-1913, Famous Players had completed five films, and Zukor was on his way to success. Its first film was Les Amours de la reine Élisabeth , which starred Sarah Bernhardt . That same year, another aspiring producer, Jesse L. Lasky , opened his Lasky Feature Play Company with money borrowed from his brother-in-law, Samuel Goldfish, later known as Samuel Goldwyn . The Lasky company hired as their first employee
14155-415: The motion pictures and television arms of the formerly Universal Pictures Company and Revue Productions (officially renamed as Universal Television in 1966). And so, with MCA in charge, Universal became a full-blown, A-film movie studio, with leading actors and directors under contract; offering slick, commercial films; and a studio tour subsidiary launched in 1964. Television production made up much of
14304-660: The new United Paramount Theaters on December 31, 1949. Leonard Goldenson , who had headed the chain since 1938, remained as the new company's president. The Balaban and Katz theatre division was spun off with UPT; its trademark eventually became the property of the Balaban and Katz Historical Foundation. The foundation later acquired ownership of the Famous Players trademark. Cash-rich and controlling prime downtown real estate, Goldenson began looking for investments. Barred from film-making by prior antitrust rulings, he acquired
14453-565: The offer due to antitrust concerns. For all intents and purposes, this was the end of DuMont, though it lingered on until 1956. In 1951, Paramount bought a stake in International Telemeter , an experimental pay TV service which operated with a coin inserted into a box. The service began operating in Palm Springs, California on November 27, 1953, but due to pressure from the FCC, the service ended on May 15, 1954. With
14602-740: The other integrated studio-theatre combines made more money than ever. At this, the Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department decided to reopen their case against the five integrated studios. Paramount also had a monopoly over Detroit movie theaters through subsidiary company United Detroit Theaters. This led to the Supreme Court decision United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. (1948) holding that movie studios could not also own movie theater chains. This decision broke up Adolph Zukor's creation, with
14751-667: The ownership rights to the Rysher library, after Viacom acquired the rights from Cox Enterprises . Universal Pictures Universal City Studios LLC , doing business as Universal Pictures (also known as Universal Studios , or Universal ), is an American film production and distribution company that is a division of Universal Studios , which is owned by NBCUniversal , a division of Comcast . Founded in 1912 by Carl Laemmle , Mark Dintenfass , Charles O. Baumann , Adam Kessel , Pat Powers , William Swanson, David Horsley , Robert H. Cochrane, and Jules Brulatour , Universal
14900-470: The parent Universal Pictures organization resulted in the dissolution of this subsidiary. In the early years, Universal had a "clean picture" policy. However, by April 1927, Carl Laemmle considered this a mistake as "unclean pictures" from other studios generated more profit while Universal lost money. In early 1927, Universal had been negotiating deals with cartoon producers since they wanted to get back into producing them. On March 4, Charles Mintz signed
15049-558: The production side, Hiram Abrams in charge of distribution, and Zukor making great plans. With only the exhibitor-owned First National as a rival, Famous Players–Lasky and its "Paramount Pictures" soon dominated the business. The fusion was finalized on November 7, 1916. Because Zukor believed in stars, he signed and developed many of the leading early stars, including Mary Pickford , Marguerite Clark , Pauline Frederick , Douglas Fairbanks , Gloria Swanson , Rudolph Valentino , and Wallace Reid . With so many important players, Paramount
15198-475: The release of the film Mickey Blue Eyes . UIP then took over the theatrical distribution inventory of future films planned to be released by Universal Pictures International, such as The Green Mile and Angela's Ashes . On October 4, 1999, Universal renewed its commitments to United International Pictures to release its films internationally through 2006. Anxious to expand the company's broadcast and cable presence, longtime MCA head Lew Wasserman sought
15347-461: The sale of Gulf and Western's industrial properties in the mid-1980s, Paramount bought a string of television stations and KECO Entertainment 's theme park operations, renaming them Paramount Parks . These parks included Paramount's Great America , Paramount Canada's Wonderland , Paramount's Carowinds , Paramount's Kings Dominion , and Paramount's Kings Island . In May 1985, Paramount decided to start its own talent department, an attempt to form
15496-623: The sale of Gulf and Western's non-entertainment properties to take over the TVX Broadcast Group chain of television stations (which at that point consisted mainly of large-market stations which TVX had bought from Taft Broadcasting , plus two mid-market stations which TVX owned prior to the Taft purchase), and the KECO Entertainment chain of theme parks from Taft successor Great American Broadcasting. Both of these companies had their names changed to reflect new ownership: TVX became known as
15645-529: The same corporate entity, the central element of the Studio system era. Following the westward trend of the industry, by the end of 1912, the company was focusing its production efforts in the Hollywood area. Universal Weekly and Moving Picture Weekly were the alternating names of Universal's internal magazine that began publication in this era; the magazine was intended to market Universal's films to exhibitors. Since much of Universal's early film output
15794-498: The same position for the new company. Without Thalberg's guidance, Universal became a second-tier studio and would remain so for several decades. In 1926, Universal opened a production unit in Germany, Deutsche Universal-Film AG, under the direction of Joe Pasternak . This unit produced three to four films per year until 1936, migrating to Hungary and then Austria in the face of Hitler 's increasing domination of central Europe. With
15943-447: The struggling ABC television network in February 1953, leading it first to financial health, and eventually, in the mid-1970s, to first place in the national Nielsen ratings, before selling out to Capital Cities in 1985 (Capital Cities would eventually sell out, in turn, to The Walt Disney Company in 1996). United Paramount Theaters was renamed ABC Theaters in 1965 and was sold to businessman Henry Plitt in 1977. The movie theater chain
16092-417: The studio incorporated as a distinct subsidiary organization. Unlike other movie moguls, Laemmle opened his studio to tourists. Universal became the largest studio in Hollywood and remained so for a decade. However, it sought an audience mostly in small towns, producing mostly inexpensive melodramas , westerns , and serials . In 1916, Universal formed a three-tier branding system for their releases. Unlike
16241-410: The studio on April 2, 1936. Although Universal's 1936 Show Boat (released a little over a month later) became a critical and financial success, it was not enough to save the Laemmles' involvement with the studio. They were unceremoniously removed from the company they had founded, with studio advertisements referring to "the new Universal". Because the Laemmles personally oversaw production, Show Boat
16390-476: The studio retained the Walter Lantz cartoon studio, whose product was released with Universal-International's films. In the 1950s, Universal-International resumed their series of Arabian Nights films, many starring Tony Curtis . The studio also had success with monster and science fiction films produced by William Alland , with many directed by Jack Arnold and starring John Agar . Other successes were
16539-547: The studio to sound production, and made several forays into high-quality production. His early efforts included the critically panned part-talkie version of Edna Ferber 's novel Show Boat (1929), the lavish musical Broadway (1929) which included Technicolor sequences; and the first all-color musical feature (for Universal), King of Jazz (1930). The more serious All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) won its year's Best Picture Oscar . Laemmle Jr. created
16688-480: The studio's library includes many individual films such as The Godfather and Titanic , both of which became the highest-grossing films of all time during their initial releases. Paramount Pictures is a member of the Motion Picture Association (MPA). Paramount is the sixth oldest surviving film studio in the world; after Gaumont Film Company (1895), Pathé (1896), Titanus (1904), Nordisk Film (1906), and Universal Pictures (1912). It
16837-620: The studio's output from its wartime average of fifty films per year (nearly twice the major studio's output) to thirty-five films a year. Distribution and copyright control remained under the name of Universal Pictures Company Inc. Goetz set out an ambitious schedule. Universal-International became responsible for the American distribution of Rank's British productions, including such classics as David Lean 's Great Expectations (1946) and Laurence Olivier 's Hamlet (1948). Broadening its scope further, Universal-International branched out into
16986-505: The studio's output, with Universal heavily committed, in particular, to deals with NBC (which much later merged with Universal to form NBC Universal; see below ) providing up to half of all prime time shows for several seasons. An innovation during this period championed by Universal was the made-for-television movie. In 1982, Universal became the studio base for many shows that were produced by Norman Lear 's Tandem Productions / Embassy Television , including Diff'rent Strokes , One Day at
17135-467: The studio's profit that "it is not possible to spend any reasonable amount of time at Paramount and not be aware of [its] presence"; filming for Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine required up to nine of the largest of the studio's 36 sound stages . In 1995, Viacom and Chris-Craft Industries ' United Television launched United Paramount Network (UPN) with Star Trek: Voyager as its flagship series, fulfilling Barry Diller's plan for
17284-536: The studio. Gone were the big ambitions, and though Universal had a few big names under contract, those it had been cultivating, like William Wyler and Margaret Sullavan , left. Meanwhile, producer Joe Pasternak, who had been successfully producing light musicals with young sopranos for Universal's German subsidiary, repeated his formula in the United States. Teenage singer Deanna Durbin starred in Pasternak's first American film, Three Smart Girls (1936). The film
17433-512: The studios' West Coast productions. On January 5, 1926, Lasky reached an agreement to buy the Robert Brunton Studios, a 26-acre facility owned by United Pictures and located at 5451 Marathon Street, for $ 1.0 million (equivalent to $ 13.8 million in 2023). On March 29, the company began an eight-month building program to renovate the existing facilities and erect new ones. On May 8, Lasky finally moved operations from
17582-410: The theater chain being split into a new company, United Paramount Theaters , and effectively brought an end to the classic Hollywood studio system . With the separation of production and exhibition forced by the U.S. Supreme Court, Paramount Pictures Inc. was split in two. Paramount Pictures Corporation was formed to be the production distribution company, with the 1,500-screen theater chain handed to
17731-428: The three companies into one. The new company Lasky and Zukor founded on June 28, Famous Players–Lasky Corporation , although it continued to use the name "Paramount," as well. As a result, it became the largest film company at the time with a value of US$ 12.5 million (equivalent to $ 241.8 million in 2023). The corporation was able to grow quickly, with Lasky and his partners Goldwyn and DeMille running
17880-910: The time of the transition in 1991, the group consisted of six outlets: Fox affiliates KRRT (now KMYS ) in the San Antonio area, WLFL-TV in Raleigh , and WTXF-TV in Philadelphia ; and independent stations KTXA in Fort Worth , KTXH in Houston , and WDCA in Washington, D.C. Shortly thereafter, the group began its expansion with its purchase of then-Fox affiliate WKBD-TV in Detroit from Cox Enterprises in 1993. The original incarnation of Viacom purchased Paramount in 1993, with
18029-520: The top-tier studios, Universal did not own any theaters to market its feature films. Universal branding their product gave theater owners and audiences a quick reference guide. Branding would help theater owners judge films they were about to lease and help fans decide which movies they wanted to see. Universal released three different types of feature motion pictures: Directors of "Jewel" films included Jack Conway , John Ford , Rex Ingram , Robert Z. Leonard , George Marshall , and Lois Weber , one of
18178-579: The two first films it produced, Claude Chabrol 's Le scandale (English title The Champagne Murders , 1967) and Romain Gary 's Les oiseaux vont mourir au Pérou (English title Birds in Peru ), it was only involved in French or other European co-productions, including Louis Malle 's Lacombe, Lucien , Bertrand Blier 's Les Valseuses (English title Going Places , 1974), and Fred Zinnemann 's The Day of
18327-449: The wake of the 1948 U.S. vs. Paramount Pictures, et al. decision. Leading actors were increasingly free to work where and when they chose, and in 1950 MCA agent Lew Wasserman made a deal with Universal for his client James Stewart that would change the rules of the business. Wasserman's deal gave Stewart a share in the profits of three pictures in lieu of a large salary. When one of those films, Winchester '73 (1950), proved to be
18476-459: The world's largest talent agency, had also become a powerful television producer, renting space at Republic Studios for its Revue Productions subsidiary. After a period of complete shutdown, a moribund Universal agreed to sell its 360-acre (1.5 km ) studio lot to MCA in 1958 for $ 11 million, renamed Revue Studios . MCA owned the studio lot, but not Universal Pictures, yet was increasingly influential on Universal's products. The studio lot
18625-406: The world, while its fortuitous earlier acquisition of the Star Trek property, which had grown into a cult favorite , enabled Paramount to have a long running science fiction film and television franchise to compete with the outstanding popular success of Star Wars . Diller's television background led him to propose one of his longest-standing ideas to the board: Paramount Television Service ,
18774-544: Was a box-office hit and reputedly resolved the studio's financial problems. The film's success led Universal to offer her a contract, which for the first five years of her career, produced her most successful pictures. When Pasternak stopped producing Durbin's pictures, and she outgrew her screen persona and pursued more dramatic roles, the studio signed 13-year-old Gloria Jean for her own series of Pasternak musicals from 1939; she went on to star with Bing Crosby , W. C. Fields , and Donald O'Connor . A popular Universal film of
18923-598: Was a more interested listener. However, the television division would be playing catch-up for over a decade after Diller's departure in 1984 before launching its own television network – UPN – in 1995. Lasting eleven years before being merged with The WB network to become The CW in 2006, UPN would feature many of the shows it originally produced for other networks, and would take numerous gambles on series such as Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise that would have otherwise either gone direct-to-cable or become first-run syndication to independent stations across
19072-433: Was able to introduce " block booking ", which meant that an exhibitor who wanted a particular star's films had to buy a year's worth of other Paramount productions. It was this system that gave Paramount a leading position in the 1920s and 1930s, but which led the government to pursue it on antitrust grounds for more than twenty years. By the mid-1920s, the old Lasky-DeMille barn property was not big enough to handle all of
19221-416: Was also borrowed for two films from Selznick International Pictures : Saboteur (1942) and Shadow of a Doubt (1943). As Universal's main product had always been lower-budgeted films, it was one of the last major studios to contract with Technicolor . The studio did not make use of the three-strip Technicolor process until Arabian Nights (1942), starring Jon Hall and Maria Montez . Technicolor
19370-526: Was also one of the first Hollywood studios to release what were known at that time as "talkies", and in 1929, released their first musical, Innocents of Paris . Richard A. Whiting and Leo Robin composed the score for the film; Maurice Chevalier starred and sang the most famous song from the film, " Louise ". The driving force behind Paramount's rise was Zukor. He built a chain of nearly 2,000 screens, ran two production studios (in Astoria, New York , now
19519-429: Was also used for the studio's remake of their 1925 horror melodrama, Phantom of the Opera (1943) with Claude Rains and Nelson Eddy . With the success of their first two pictures, a regular schedule of high-budget Technicolor films followed. In 1945, J. Arthur Rank, who had already owned a stake in the studio almost a decade before, hoping to expand his American presence, bought into a four-way merger with Universal,
19668-447: Was an extremely cautious studio chief. Unlike rivals Adolph Zukor , William Fox , and Marcus Loew , Laemmle chose not to develop a theater chain . He also financed all of his own films, refusing to take on debt. This policy nearly bankrupted the studio when actor-director Erich von Stroheim insisted on excessively lavish production values for his films Blind Husbands (1919) and Foolish Wives (1922), but Universal shrewdly gained
19817-481: Was destroyed in subsequent fires and nitrate degradation, the surviving issues of these magazines are a crucial source for film historians. On March 15, 1915, Laemmle opened the world's largest motion picture production facility, Universal City Studios , on a 230-acre (0.9-km ) converted farm just over the Cahuenga Pass from Hollywood. Studio management became the third facet of Universal's operations, with
19966-615: Was established on June 8, 1912, formed in a merger of Independent Moving Pictures (IMP), the Powers Motion Picture Company , Rex Motion Picture Manufacturing Company , Champion Film Company , Nestor Film Company , and the New York Motion Picture Company . Eventually all would be bought out by Laemmle. The new Universal studio was a vertically integrated company , with movie production, distribution, and exhibition venues all linked in
20115-429: Was even more popular than Mickey Mouse . After an unsuccessful expansion into feature films, as well as the fact that Max and Dave Fleischer were no longer speaking to one another, Fleischer Studios was acquired by Paramount, which renamed the operation Famous Studios . That incarnation of the animation studio continued cartoon production until 1967, but has been historically dismissed as having largely failed to maintain
20264-550: Was folded the next year after Viacom completed its merger with CBS. The remaining PSG stations were merged with the CBS owned-and-operated stations to form the Viacom Television Stations Group . Today, that group is called CBS News and Stations . Stations are arranged alphabetically by state and by community of license . Paramount Communications Paramount Pictures Corporation , commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount ,
20413-468: Was made head of production at the renamed Universal-International Pictures, a subsidiary of Universal Pictures Company, Inc. which also served as an import-export subsidiary, and copyright holder for the production arm's films. Goetz, a son-in-law of Louis B. Mayer , decided to bring "prestige" to the new company. He stopped the studio's low-budget production of B movies , serials and curtailed Universal's horror and " Arabian Nights " cycles. He also reduced
20562-585: Was made in response to a change in distribution practices that had occurred among the various major studios. In August 1987, Paramount Overseas Productions declared that the subsidiary would be in service not just for the upcoming film Experts , which was shot on a budget of $ 12 million in Canada , but also for other films filmed there worldwide, including the United Kingdom and Canada . In 1993, Sumner Redstone 's entertainment conglomerate Viacom made
20711-626: Was measured in terms of the 25 billion admission tickets that were clocked in China in 1986, and Worldwide Media Sales, a division of the New York-based Worldwide Media Group, had been placed in charge of the undertaking. In the early 1980s, the company had its own pay television arm Universal Pay Television (a.k.a. Universal Pay TV Programming, Inc.), which spawned in 1987, an 11-picture cable television agreement with then-independent film studio New Line Cinema . In
20860-454: Was not allowed to show the films on television. The production arm of the studio still struggled. While there were to be a few hits like The Killers (1946) and The Naked City (1948), both produced by Mark Hellinger , Universal-International's new theatrical films often met with disappointing response at the box office. By the late 1940s, Goetz was out. The studio returned to low-budget and series films such as Ma and Pa Kettle (1949),
21009-585: Was re-listed on the New York Stock Exchange and when the company was under Balaban's leadership, the studio was successfully relaunched. As always, Paramount films continued to emphasize stars; in the 1920s there were Gloria Swanson , Wallace Reid , Rudolph Valentino , Florence Vidor , Thomas Meighan , Pola Negri , Bebe Daniels , Antonio Moreno , Richard Dix , Esther Ralston , Emil Jannings , George Bancroft , Betty Compson , Clara Bow , Adolphe Menjou , and Charles Buddy Rogers . By
21158-401: Was released (despite the takeover) with Carl Laemmle and Carl Laemmle Jr.'s names on the credits and in the film's advertising campaign. Standard Capital's J. Cheever Cowdin had taken over as president and chairman of the board of directors and instituted severe cuts in production budgets. Joining him were British entrepreneurs C.M. Woolf and J. Arthur Rank , who bought a significant stake in
21307-520: Was released. On May 8, 1914, Paramount Pictures Corporation (previously known as Progressive Pictures) was founded by a Utah theatre owner, W. W. Hodkinson , who had bought and merged five smaller firms. On May 15, 1914, Hodkinson signed a five-year contract with the Famous Players Film Company, the Lasky Company and Bosworth, Inc. to distribute their films. Actor, director and producer Hobart Bosworth had started production of
21456-483: Was renamed Plitt Theaters. In 1985, Cineplex Odeon Corporation merged with Plitt. In later years, Paramount's TV division would develop a strong relationship with ABC, providing many hit series to the network. Paramount Pictures had been an early backer of television, launching experimental stations in 1939 in Los Angeles and Chicago. The Los Angeles station eventually became KTLA , the first commercial station on
21605-503: Was sold to MCA (now Universal Music Group ) in 1979. Paramount's successful run of pictures extended into the 1980s and 1990s, generating hits like Airplane! , American Gigolo , Ordinary People , An Officer and a Gentleman , Flashdance , Terms of Endearment , Footloose , Pretty in Pink , Top Gun , Crocodile Dundee , Fatal Attraction , Ghost , the Friday
21754-460: Was still chairman emeritus; he referred to chairman Barney Balaban (born 1888) as "the boy". Such aged leadership was incapable of keeping up with the changing times, and in 1966, a sinking Paramount was sold to Charles Bluhdorn 's industrial conglomerate, Gulf and Western Industries . Bluhdorn immediately put his stamp on the studio, installing a virtually unknown producer named Robert Evans as head of production. Despite some rough times, Evans held
21903-502: Was temporarily closed with the objective of equipping it with the technology for the production of sound films . In the same year, Paramount began releasing Inkwell Imps , animated cartoons produced by Max and Dave Fleischer 's Fleischer Studios in New York City. The Fleischers, veterans in the animation industry, were among the few animation producers capable of challenging the prominence of Walt Disney . The Paramount newsreel series Paramount News ran from 1927 to 1957. Paramount
22052-454: Was the big player in New York City, and did not want the Publix theaters to overshadow theirs. The two companies brokered a non-competition deal for New York City and Chicago, and Loew's took over the New York City area projects, developing five wonder theaters . Publix continued Balaban's wonder theater development in its home area. On April 24, 1930, Paramount-Famous Lasky Corporation became
22201-542: Was upgraded and modernized, while MCA clients like Doris Day , Lana Turner , Cary Grant , and director Alfred Hitchcock were signed to Universal contracts. The long-awaited takeover of Universal Pictures by MCA, Inc. happened in mid-1962 as part of the MCA- Decca Records merger. As a final gesture before leaving the talent agency business, virtually every MCA client was signed to a Universal contract. In 1964, MCA formed Universal City Studios, Inc ., merging
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