Cecil Blount DeMille was an American filmmaker and actor. Between 1914 and 1958, he made 70 features, both silent and sound films. He is acknowledged as a founding father of American cinema and the most commercially successful producer-director in film history, with many films dominating the box office three or four at a time. His films were distinguished by their epic scale and by his cinematic showmanship. His silent films included social dramas, comedies, Westerns, farces, morality plays, and historical pageants. He was an active Freemason and member of Prince of Orange Lodge #16 in New York City.
Paramount Pictures Corporation, commonly known as Paramount Pictures or simply Paramount, 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, and the sole member of the "Big Five" film studios located within the city limits of Los Angeles.
Adolph Zukor was a Hungarian-American film producer best known as one of the three founders of Paramount Pictures. He produced one of America's first feature-length films, The Prisoner of Zenda, in 1913.
Samuel Goldwyn, also known as Samuel Goldfish, was a Polish-born American film producer and pioneer in the American film industry, who produced Hollywood's first major motion picture. He was best known for being the founding contributor and executive of several motion picture studios in Hollywood. He was awarded the 1973 Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award, the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award (1947) and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award (1958).
The Hollywood Heritage Museum, also known as the "Hollywood Studio Museum," is located on Highland Ave. in Hollywood, California, United States.
William Wadsworth Hodkinson, known more commonly as W. W. Hodkinson, was born in Independence, Kansas. Known as The Man Who Invented Hollywood, he opened one of the first movie theaters in Ogden, Utah in 1907 and within just a few years changed the way movies were produced, distributed, and exhibited. He became a leading West Coast film distributor in the early days of motion pictures and in 1914 he founded and became president of the first nationwide film distributor, Paramount Pictures Corporation. Hodkinson was also responsible for doodling the mountain that became the Paramount logo also in 1914. After being driven out of Paramount, he established his own independent distribution company, the W. W. Hodkinson Corporation, in 1917, before selling it off in 1924. He left the motion picture business in 1929 to form Hodkinson Aviation Corporation, and later formed the Central American Aviation Corporation and Companía Nacional de Aviación in Guatemala.
The Famous Players Film Company was a film company founded in 1912 by Adolph Zukor in partnership with the Frohman brothers, powerful New York City theatre owners and producers.
Jetta Goudal was a Dutch-American actress, successful in Hollywood films of the silent film era.
Salome of the Tenements is a 1925 American silent drama film adapted to the screen by Sonya Levien from the Anzia Yezierska novel of the same name. Made by Jesse L. Lasky and Adolph Zukor's Famous Players–Lasky Corporation, a division of Paramount Pictures, it was directed by Sidney Olcott and starred Jetta Goudal and Godfrey Tearle.
The Famous Players–Lasky Corporation was an American motion picture and distribution company formed on June 28, 1916, from the merger of Adolph Zukor's Famous Players Film Company – originally formed by Zukor as Famous Players in Famous Plays – and the Jesse L. Lasky Feature Play Company.
Helen Marguerite Clark was an American stage and silent film actress. As a movie actress, at one time Clark was second only to Mary Pickford in popularity. With a few exceptions and some fragments, most of Clark's films are considered lost.
Famous Players may refer to
Walter Wanger was an American film producer active from the 1910s, his career concluding with the turbulent production of Cleopatra, his last film, in 1963. He began at Paramount Pictures in the 1920s and eventually worked at virtually every major studio as either a contract producer or an independent. He also served as President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences from 1939 to October 1941 and from December 1941 to 1945. Strongly influenced by European films, Wanger developed a reputation as an intellectual and a socially conscious movie executive who produced provocative message movies and glittering romantic melodramas. He achieved notoriety when, in 1951, he shot and wounded the agent of his wife, Joan Bennett, because he suspected they were having an affair. He was convicted of the crime and served a four-month sentence, then returned to making movies.
The Kaufman Astoria Studios is a film studio located in the Astoria neighborhood of Queens in New York City. The studio was constructed for Famous Players–Lasky in 1920, since it was close to Manhattan's Theater District. The property was taken over by real estate developer George S. Kaufman in 1982 and renamed Kaufman Astoria Studios.
Charles Eyton was an actor-producer who became general manager of Famous Players–Lasky Corporation during the silent film era.
Alexander Lichtman was a film salesman, occasionally working as a film producer. He was president of United Artists in 1935. He proposed the process of block booking to Adolph Zukor, which became industry standard practice. Variety called him "perhaps the greatest film salesman in the history of the business".
Hiram Abrams was an early American movie mogul and one of the first presidents of Paramount Pictures. He was also the first managing director of United Artists.
The Captive is an American silent-era film released on April 22, 1915. It was released on five reels. The film was written, directed, edited, and produced by Cecil B. DeMille. Jesse L. Lasky was another producer and Jeanie MacPherson worked with DeMille to write the screenplay. The film is based on a play written by Cecil B. DeMille and Jeanie MacPherson. The Captive grossed over $56,000 on a budget of $12,154. Blanche Sweet stars as Sonia Martinovich, alongside House Peters who stars as Mahmud Hassan. The film details the romantic war-era plight of Sonia and her lover Mahmud.
Wilfred Buckland was an American art director. Buckland worked as an art director with Cecil B. DeMille and Jesse Lasky, and later with Alan Dwan, from 1914 to 1927. He was Hollywood's first "art director" and is credited with a number of advancements in filmmaking, including the advances in lighting techniques, the development of architectural sets, and the use of miniature sets. In 1924, he was named one of the ten individuals who had contributed the most to the advancement of the motion picture industry since the time of its inception. A 1980 exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London advanced the argument that "everything we know as 'Hollywood' traces to Wilfred Buckland." Buckland was among the first inductees in the Art Directors Guild Hall of Fame.
Harold B. Franklin was an American cinema chain executive who later moved into production of stage shows and films. He co-produced the musical comedy Revenge with Music (1934). He produced the 1940 melodrama parody film The Villain Still Pursued Her.
