Marcus Loew | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | May 7, 1870 New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Died | September 5, 1927 (aged 57) Glen Cove, New York, U.S. |
| Nationality | Austrian-American |
| Occupation | Film exhibitor |
| Known for | Founder of Loews Inc. |
| Title | President |
| Successor | Nicholas Schenck |
| Spouse | Carrie Loew |
| Children | 2 |
Marcus Loew (May 7, 1870 - September 5, 1927) [1] was an American business magnate and a pioneer of the motion picture industry who formed Loew's Theatres and the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studio (MGM).
Loew was born in New York City, into a poor Jewish family, who had emigrated to New York City a few years previously from Austria and Germany. [2] He was forced by circumstances to work at a very young age and had little formal education. Nevertheless, beginning with a small investment of money saved from menial jobs, he bought into the penny arcade business. Shortly after, in partnership with Adolph Zukor and others, he founded the successful but short-lived Automatic Vaudeville Company which established a chain of arcades across several cities. After the company dissolved in 1904 Loew converted his share of the business into nickelodeons and over time he turned Loew's Theatres into a leading chain of vaudeville and movie theaters in the United States.
By 1905, Marcus Loew was on his own and his success eventually necessitated that he secure a steady flow of product for his theaters. In 1904, he founded the People's Vaudeville Company, a theater chain showcasing one-reel films and live variety shows. In 1910, the company had considerably expanded and was renamed Loew's Consolidated Enterprises. His associates included Adolph Zukor, Joseph Schenck, and Nicholas Schenck. In addition to theaters, Loew and the Schencks expanded the Fort George Amusement Park in upper Manhattan.
By 1913, Loew operated a large number of theaters in New York City including the American Music Hall, Avenue A Theatre, Avenue B Theatre, Broadway Theatre (41st St.), Circle Theatre, and the Columbia Theatre in Brooklyn. Other Loew-operated theaters were the Delancey St. Theatre, Greeley Sq. Theatre, Herald Square Theatre, Liberty Theatre, Brooklyn, Lincoln Sq. Theatre, National Theatre (149th St.), Plaza Theatre, 7th Ave. Theatre (124th St.), Shubert Theatre, Brooklyn, and the Yorkville Theatre. [3] Outside of New York, he managed the Columbia Theatres of both Washington, D.C., [4] [5] and Boston and Philadelphia’s Metropolitan Opera House. [3]
Loew found himself faced with a serious dilemma: his merged companies lacked a central managerial command structure. Loew preferred to remain in New York overseeing the growing chain of Loew's Theatres. Film production had been gravitating toward southern California since 1913. By 1917 he oversaw a number of enterprises: Borough Theatre Co., Empress Amusement Corp., Fort George Amusement Co., Glendive Amusement Corp., Greeley Square Amusement Co., Loew's Consolidated Enterprise, Loew's Theatrical Enterprises, Mascot Amusement Co., Natonia Amusement Co., People's Vaudeville Co. [6] In 1919, Loew reorganized the company under the name Loew's, Inc. [7]
In 1920, Loew purchased Metro Pictures Corporation. A few years later, he acquired a controlling interest in the financially troubled Goldwyn Picture Corporation which at that point was controlled by theater impresario Lee Shubert. Goldwyn Pictures owned the "Leo the Lion" trademark and studio property in Culver City, California. But without its founder Samuel Goldwyn, the Goldwyn studio lacked strong management. With Loew's vice president Nicholas Schenck needed in New York City to help manage the large East Coast movie theater operations, Loew had to find a qualified executive to take charge of this new Los Angeles entity.
Loew recalled meeting a film producer named Louis B. Mayer who had been operating a successful, modest studio in east Los Angeles. Mayer had been making low budget melodramas for a number of years, marketing them primarily to women. Since he rented most of his equipment and hired most of his stars on a per-picture basis, Loew wasn't after Mayer's brick and mortar business; he wanted Mayer and his Chief of Production, the former Universal Pictures executive, Irving Thalberg. Nicholas Schenck was dispatched to finalize the deal that ultimately resulted in the formation of Metro-Goldwyn Pictures in April 1924 with Mayer as the studio head and Thalberg chief of production.
Mayer's company folded into Metro Goldwyn with two notable additions: Mayer Pictures' contracts with key directors such as Fred Niblo and John M. Stahl, and up-and-coming actress Norma Shearer, later married to Thalberg. Mayer would eventually be rewarded by having his name added to the company. Loews Inc. would act as MGM's financier and retain controlling interest for decades.
Though MGM was immediately successful, Loew died in 1927 of a heart attack at the age of 57 at his country home in Glen Cove, New York. Reporting his death, Variety called him "the most beloved man of all show business of all time". [8] He was interred in the Maimonides Cemetery in Brooklyn. [9]
For his very significant contribution to the development of the motion picture industry, Marcus Loew has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1617 Vine Street.
He and his wife, Carrie Loew, had twin sons, David L. Loew (1897–1973) and Arthur Marcus Loew Sr (1897–1977). [8] Arthur married Mildred Zukor, daughter of Adolph Zukor [10] and became president of MGM. Their son, Arthur Loew Jr. (1925–1995), was an actor, producer and writer. [11]
E.M. Loew (né Elias Moses Loew; 1897–1984), also a major theater operator, to a lesser degree, is often assumed to be related to Marcus Loew. They weren't even distantly related. Among other things, E.M. Loew was, with Lou Walters (father of Barbara Walters), co-owner of the Latin Quarter in Boston, the Latin Quarter in New York, and the Latin Quarter in Miami Beach. [12]
The Fox Film Corporation was an American Independent film production studio formed by William Fox (1879–1952) in 1915, by combining his earlier Greater New York Film Rental Company and Box Office Attractions Film Company.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924, and based in Beverly Hills, California.
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.
Irving Grant Thalberg was an American film producer during the early years of motion pictures. He was called "The Boy Wonder" for his youth and ability to select scripts, choose actors, gather production staff, and make profitable films, including Grand Hotel, China Seas, A Night at the Opera, Mutiny on the Bounty, Camille and The Good Earth. His films carved out an international market, "projecting a seductive image of American life brimming with vitality and rooted in democracy and personal freedom", states biographer Roland Flamini.
Nicholas M. Schenck was a Russian-American film studio executive and businessman.
Major film studios are production and distribution companies that release a substantial number of films annually and consistently command a significant share of box office revenue in a given market. In the American and international markets, the major film studios, often known simply as the majors or the Big Five studios, are commonly regarded as the five diversified media conglomerates whose various film production and distribution subsidiaries collectively command approximately 80 to 85% of U.S. box office revenue. The term may also be applied more specifically to the primary motion picture business subsidiary of each respective conglomerate.
Loews Cineplex Entertainment, also known as Loews Incorporated, is an American theater chain operating in North America. From 1924 until 1959, it was also the parent company of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios (MGM). It was formerly jointly owned by Sony Pictures and Universal Studios and operated theatres in the United States, Canada, South Korea, Spain and Mexico.
Louis Burt Mayer was a Canadian-American film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios (MGM) in 1924. Under Mayer's management, MGM became the film industry's most prestigious movie studio, accumulating the largest concentration of leading writers, directors, and stars in Hollywood.
Samuel Goldwyn, also known as Samuel Goldfish, was a Polish-born American film producer. 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).
Wilhelm Fried Fuchs, commonly and better known as William Fox, was an American film industry executive who founded the Fox Film Corporation in 1915 and the Fox West Coast Theatres chain in the 1920s. Although he lost control of his film businesses in 1930, his name was used by 20th Century Fox and continues to be used in the trademarks of the present-day Fox Corporation, including the Fox Broadcasting Company, Fox News, Fox Sports and Foxtel.
Goldwyn Pictures Corporation was an American motion picture production company that operated from 1916 to 1924 when it was merged with two other production companies to form the major studio, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was founded on November 19, 1916, by Samuel Goldwyn, an executive at Lasky's Feature Play Company, and Broadway producer brothers Edgar and Archibald Selwyn, using an amalgamation of both last names to name the company.
Joseph Michael Schenck was a Russian-born American film studio executive.
Lewis J. Selznick was an American producer in the early years of the film industry. After initial involvement with World Film at Fort Lee, New Jersey, he established Selznick Pictures in California.
Twentieth Century Pictures, Inc. was an independent Hollywood motion picture production company created in 1933 by Joseph Schenck and Darryl F. Zanuck from Warner Bros. Financial backing came from Schenck's younger brother Nicholas Schenck, president of Loew's, the theater chain that owned Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Louis B. Mayer of MGM, who wanted a position for his son-in-law, William Goetz, Bank of America and Herbert J. Yates owner of the film processing laboratory Consolidated Film Industries, who later founded Republic Pictures Corporation in 1935. . The company product was distributed by United Artists (UA), and leased space at Samuel Goldwyn Studios.
Metro Pictures Corporation was a motion picture production company founded in early 1915 in Jacksonville, Florida. It was a forerunner of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The company produced its films in New York, Los Angeles, and sometimes at leased facilities in Fort Lee, New Jersey. It was purchased in 1919.
The Sony Pictures Studios is an American television and film studio complex located in Culver City, California at 10202 West Washington Boulevard and bounded by Culver Boulevard (south), Washington Boulevard (north), Overland Avenue (west) and Madison Avenue (east). Founded in 1912, the facility is currently owned by Sony Pictures and houses the division's film studios, such as Columbia Pictures, TriStar Pictures, and Screen Gems. The complex was the original studios of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1924 to 1986 and Lorimar-Telepictures from 1986 to 1989.
Mitchel H. Mark a.k.a. Mitchell Mark a.k.a. Mitchell H. Mark was a pioneer of motion picture exhibition in the United States.
Nils T. Granlund was an American show producer, entertainment industry entrepreneur and radio industry pioneer. He was a publicist for Marcus Loew who formed Loews Theatres and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Although his birth name was Nils Theodore Granlund, he later used Thor as a middle name, and after appearing on early radio was commonly referenced only by his initials, N.T.G., on the air and in print.
Arthur Loew Jr. was an American film producer.
The Automatic Vaudeville Company was a short-lived American entertainment business founded in 1903 by Adolph Zukor, David Warfield and Marcus Loew, which owned a chain of penny arcades.
... as he began to expand his movie empire. In October 1919, Loew and Walter Brownley of Washington purchased the Columbia and two buildings on 12th Street for half a million dollars. The Columbia was one of the big moneymakers among ...
LCCN 98-641840; ISSN 0040-5531, ISSN 2832-0441; OCLC 4046918(all editions) & OCLC 32098816(all editions). 
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
| Other | |
