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Location | Culver City, California, U.S. |
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Address | 10202 West Washington Boulevard |
Coordinates | 34°01′02″N118°24′06″W / 34.017222°N 118.401667°W |
Opening date | 1912 | (as Inceville Studios)
Developer | Thomas H. Ince |
Owner | Sony Pictures (Sony) |
No. of tenants | 15 |
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 1988.
In addition to films shot at the facility, several television shows have been broadcast live or taped there. The lot, which is open to the public for daily studio tours, currently houses a total of sixteen separate sound stages.
Director Thomas H. Ince built his pioneering Inceville studios in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles in 1912. While Ince was filming at Ballona Creek in 1915, Harry Culver, the founding father of Culver City, persuaded Ince to move Inceville to Culver City. During that time, Ince co-founded Triangle Film Corporation and the Triangle Studios was opened in the form of a Greek colonnade – the entrance to the studios. The colonnade still stands fronting Washington Boulevard and is a Culver City historical landmark.
Ince added a few stages and an Administration Building before selling out to his partners D. W. Griffith and Mack Sennett. Ince relocated down the street and built the Culver Studios at that location. In 1918, Triangle Studios was sold to film producer Samuel Goldwyn. Goldwyn also added a few sound stages before selling his shares in Goldwyn Studios.
In 1924, Loew's President Marcus Loew organized the mergers and acquisitions of three film companies – The Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures and Louis B. Mayer Pictures to form Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and occupying the Goldwyn production facilities. [ citation needed ]
In the Classic Hollywood cinema, MGM Studios was responsible for shooting 52 films a year, from screen epic films such as Ben-Hur , and Mutiny on the Bounty , to drawing-room dramas such as Grand Hotel , Dinner at Eight , and Anna Karenina . But it was the Technicolor musical films, including The Wizard of Oz , Singin' in the Rain and Gigi that MGM was best known for. MGM's success led to six working studio complexes, more than 180 acres (0.73 km2) including twenty-eight soundstages – Stage 15 is the second largest sound stage in the world, and Stage 27 served as "Munchkinland" in the production of The Wizard of Oz.[ citation needed ]
In addition to the main production building, MGM added two large backlot facilities – Lot 2 located opposite the main studio across Overland Avenue. Lot 3 entered the corner of Jefferson Boulevard and Overland Avenue and was MGM's largest backlot. The administration building was inaugurated in 1938 and was named for Thalberg.[ citation needed ]
However, the United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. antitrust case of 1948 severed MGM's connection with Loews Theaters, and it struggled through its affairs.
On August 10, 1965, a massive fire destroyed Vault #7 in Lot 3, resulting in the loss of hundreds of silent-era films, among them Lon Chaney's 1927 film London After Midnight , though the majority of MGM's silent film stock survived the fire. In 1969, millionaire Kirk Kerkorian bought MGM and proceeded to dismantle the studio. MGM's film memorabilia was sold through an 18-day auction, and 38 acres (150,000 m2) of the studio's backlots were sold. Lot 3 was razed while Lot 2 was sold to housing developments. Kerkorian used the money to construct his MGM Resorts hotel chain.[ citation needed ]
In 1981, Kerkorian's Tracinda acquired United Artists and merged it with MGM to become MGM/UA Entertainment Co. He then sold MUEC to Ted Turner in 1986, who after 74 days, sold MGM/UA back to Kerkorian while retaining the pre-1986 MGM film library. In 1986, the studio lot was sold to Lorimar-Telepictures. During that time, the MGM logo was removed from the studios and moved across the street to the Filmland Building (now known as Sony Pictures Plaza) before their 1992 and 2003 moves to Santa Monica and Century City and finally settling in Beverly Hills from 2011 onwards. [1]
In 1988, Warner Communications acquired Lorimar-Telepictures two years before merging with Time Inc. to become Time Warner (now Warner Bros. Discovery). The following year, Sony hired producers Jon Peters and Peter Guber to run the company's newly acquired Columbia Pictures Entertainment unit, even though they had a contract with Warner Bros. To resolve this issue, Warner sold their Lorimar lot to Columbia, among other deals. Columbia Pictures had been sharing with Warner Bros. their studio lot in Burbank, California in a partnership called The Burbank Studios starting in 1972. Sony sold its interest in The Burbank Studios as a result of the Guber-Peters issue. [2]
Sony acquired the property, first renamed Columbia Studios, in poor condition and thereafter invested $100 million to renovate the studio complex. The property underwent a three-year comprehensive plan as it transitioned to the 45 acres (0.18 km2) Sony Pictures Studios complex. The buildings, many of which still bore the names of MGM film actors such as Clark Gable, Judy Garland, Rita Hayworth and Burt Lancaster, were painted and upgraded. New walls were erected around the lot and the ironwork gates were restored. Nostalgic art deco and false fronts on Main Street were added, as well as hand-painted murals of Columbia film posters. The MGM logo was removed from the Filmland Building in late 1992. [1]
The long-running game shows Jeopardy! (Studio 10, renamed "The Alex Trebek Stage" in July 2021) and Wheel of Fortune (Studio 11), along with their spin-offs, have been taped at Sony Pictures Studios since the mid-1990s.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., is an American media company specializing in film and television production and distribution based in Beverly Hills, California. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was founded on April 17, 1924, and has been owned by the Amazon MGM Studios subsidiary of Amazon since 2022.
Culver City is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,779. It is mostly surrounded by Los Angeles, but also shares a border with the unincorporated area of Ladera Heights to the east. The city was named after its founder, Harry Culver, who first attempted to establish it in 1913.
United Artists (UA) is an American film production company owned by Amazon MGM Studios. In its original operating period, UA was founded in 1919 by Charlie Chaplin, D.W. Griffith, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks as a venture premised on allowing actors to control their own financial and artistic interests rather than being dependent upon commercial studios.
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., commonly known as Columbia Pictures, is an American film production and distribution company that is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Entertainment's Sony Pictures, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Sony Group Corporation. Since 2022, Columbia Pictures created deals with Sony’s Playstation in Japan.
Lorimar Productions, Inc., later known as Lorimar Television and Lorimar Distribution, was an American production company that was later a subsidiary of Warner Bros., active from 1969 until 1993, when it was folded into Warner Bros. Television. It was founded by Irwin Molasky, Merv Adelson, and Lee Rich. The company's name was a portmanteau of the name of Adelson's then wife, Lori, and Palomar Airport.
Desilu Productions, Inc. was an American television production company founded and co-owned by husband and wife Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball. The company is best known for shows such as I Love Lucy, The Lucy Show, Mannix, The Untouchables, Mission: Impossible and Star Trek. Until 1962, Desilu was the second-largest independent television production company in the United States, behind MCA's Revue Studios, until MCA bought Universal Pictures and Desilu became and remained the number-one independent production company, until Ball sold it to Gulf and Western Industries in 1968.
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.
Turner Entertainment Company is an American multimedia company founded by Ted Turner on August 2, 1986. Purchased by Time Warner Entertainment on October 10, 1996, as part of its acquisition of Turner Broadcasting System (TBS), the company was largely responsible for overseeing the TBS library for worldwide distribution. In recent years, this role has largely been limited to being the copyright holder, as it has become an in-name-only subsidiary of Warner Bros., which currently administers their library.
Kerkor "Kirk" Kerkorian was an Armenian-American businessman, investor, and philanthropist. He was the president and CEO of Tracinda Corporation, his private holding company based in Beverly Hills, California. Kerkorian was one of the important figures in the shaping of Las Vegas and, with architect Martin Stern Jr., is described as the "father of the mega-resort". He built the world's largest hotel in Las Vegas three times: the International Hotel, the original MGM Grand Hotel (1973) and the current MGM Grand (1993). He purchased the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer movie studio in 1969.
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 Goldfish, 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.
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio conglomerate that produces, acquires, and distributes filmed entertainment through multiple platforms. Through an intermediate holding company called Sony Film Holding Inc., it is operated as a subsidiary of Sony Entertainment Inc., which is itself a subsidiary of the Japanese multinational technology and media conglomerate Sony Group Corporation.
Warner Bros. Television Studios, operating under the name Warner Bros. Television, is an American television production and distribution studio and the flagship studio of the Warner Bros. Television Group division of Warner Bros., a flagship studio of Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). Launched on March 21, 1955 by William T. Orr, it serves as a television production arm of DC Comics productions by DC Studios and, alongside Paramount Global's CBS Studios, The CW, the latter that launched in 2006 and WBD has a 12.5% ownership stake. It also serves as the distribution arm of WBD units HBO, Cartoon Network and Adult Swim.
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.
MGM Home Entertainment LLC is the home video distribution arm of the American media company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). It is owned by the Amazon MGM Studios subsidiary of Amazon.
Lorimar-Telepictures Corporation, Inc. was an entertainment company established in 1985 with the merger of Lorimar Productions, Inc. and Telepictures Corporation. Headquartered at the former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios in Culver City, California, its assets included television production and syndication, feature films, home video, and broadcasting.
The Culver Studios is a film studio in Culver City, California. Originally created by silent movie pioneer Thomas H. Ince, classics from Hollywood's Golden Age were filmed there. It was purchased, in 2014, by Hackman Capital Partners, which completely modernized the lot over the next four years, while preserving the site's historic structures. The studios have operated under a multitude of names: Ince Studio (1918-1925), De Mille Studios (1925–1928), Pathé Studios (1928–1931), RKO-Pathé Studios (1931–1935), Selznick International Pictures (1935–1956), Desilu-Culver Studios (1956–1970), Culver City Studios (1970–1977), and Laird International Studios (1977–1986). Through all these name changes, the site was also commonly called "40 Acres" by entertainment industry insiders, although it was never actually 40 acres in size.
Sunset Gower Studios is a 14-acre (57,000 m2) television and movie studio at the corner of Sunset Boulevard and North Gower Street in the Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. Established in 1912, it continues today as Hollywood's largest independent studio and an active facility for television and film production on its twelve soundstages.
Michael J. Kohut was an American audio engineer. He was a seven-time Academy Award nominee for Best Sound, a BAFTA award winner for Best Sound for Fame and was President of Post Production Facilities at Sony Pictures Studios. During his tenure at Sony Pictures Studios, he led the American team in the development of Sony Dynamic Digital Sound the discrete eight-channel playback system for motion picture sound.
Warner Bros. Studios Burbank, formerly known as First National Studio (1926–1929), Warner Bros.-Seven Arts Studios (1967–1970) and The Burbank Studios (1972–1990), is a major filmmaking facility owned and run by Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. in Burbank, California, United States. First National Pictures built the 62-acre (25 ha) studio lot in 1926 as it expanded from a film distributor to film production.