William T. Rock, Albert E. Smith and J. Stuart Blackton, 1916
Vitagraph Studios, also known as the Vitagraph Company of America, was a United Statesmotion picture studio. It was founded by J. Stuart Blackton and Albert E. Smith in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York, as the American Vitagraph Company. By 1907, it was the most prolific American film production company, producing many famous silent films.[1] It was bought by Warner Bros. in 1925.
Advertisement for Vitagraph features in The Moving Picture World, 1916
Vitagraph Studios, Hollywood, California
Vitagraph Company, Brooklyn New York, c. 1915
The Life of Moses (1909), directed by J. Stuart Blackton, the first five-reel picture made in America
PLAY Sonny Jim and the Amusement Company Ltd (1915) directed by Tefft Johnson; runtime 00:13:59
PLAY The Good in the Worst of Us (1915) directed by William J. Humphrey; runtime 00:13:05
In 1896, English émigré Blackton was moonlighting as a reporter/artist for the New York Evening World when he was sent to interview Thomas Edison about his new film projector. The inventor talked the entrepreneurial reporter into buying a set of films and a projector. A year later, Blackton and business partner Smith founded the American Vitagraph Company in direct competition with Edison. A third partner, distributor William "Pop" Rock, joined in 1899. The company's first studio was located on the rooftop of a building on Nassau Street in Manhattan. Operations were later moved to the Midwood neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York.
The company's first claim to fame came from newsreels: Vitagraph cameramen were on the scene to film events from the Spanish–American War of 1898. These shorts were among the first works of motion-picture propaganda, and a few had studio re-enactments that were passed off as footage of actual events (The Battle of Santiago Bay was filmed in an improvised bathtub, with the "smoke of battle" provided by Mrs. Blackton's cigar). In 1897, Vitagraph produced The Humpty Dumpty Circus, which was the first film to use the stop-motion technique.[2]
Vitagraph was not the only company seeking to make money from Edison's motion picture inventions, and Edison's lawyers were very busy in the 1890s and 1900s filing patents and suing competitors for patent infringement. Blackton did his best to avoid lawsuits by buying a special license from Edison in 1907 and by agreeing to sell many of his most popular films to Edison for distribution.
The American Vitagraph Company made many contributions to the history of movie-making. In 1903, the director Joseph Delmont started his career by producing westerns; he later became famous by using "wild carnivores" in his films—a sensation for that time.
In 1909, it was one of the original ten production companies included in Edison's attempt to corner movie-making in the United States, the Motion Picture Patents Company. Due to its extensive European distribution interests, Vitagraph also participated in the Paris Film Congress in February 1909. This was a failed attempt by European producers to form a cartel similar to the MPPC.
The first film adaptation of the novel Les Misérables, a short silent historical drama starring Maurice Costello as Jean Valjean and William V. Ranous as Javert, is distributed by the Vitagraph Company of America. The film consists of four reels, each released over the course of three months beginning on 4 September to 27 November 1909.
John Bunny made films for Vitagraph in the 1910s, most of them co-starring Flora Finch, and was the most popular film comedian in the world in the years before Chaplin. His death in 1915 was observed worldwide.
In 1910, a number of movie houses showed the five parts of the Vitagraph serial The Life of Moses consecutively (a total length of almost 90 minutes), making it one of many to claim the title of "the first feature film." A long series of Shakespeare adaptations were the first done of the Bard's works in the U.S.
The 1915 feature The Battle Cry of Peace (written and directed by Blackton) was one of the great propaganda films of World War I. Ironically, after America declared war, the film was modified for re-release because it was seen as not being sufficiently pro-war, thus also earning the film a place in the history of censorship.
Vitagraph's leading star of the post-World War I period was comedian Larry Semon. He had joined the studio in 1916 as a writer and director, but soon became a star in a steady stream of comedy shorts. A former cartoonist, Semon favored large-scale slapstick. His films were so profitable that Vitagraph gave Semon a free hand in making them, but Semon became so extravagant in staging the films that the expenses nearly broke the company. Semon's relationship with Vitagraph became strained when the company insisted that Semon finance the films himself, and he left for Educational Pictures in 1923.
Vitagraph withdraws because it does not believe that justice, to the distributors and to the public and to those independent producers who are not theater owning exhibitors, can be obtained through the labors of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America.[13]
Acquisition by Warner Bros.
On April 20, 1925,[14] Smith finally gave up and sold the company to Warner Bros.[15] for a comfortable profit. The Flatbush studio (renamed Vitaphone) was later used as an independent unit within Warner Bros., specializing in early sound shorts. Vitaphone closed the Flatbush plant in 1940.
Vitagraph brand name
The Vitagraph name was briefly resurrected on two occasions. In 1932–33, producer Leon Schlesinger made six westerns starring John Wayne and released them through the Warner Bros. exchanges. The studio chose to market these very-low-budget features under the less prestigious Vitagraph banner. In 1960 Vitagraph returned to theater screens (starting with 1960's Looney Tunes cartoon Hopalong Casualty), with the end titles reading "A Warner Bros. Cartoon / A Vitagraph Release". Merrie Melodies of the same period (starting with that same year's From Hare to Heir) had the same end title, with the last line being "A Vitaphone Release." This may have been done to protect the studio's ownership of the two dormant trade names. Both the Vitagraph and Vitaphone names were retired in 1969.
Vitagraph's first office, opened in 1898, was in Lower Manhattan, at 140 Nassau Street,[17] on the corner of Nassau St. and Beekman St.,[18] where they shot their first film, The Burglar on the Roof, in 1897.[19] In 1890, the company moved to 110-16 Nassau Street in Brooklyn, New York.[17] They subsequently opened a glass-enclosed studio, the first modern film studio in the U.S., built in 1906, on property bounded by Locust Avenue, East 15th Street, Elm Avenue, and right-of-way of the BMT Brighton Line of the New York City Subway.[20][21] Transportation of equipment and costumes from the Nassau Street interior stages was by subway to the adjacent Avenue M (BMT Brighton Line) Subway rapid transit station[22] in the Midwood section of Brooklyn.[23][24] They created a second film studio in Santa Monica, California, in 1911, and a year later moved to a 29-acre sheep ranch at 4151 Prospect Ave[25] in the Los Feliz district of Los Angeles, a studio subsequently owned by ABC and currently Disney Studios.
Preservation Efforts and Demolition
The Vitagraph Studios building, located in the Midwood neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, held a significant place in the early history of American cinema. As one of the first motion picture studios in the United States, Vitagraph was responsible for producing hundreds of silent films in the early 20th century. The building, with its recognizable smokestack, remained a physical reminder of the silent film era long after the studio ceased operations and was acquired by Warner Bros. in 1925.[26]
In the latter half of the 20th century, as New York City’s landscape rapidly changed, film historians and preservationists began advocating for the protection of the Vitagraph building due to its historical importance. The structure became a focus of preservation efforts in the 2000s and 2010s, when campaigns were launched to secure landmark status for the site.[27][28] Supporters, including local historians and members of the film community, argued that the building was one of the last surviving links to New York’s early role as a hub of film production before Hollywood’s rise. They proposed various uses for the building, including transforming it into a museum or cultural center that would honor the legacy of early cinema.[29][30]
However, the preservation campaigns faced significant obstacles. Opponents of landmark designation, including developers and some local officials, cited the deteriorating condition of the building and its increasingly outdated industrial design. The site’s location in a developing residential neighborhood further complicated efforts, as developers eyed the property for housing projects.[31][32] In 2008, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission declined to grant the building landmark status, stating that while the Vitagraph building held undeniable cultural significance, it did not meet the architectural criteria for preservation. According to the Commission, “the building has lost many of its original architectural features over the years,” and “the alterations to its structure have compromised its integrity as a historic resource.”[29] The Commission also emphasized that the building's utilitarian design did not exemplify the type of architectural distinction typically associated with landmarks, despite its historical connections. In 2012, they further ruled that the smokestack "lacked architectural merit."[33]
Despite ongoing petitions, appeals, and media attention, the decision stood, and the efforts to protect the building ultimately faltered.[34] In 2015, after years of neglect and unsuccessful attempts to preserve the structure, the Vitagraph Studios building was demolished to make way for new apartment complexes.[35] This demolition marked the end of a tangible piece of early American film history, though it sparked renewed interest in preserving other film heritage sites.[36]
First National Pictures was an American motion picture production and distribution company. It was founded in 1917 as First National Exhibitors' Circuit, Inc., an association of independent theatre owners in the United States, and became the country's largest theater chain. Expanding from exhibiting movies to distributing them, the company reincorporated in 1919 as Associated First National Theatres, Inc. and Associated First National Pictures, Inc.
A sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades passed before sound motion pictures became commercially practical. Reliable synchronization was difficult to achieve with the early sound-on-disc systems, and amplification and recording quality were also inadequate. Innovations in sound-on-film led to the first commercial screening of short motion pictures using the technology, which took place in 1923. Before sound-on-film technology became viable, soundtracks for films were commonly played live with organs or pianos.
James Stuart Blackton was a British-American film producer and director of the silent era. One of the pioneers of motion pictures, he founded Vitagraph Studios in 1897. He was one of the first filmmakers to use the techniques of stop-motion and drawn animation, is considered a father of American animation, and was the first to bring many classic plays and books to the screen. Blackton was also the commodore of the Motorboat Club of America and the Atlantic Yacht Club.
Vitaphone was a sound film system used for feature films and nearly 1,000 short subjects made by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1931. Vitaphone is the last major analog sound-on-disc system and the only one that was widely used and commercially successful. The soundtrack is not printed on the film, but issued separately on phonograph records. The discs, recorded at 33+1⁄3 rpm and typically 16 inches (41 cm) in diameter, are played on a turntable physically coupled to the projector motor while the film is projected. Its frequency response is 4300 Hz. Many early talkies, such as The Jazz Singer (1927), used the Vitaphone system. The name "Vitaphone" derived from the Latin and Greek words, respectively, for "living" and "sound".
Samuel Louis Warner was an American film producer who was the co-founder and chief executive officer of Warner Bros. He established the studio along with his brothers Harry, Albert, and Jack L. Warner. Sam Warner is credited with procuring the technology that enabled Warner Bros. to produce the film industry's first feature-length talking picture, The Jazz Singer. He died in 1927, on the day before the film's enormously successful premiere.
Norma Marie Talmadge was an American actress and film producer of the silent era. A major box-office draw for more than a decade, her career reached a peak in the early 1920s, when she ranked among the most popular idols of the American screen.
Frederick Alan Crosland was an American stage actor and film director. He is noted for having directed the first feature film using spoken dialogue, The Jazz Singer (1927) and the first feature movie with sychronization soundtrack, Don Juan (1926).
Lawrence Semon was an American actor, director, producer, and screenwriter during the silent film era. In his day, Semon was considered a major movie comedian, but he is now remembered mainly for working with both Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy before they started working together.
Samuel Sax was an American film producer. He produced 80 films between 1925 and 1946, including the last films of Roscoe Arbuckle. From 1938 to 1941, Sax headed Warner Brothers's British subsidiary at Teddington Studios in London.
Buzzin' Around is a 1933 American pre-Code comedy film starring Fatty Arbuckle, and directed by Alfred J. Goulding.
Wally Van was an American actor and film director of the silent era.
The Automobile Thieves is an American crime-drama silent film directed by J. Stuart Blackton. The picture stars Blackton and Florence Lawrence. It was released on November 10, 1906 by The American Vitagraph Company; a print of the feature is preserved in the UCLA Film and Television Archive.
JC Studios was a film and television studio located at 1268 East 14th Street in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, New York. The land on which the studio buildings were situated can trace its motion picture history back to around 1903, when it served as a studio and backlot for Vitagraph and Florence Turner, its first Vitagraph girl. Vitagraph's main Brooklyn facility was located across East 14th Street on property occupied by the Shulamith School for Girls until 2010. In 2017 the site became an eight-story, 300-unit apartment building. Warner Bros built the main studio, bordering on Locust Avenue, in 1936 for use as a short-subject production facility.
Gladys Leslie Moore was an American actress in silent film, active in the 1910s and 1920s. Though less-remembered than superstars like Mary Pickford, she had a number of starring roles from 1917 to the early 1920s and was one of the young female stars of her day.
The Battle Cry of Peace is a 1915 American silent war film directed by Wilfrid North and J. Stuart Blackton, one of the founders of Vitagraph Company of America who also wrote the scenario. The film is based on the book Defenseless America, by Hudson Maxim, and was distributed by V-L-S-E, Incorporated. The film stars Charles Richman, L. Rogers Lytton, and James W. Morrison.
Albert Edward Smith was an American stage magician, film director and producer, and a naturalized American. He founded Vitagraph Studios with his business partner James Stuart Blackton in 1897.
Vitaphone Varieties is a series title used for all of Warner Bros.', earliest short film "talkies" of the 1920s, initially made using the Vitaphone sound on disc process before a switch to the sound-on-film format early in the 1930s. These were the first major film studio-backed sound films, initially showcased with the 1926 synchronized scored features Don Juan and The Better 'Ole. Although independent producers like Lee de Forest's Phonofilm were successfully making sound film shorts as early as 1922, they were very limited in their distribution and their audio was generally not as loud and clear in theaters as Vitaphone's. The success of the early Vitaphone shorts, initially filmed only in New York, helped launch the sound revolution in Hollywood.
The Airship, or 100 Years Hence is an American adventure comedy-drama silent short film written, produced and directed by J. Stuart Blackton. The film stars Blackton and Florence Lawrence. It was released on April 25, 1908 by The American Vitagraph Company; a partial print of The Airship, or 100 Years Hence is preserved in the Paper Print Collection. The Airship, or 100 Years Hence advertised that it would be "a forecast of a probable means of air navigation in the coming century."
The Twentieth Century Tramp; or, Happy Hooligan and His Airship is an American silent short film produced and directed by Edwin S. Porter and released in 1902. This film is an adaptation of the cartoon Happy Hooligan, played by J. Stuart Blackton.
Lady Godiva is a 1911 American silent historical drama film directed by J. Stuart Blackton and produced by Vitagraph Studios in Brooklyn, New York. Its scenario is based on a legendary incident in the life of Godiva, Countess of Mercia, who lived in England during the mid-11th century. Allegedly, the Anglo-Saxon noblewoman rode naked—covered only by her long hair—through the streets of Coventry to protest and abolish an oppressive tax imposed on that town's residents by her husband, Leofric, Earl of Mercia. The film, copies of which survive today, stars Julia Swayne Gordon in the title role with a supporting cast including Robert Maillard, Harold Wilson, and Kate Price.
References
↑ Eilseen Bowser, The Transformation of Cinema 1907–1915, University of California Press, 1990, p. 23. ISBN0-520-08534-5.
↑ Florence Turner and Florence Lawrence were tied for being the first big movie stars. Eilseen Bowser, The Transformation of Cinema 1907–1915, University of California Press, 1990, p. 113–114. ISBN0-520-08534-5.
↑ Copp, DeWitt S., "A Few Great Captains: The Men and Events That Shaped the Development of U.S. Air Power", The Air Force Historical Foundation, Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, Library of Congress catalog card number 78-22310, ISBN0-385-13310-3, p. 7.
Slide, Anthony; Gevinson, Alan (1987). The Big V: A History of the Vitagraph Company. Metuchen, New Jersey: Scarecrow Press. ISBN0-8108-2030-7.
Spadoni, Robert (1999). "The Figure Seen from the Rear, Vitagraph, and the Development of Shot/Reverse Shot". Film History. 11 (3): 319–41. JSTOR3815205.
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