Remember John Cameron's Titanic?? AUGH! Grease?? Ghost?? Forrest Gump?? AWESOME!! The Godfather?? Mission Impossible??, Psyco??, Indecent Proposal?? All were Paramount films, and Adolph Zukor was the basic foundation of the Paramount company ...
Adolph Zukor was born January 7, 1873 in Ricse, Hungary. He immigrated to America in 1889, at the age of 16. He became involved in the motion picture industry when he began work at a theater in 1893. While working in the theater he started having a fascination with the whole movie-making process. Starting as a floor sweeper, he worked his way up to a film distributor. By 1911, Zukor had secured his own theater. His success began with penny arcades offering moving peepshows that evolved into nickle theatres offering longer, larger moving pictures. It was then he met Daniel Frohman (Daniel was a fellow theatrical manager and was the brother of Charles Frohman, the foremost theatrical manager of the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the United States.) Together, Zukor and Frohman formed an early production studio, Famous Players Film Company, whose primary goal was to bring noted stage actors to the screen. Famous Players began to produce movies in New York, beginning with The Prisoner of Zenda and The Count of Monte Cristo. A year later Zukor had the funds to invest in a film distribution company named Paramount Pictures.
June 28, 1916 marked a turning point in Paramount's history. The Jesse L. Lasky Company, which was producing films in Hollywood, California, merged with Famous Players to form the Famous Players-Lasky Corporation. The corporation consolidated its production and distribution divisions, and audiences began seeing "Paramount Pictures." Zukor and Lasky then constructed a vast new studio on Marathon Street (splits with Melrose) in Hollywood, which the company has occupied since 1926.
Paramount was the filming home of such early superstars as Elvis Presley, Mae West, W.C. Fields, and Mary Pickford, as well as directors Cecil B. Demille and D.W. Griffith. In Hollywood's Golden Age, Paramount's stars included Clara Bow, Gary Cooper, William Powell, Claudette Colbert, Alan Ladd, and Marlene Dietrich.
In 1948, Paramount was the head of one of the biggest motion picture cases in history. UNITED STATES v. PARAMOUNT PICTURES, Inc., 334 U.S. 131 , a Supreme Court case commonly referred to as the �Paramount Decision� or �Paramount Decree� was the culmination of over 20 years� pursuit by the U.S. government to end various monopolistic practices in the motion picture industry. All major film producers and distributors were involved in this anti-trust suit in addition to Paramount, including Warner Bros., RKO (Radio-Keith-Orpheum), Universal, Twentieth Century-Fox, Columbia, United Artists, Loew�s Inc. (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer), and the American Theatres Association. The U.S v. PARAMOUNT PICTURES, Inc. case was decided May 3, 1948, and forced dismantling of the vertical integration of major motion picture studios, leading to the end of Hollywood�s �studio system.� RKO was the first to agree to divorce its film exhibition business from the production and distribution side, including the selling off of interest in over 200 theatres. Paramount acquiesced in 1949, and the others were forced to follow.
On March 24, 1966, Gulf+Western Industries, Inc. acquired control of Paramount. Zukor remained Chairman of Paramount Pictures until his death on June 10th, 1976, at the ripe age of 103. See his grave here. (R.I.P. Adolph, your legacy was truly great!!) The corporation turned its interest toward the new entertainment division, and on June 5, 1989, G+W was renamed Paramount Communications Inc.
On March 11, 1994, Paramount merged with Viacom Inc, under the leadership of Sumner Redstone, chairman of the board and chief executive officer. Sherry Lansing is chairman, Paramount Motion Picture Group. Today, Paramount Pictures, together with Paramount Television, CBS Television, Simon & Schuster Publishing, MTV Networks, Showtime Networks, Infinity, BET, UPN, Paramount Parks and Blockbuster Entertainment comprise the entertainment leader, Viacom Inc. |
