1.
Fox Broadcasting Company
–
The Fox Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcast television network that is owned by the Fox Entertainment Group subsidiary of 21st Century Fox. It is the third largest major network in the world based on total revenues, assets. Launched on October 9,1986 as a competitor to the Big Three television networks, Fox and its affiliated companies operate many entertainment channels in international markets, although these do not necessarily air the same programming as the U. S. network. Most viewers in Canada have access to at least one U. S, the network is named after sister company 20th Century Fox, and indirectly for producer William Fox, who founded one of the movie studios predecessors, Fox Film. Fox is a member of the North American Broadcasters Association and the National Association of Broadcasters, 20th Century Fox had been involved in television production as early as the 1950s, producing several syndicated programs. Following the demise of the DuMont Television Network in August of that year after it became mired in financial problems. 20th Century Fox would also produce original content for the NTA network, KTTV in Los Angeles, KRIV in Houston, WFLD-TV in Chicago, and KRLD-TV in Dallas. In October 1985, 20th Century Fox announced its intentions to form a television network that would compete with ABC, CBS. The plans were to use the combination of the Fox studios, organizational plans for the network were held off until the Metromedia acquisitions cleared regulatory hurdles. Then, in December 1985, Rupert Murdoch agreed to pay $325 million to acquire the remaining equity in TCF Holdings from his original partner, Marvin Davis. These first six stations, then broadcasting to a reach of 22% of the nations households. Except for KDAF, all of the original owned-and-operated stations are part of the Fox network today. Like the core O&O group, Foxs affiliate body consisted of independent stations. The Fox Broadcasting Company launched at 11,00 p. m. Eastern and its inaugural program was a late-night talk show, The Late Show, which was hosted by comedian Joan Rivers. By early 1987, Rivers quit The Late Show after disagreements with the network over the creative direction. The network expanded its programming into prime time on April 5,1987, with Children and the sketch comedy series The Tracey Ullman Show. Fox added one new show per week over the several weeks, with the drama 21 Jump Street. On July 11, the network rolled out its Saturday night schedule with the premiere of the drama series Werewolf
2.
Film industry
–
The film industry or motion picture industry comprises the technological and commercial institutions of filmmaking, i. e. Though the expense involved in making movies almost immediately led film production to concentrate under the auspices of standing production companies, advances in affordable film making equipment, and expansion of opportunities to acquire investment capital from outside the film industry itself, have allowed independent film production to evolve. Hollywood is the oldest film industry of the world and the largest in terms of box office gross, other centers include Hong Kong and in Europe the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain, and Germany are the countries that lead movie production. The worldwide theatrical market had a box office of US$38.3 billion in 2015. The top three continents/regions by box office gross were, Asia-Pacific with US$14.1 billion, North America with US$11.1 billion and Europe, distinct from the centers are the locations where movies are filmed. Because of labor and infrastructure costs, many films are produced in other than the one in which the company which pays for the film is located. For example, many U. S. movies are filmed in Canada, many Nigerian movies are filmed in Ghana, while many Indian movies are filmed in the Americas, Europe, Singapore etc. The cinema of the United States, often referred to as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. The United States cinema is the oldest film industry in the world which originated more than 121 years ago and also the largest film industry in terms of revenue. Hollywood is the nexus of the U. S. film industry with established film study facilities such as the American Film Institute, LA Film School. However, four of the six film studios are owned by East Coast companies. Today, American film studios collectively generate several hundred movies every year, only The Walt Disney Company — which owns the Walt Disney Studios — is fully based in Southern California. And while Sony Pictures Entertainment is headquartered in Culver City, California, its parent company, most shooting now takes place in California, New York, Louisiana, Georgia and North Carolina. Hollywood is the most popular film industry with the highest number of screens, between 2009-2015, Hollywood consistently grossed $10 billion annually. Jenkins used his Phantoscope to project his film before an audience of family, friends, the film featured a vaudeville dancer performing a Butterfly Dance. Jenkins and his new partner Thomas Armat modified the Phantoscope for exhibitions in temporary theaters at the Cotton States Exposition in the fall of 1895, the Phantoscope was later sold to Thomas Edison, who changed the name of the projector to Edisons Vitascope. Nestor Studios was Hollywoods first movie studio, founded on October 27,1911 It was built by David Horsley for Nestor Motion Picture Company and it was then owned and operated by David Horsley and his brother, William Horsley. The first motion picture stage in Hollywood was built behind the tavern, other East Coast studios had moved production to Los Angeles, prior to Nestors move west
3.
Twentieth Century Pictures
–
Twentieth Century Pictures was an independent Hollywood motion picture production company created in 1933 by Joseph Schenck and Darryl F. Zanuck from Warner Bros. The company product was distributed by United Artists, and leased space at Samuel Goldwyn Studios, Schenck was President of Twentieth Century, while Zanuck was named Production Chief and Goetz and Raymond Griffith served as vice-presidents. Their initial stars under contract were George Arliss, Constance Bennett, the company was successful from the very beginning, out of their first 18 films, only one, Born to Be Bad, was not a financial success. Their 1934 production, The House of Rothschild was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, in 1935, they produced the classic film Les Misérables, from Victor Hugos novel, which was also nominated for Best Picture. W. Twentieth Century Pictures merged with Fox Studios to form 20th Century-Fox in 1935, for many years, 20th Century Fox claimed to have been founded in 1915. For instance, it marked 1945 as its 30th anniversary, however, in recent years it has claimed the 1935 merger as its founding
4.
Fox Film
–
The Fox Film Corporation was an American company that produced motion pictures, formed by William Fox on 1 February 1915. It was the successor to his earlier Greater New York Film Rental Company. On July 23,1926, the company bought the patents of the Movietone sound system for recording sound on to film, after the Crash of 1929, William Fox lost control of the company in 1930, during a hostile takeover. Under new president Sidney Kent, the new owners merged the company with Twentieth Century Pictures to form 20th Century Fox in 1935, William Fox entered the film industry in 1904 when he purchased a one-third share of a Brooklyn nickelodeon for $1,667. Fox invested further in the industry by founding the Greater New York Film Rental Company as a film distributor. In 1914, reflecting the broader scope of his business, he renamed it the Box Office Attraction Film Rental Company and he also continued to distribute material from other sources, such as Winsor McCays early animated film Gertie the Dinosaur. Later that year, Fox concluded that depending on other companies for the products he depended on was insufficient and he purchased the Éclair studio facilities in Fort Lee, New Jersey, along with property in Staten Island, and arranged for actors and crew. The company became a studio, with its name shortened to the Box Office Attractions Company. Always more of an entrepreneur than a showman, Fox concentrated on acquiring and building theaters, in 1917, William Fox sent Sol M. Wurtzel to Hollywood to oversee the studios West Coast production facilities where a more hospitable and cost-effective climate existed for filmmaking. Fox had purchased the Edendale studio of the failing Selig Polyscope Company, with the introduction of sound technology, Fox moved to acquire the rights to a sound-on-film process. In the years 1925–26, Fox purchased the rights to the work of Freeman Harrison Owens and this resulted in the Movietone sound system later known as Fox Movietone developed at the Movietone Studio. Later that year, the company began offering films with a track, and the following year Fox began the weekly Fox Movietone News feature. The growing company needed space, and in 1926 Fox acquired 300 acres in the country west of Beverly Hills and built Movietone City. When rival Marcus Loew died in 1927, Fox offered to buy the Loew familys holdings, Loews Inc. controlled more than 200 theaters, as well as the MGM studio. When the family agreed to the sale, the merger of Fox, but MGM studio boss Louis B. Mayer was not included in the deal and fought back. Using political connections, Mayer called on the Justice Departments antitrust unit to delay giving final approval to the merger, overextended and close to bankruptcy, Fox was stripped of his empire in 1930 and ended up in jail. Fox Film, with more than 500 theatres, was placed in receivership, a bank-mandated reorganization propped the company up for a time, but it soon became apparent that despite its size, Fox could not stand on its own. Under new president Sidney Kent, the new owners began negotiating with the upstart, the two companies merged that spring as 20th Century-Fox
5.
20th Century Fox
–
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation is an American film studio currently owned by 21st Century Fox. It is one of the Big Six major American film studios and is located in the Century City area of Los Angeles, the studio was formerly owned by News Corporation. 20th Century Fox is a member of the Motion Picture Association of America, in 2015, 20th Century Fox celebrated its 80th anniversary as a studio. Spyros Skouras, then manager of the Fox West Coast Theaters, the studios biggest star, Will Rogers, died in a plane crash weeks after the merger. Its leading female star, Janet Gaynor, was fading in popularity and promising leading men James Dunn, at first, it was expected that the new company was originally to be called Fox-20th Century, even though 20th Century was the senior partner in the merger. However, 20th Century brought more to the bargaining table besides Schenck and Zanuck, the new company, 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation, began trading on May 31,1935, the hyphen was dropped in 1985. Schenck became Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, while Kent remained as President, Zanuck became Vice President in Charge of Production, replacing Foxs longtime production chief Winfield Sheehan. The company established a training school. The contracts included an option for renewal for as long as seven years. For many years, 20th Century Fox claimed to have founded in 1915. For instance, it marked 1945 as its 30th anniversary, however, in recent years it has claimed the 1935 merger as its founding, even though most film historians agree it was founded in 1915. The companys films retained the 20th Century Pictures searchlight logo on their credits as well as its opening fanfare. Also on the Fox payroll he found two players who he built up into the studios leading assets, Alice Faye and seven-year-old Shirley Temple, favoring popular biographies and musicals, Zanuck built Fox back to profitability. Thanks to record attendance during World War II, Fox overtook RKO, while Zanuck went off for eighteen months war service, junior partner William Goetz kept profits high by going for light entertainment. The studios—indeed the industrys—biggest star was creamy blonde Betty Grable, in 1942, Spyros Skouras succeeded Kent as president of the studio. Together with Zanuck, who returned in 1943, they intended to make Foxs output more serious-minded. During the next few years, with pictures like The Razors Edge, Wilson, Gentlemans Agreement, The Snake Pit, Boomerang, and Pinky, Zanuck established a reputation for provocative, adult films. Fox also specialized in adaptations of best-selling books such as Ben Ames Williams Leave Her to Heaven, starring Gene Tierney and they also made the 1958 film version of South Pacific
6.
Fort Lee, New Jersey
–
Fort Lee is a borough at the eastern border of Bergen County, New Jersey, United States, in the New York City Metropolitan Area, situated atop the Hudson Palisades. The borough is the terminus of the George Washington Bridge and is located across the Hudson River from the Manhattan borough of New York City. Named for the site of an early American Revolutionary War military encampment, according to the United States Census Bureau, the borough had a total area of 2.888 square miles, including 2.541 square miles of land and 0.347 square miles of water. The borough is situated atop the escarpment of the Hudson Palisades on the peninsula between the Hackensack and Hudson rivers, the borough is bisected by the confluence of roads at GWB Plaza leading to the George Washington Bridge. Unincorporated communities, localities and place names located partially or completely within the borough include Coytesville, Palisade, the borough borders Cliffside Park, Edgewater, Englewood, Englewood Cliffs, Leonia, Palisades Park, Ridgefield. and the Washington Heights neighborhood of Upper Manhattan. It was during Washingtons retreat in November 1776 that Thomas Paine composed his pamphlet, The American Crisis and these events are recalled at Monument Park and Fort Lee Historic Park. Fort Lee was formed by an act of the New Jersey Legislature on March 29,1904, with the creation of Fort Lee, Ridgefield Township became defunct and was dissolved as of March 29,1904. The Fort Lee Police Department was formed under borough ordinance on August 9,1904, the history of cinema in the United States can trace its roots to the East Coast where, at one time, Fort Lee was the motion picture capital of America. The industry got its start at the end of the 19th century with the construction of Thomas Edisons Black Maria, in 1909, a forerunner of Universal Studios, the Champion Film Company, built the first studio. They were quickly followed by others who either built new studios or who leased facilities in Fort Lee, such notables as Mary Pickford got their start at Biograph Studios. With the offshoot businesses that sprang up to service, the film studios, however, just as the development of Fort Lee production facilities were gaining strength, Nestor Studios of Bayonne, New Jersey, built the first studio in Hollywood in 1911. Californias more hospitable and cost-effective climate led to the shift of virtually all filmmaking to the West Coast by the 1930s. At the time, Thomas Edison owned almost all the relevant to motion picture production. Television and film in New Jersey remains an important industry, since 2000, the Fort Lee Film Commission has been charged with celebrating the history of film in Fort Lee, as well as attracting film and television production companies to the borough. In 1957, market researcher James Vicary claimed that quickly flashing messages on a screen, in Fort Lee, had influenced people to purchase more food. Vicary coined the term subliminal advertising and formed the Subliminal Projection Company based on a six-week test, Vicary claimed that during the presentation of the movie Picnic he used a tachistoscope to project the words Drink Coca-Cola and Hungry. Eat popcorn for 1/3000 of a second at five-second intervals, Vicary asserted that during the test, sales of popcorn and Coke in that New Jersey theater increased 57. 8% and 18. 1% respectively. In 1962, Vicary admitted to lying about the experiment and falsifying the results, an identical experiment conducted by Henry Link showed no increase in cola or popcorn sales
7.
William Fox (producer)
–
William Fox was an American motion picture executive, who founded the Fox Film Corporation in 1915 and the Fox West Coast Theatres chain in the 1920s. Fox was born in Tolcsva, Hungary and originally named Wilhelm Fried and his parents, Michael Fuchs and Hannah Fried, were both German Jews. The family emigrated to the United States when William was nine months old and settled in New York City, Wilhelm worked as a newsboy and in the fur and garment industry as a youth, then later changed his name to William Fox. In 1900, he started his own company, which he sold in 1904 to purchase his first nickelodeon, always more of an entrepreneur than a showman, he concentrated on acquiring and building theaters. The companys first film studio was leased in Fort Lee, New Jersey and he now had the capital to acquire facilities and expand his production capacity. Sound-on-film systems such as Movietone and RCA Photophone soon became the standard, from 1928 to 1963, Fox Movietone News was one of the major newsreel series in the U. S. along with The March of Time and Universal Newsreel. In 1927, Marcus Loew, head of rival studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, died, Fox saw an opportunity to expand his empire, and in 1929, with Schencks assent, bought the Loew familys holdings in MGM. However, MGM studio bosses Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg were outraged, since, despite their high posts in MGM, Mayer used his political connections to persuade the Justice Department to sue Fox for violating federal antitrust law. During this time, in the middle of 1929, Fox was badly hurt in an automobile accident, Fox lost control of the Fox Film Corporation in 1930 during a hostile takeover. A combination of the market crash, Foxs car accident injury. At his bankruptcy hearing in 1936, he attempted to bribe judge John Warren Davis and committed perjury, after serving his time, Fox retired from the film business. He died more or less unnoticed in 1952 at the age of 73 in New York City, no Hollywood producers came to his funeral. He is interred at Salem Fields Cemetery, Brooklyn, in 1935, Fox Film Corporation, under new president Sidney Kent, merged with the upstart Twentieth Century Pictures to form 20th Century-Fox. 20th Century Fox was itself merged into Rupert Murdochs News Corporation in 1985, News Corporation, 20th Century Foxs corporate parent, continues to make movies and started the Fox Network, one of the four principal commercial broadcast television networks in the United States. Fox personally oversaw the construction of many Fox Theatres in US cities including Atlanta, Detroit, Oakland, San Francisco, an Empire of Their Own, How the Jews Invented Hollywood. William Fox at the Internet Movie Database Historical Article on William Fox William Fox at Find a Grave
8.
Film
–
A film, also called a movie, motion picture, theatrical film or photoplay, is a series of still images which, when shown on a screen, creates the illusion of moving images due to the phi phenomenon. This optical illusion causes the audience to perceive continuous motion between separate objects viewed rapidly in succession, the process of filmmaking is both an art and an industry. The word cinema, short for cinematography, is used to refer to the industry of films. Films were originally recorded onto plastic film through a photochemical process, the adoption of CGI-based special effects led to the use of digital intermediates. Most contemporary films are now fully digital through the process of production, distribution. Films recorded in a form traditionally included an analogous optical soundtrack. It runs along a portion of the film exclusively reserved for it and is not projected, Films are cultural artifacts created by specific cultures. They reflect those cultures, and, in turn, affect them, Film is considered to be an important art form, a source of popular entertainment, and a powerful medium for educating—or indoctrinating—citizens. The visual basis of film gives it a power of communication. Some films have become popular worldwide attractions by using dubbing or subtitles to translate the dialog into the language of the viewer, some have criticized the film industrys glorification of violence and its potentially negative treatment of women. The individual images that make up a film are called frames, the perception of motion is due to a psychological effect called phi phenomenon. The name film originates from the fact that film has historically been the medium for recording and displaying motion pictures. Many other terms exist for a motion picture, including picture, picture show, moving picture, photoplay. The most common term in the United States is movie, while in Europe film is preferred. Terms for the field, in general, include the big screen, the screen, the movies, and cinema. In early years, the sheet was sometimes used instead of screen. Preceding film in origin by thousands of years, early plays and dances had elements common to film, scripts, sets, costumes, production, direction, actors, audiences, storyboards, much terminology later used in film theory and criticism apply, such as mise en scène. Owing to the lack of any technology for doing so, the moving images, the magic lantern, probably created by Christiaan Huygens in the 1650s, could be used to project animation, which was achieved by various types of mechanical slides
9.
Sol M. Wurtzel
–
Sol Wurtzel was an American film producer. Born in New York City, his parents were both German Jews, Wurtzel worked as an executive assistant to William Fox, founding owner of the Fox Film Corporation. In 1911, Wurtzel hired Alan E. Freedman as a bookkeeper for Foxs fledgling film processing laboratory, Freedman would remain for over 50 years, eventually turning the operation into the gargantuan Color by DeLuxe DeLuxe Laboratories. In 1917, Fox sent Wurtzel to California to oversee the studios West Coast productions and he developed a formula for creating consistently profitable B movies that are heralded today. He discovered young director John Ford who later went on to earn four Academy Awards and he also discovered and made a star of famous cowboy Will Rogers. Wurtzel cast dancer Rita Hayworth in her first film role, the 1935 production Dantes Inferno and he gave an unknown Marilyn Monroe her first walk-on in his 1947 production of Dangerous Years. He produced several of Laurel and Hardys later comedies in the 1940s, including Great Guns, A-Haunting We Will Go, Jitterbugs, the Fighting Guerrillas on the guerrilla resistance movement in Serbia. Ill for many following a stroke in 1952, Wurtzel died at his home in Hollywood April 9,1958. John Ford delivered the eulogy at his funeral, Wurtzel was interred in the Hillside Memorial Park Cemetery in Culver City, California. Much of Wurtzels family continued to work at Fox Studios until the late 1980s
10.
Hollywood
–
Hollywood is an ethnically diverse, densely populated neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California. It is notable as the home of the U. S. film industry, including several of its studios, and its name has come to be a shorthand reference for the industry. Hollywood was a community in 1870 and was incorporated as a municipality in 1903. It was consolidated with the city of Los Angeles in 1910, in 1853, one adobe hut stood in Nopalera, named for the Mexican Nopal cactus indigenous to the area. By 1870, an agricultural community flourished, the area was known as the Cahuenga Valley, after the pass in the Santa Monica Mountains immediately to the north. According to the diary of H. J. Whitley, known as the Father of Hollywood, along came a Chinese man in a wagon carrying wood. The man got out of the wagon and bowed, the Chinese man was asked what he was doing and replied, I holly-wood, meaning hauling wood. H. J. Whitley had an epiphany and decided to name his new town Hollywood, Holly would represent England and wood would represent his Scottish heritage. Whitley had already started over 100 towns across the western United States, Whitley arranged to buy the 500-acre E. C. Hurd ranch and disclosed to him his plans for the land. They agreed on a price and Hurd agreed to sell at a later date, before Whitley got off the ground with Hollywood, plans for the new town had spread to General Harrison Gray Otis, Hurds wife, eastern adjacent ranch co-owner Daeida Wilcox, and others. Daeida Wilcox may have learned of the name Hollywood from Ivar Weid, her neighbor in Holly Canyon and she recommended the same name to her husband, Harvey. In August 1887, Wilcox filed with the Los Angeles County Recorders office a deed and parcel map of property he had sold named Hollywood, Wilcox wanted to be the first to record it on a deed. The early real-estate boom busted that year, yet Hollywood began its slow growth. By 1900, the region had a post office, newspaper, hotel, Los Angeles, with a population of 102,479 lay 10 miles east through the vineyards, barley fields, and citrus groves. A single-track streetcar line ran down the middle of Prospect Avenue from it, but service was infrequent, the old citrus fruit-packing house was converted into a livery stable, improving transportation for the inhabitants of Hollywood. The Hollywood Hotel was opened in 1902 by H. J. Whitley who was a president of the Los Pacific Boulevard, having finally acquired the Hurd ranch and subdivided it, Whitley built the hotel to attract land buyers. Flanking the west side of Highland Avenue, the structure fronted on Prospect Avenue, the hotel was to become internationally known and was the center of the civic and social life and home of the stars for many years. Whitleys company developed and sold one of the residential areas
11.
West Coast of the United States
–
The West Coast or Pacific Coast is the coastline along which the contiguous Western United States meets the North Pacific Ocean. As a region, this term most often refers to the states of California. More specifically, it refers to an area defined on the east by the Cascade Range, Sierra Nevada and Mojave Desert, the U. S. Census groups the five states of California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, and Hawaii together as the Pacific States division. As of the 2010 Census, the population of the Census Bureaus Pacific Region was approximately 47.8 million – about 15. 3% of US population. The largest city on the west coast of the United States is Los Angeles, small isolated groups of hunter-gatherers migrated alongside herds of large herbivores far into Alaska. Between 16,500 BCE and 13,500 BCE, ice-free corridors developed along the Pacific coast and valleys of North America, Alaska Natives, indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, and California indigenous peoples eventually descended from the Paleo-Indians. They developed various languages and established trade routes, later, Spanish, British, French, Russian, and American explorers and settlers began colonizing the area. The West Coast of the United States has a climate in its Northern edge towards the Canada–US border. The coastline sees significantly mild temperatures when compared to the areas during summer. In far Northern California there is a difference of 17 °C between Eurekas and Willow Creek in spite of only 25 miles separating the locations and Willow Creek being located at a 500 metres elevation, coastal fog is also prevalent in keeping shoreline temperatures cool. Since the West Coast has been populated by more recently than the East Coast. Additionally, its demographic composition underlies its cultural difference from the rest of the United States. Californias history first as a major Spanish colony, and later Mexican territory, has given the lower West Coast a distinctive Hispanic tone, which it also shares with the rest of the Southwest. Similarly, two of the three cities in which Asian Americans have concentrated, San Francisco and Los Angeles, are located on the West Coast, San Franciscos Chinatown, the oldest in North America, is a vibrant cultural center. The West Coast also has a large share of green cities within the United States. Other writers, like Jean Baudrillard, Mike Davis, and Umberto Eco, have made related statements on Californian culture, in the Northwest, Portland and Seattle are both considered among the coffee capitals of the world. While Starbucks originated in Seattle, both towns are known for coffee roasters and independent coffeeshops. In the Pacific Northwest at large, which includes the Canadian west coast, the culture has significantly shaped by the environment, especially by its forests, mountains
12.
Patent
–
A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for detailed public disclosure of an invention. An invention is a solution to a technological problem and is a product or a process. Patents are a form of intellectual property, the procedure for granting patents, requirements placed on the patentee, and the extent of the exclusive rights vary widely between countries according to national laws and international agreements. Typically, however, a patent application must include one or more claims that define the invention. A patent may include many claims, each of which defines a specific property right and these claims must meet relevant patentability requirements, such as novelty, usefulness, and non-obviousness. Nevertheless, there are variations on what is patentable subject matter from country to country, the word patent originates from the Latin patere, which means to lay open. More directly, it is a version of the term letters patent. Similar grants included land patents, which were land grants by early state governments in the USA, and printing patents, a precursor of modern copyright. In modern usage, the term patent usually refers to the granted to anyone who invents any new, useful. The additional qualification utility patent is used to distinguish the primary meaning from these other types of patents. Particular species of patents for inventions include biological patents, business method patents, chemical patents, the period of protection was 10 years. These were mostly in the field of glass making, as Venetians emigrated, they sought similar patent protection in their new homes. This led to the diffusion of patent systems to other countries, by the 16th century, the English Crown would habitually abuse the granting of letters patent for monopolies. After public outcry, King James I of England was forced to revoke all existing monopolies, the Statute became the foundation for later developments in patent law in England and elsewhere. Important developments in patent law emerged during the 18th century through a process of judicial interpretation of the law. During the reign of Queen Anne, patent applications were required to supply a complete specification of the principles of operation of the invention for public access. Influenced by the philosophy of John Locke, the granting of patents began to be viewed as a form of property right. The English legal system became the foundation for patent law in countries with a common law heritage, including the United States, New Zealand, in the Thirteen Colonies, inventors could obtain patents through petition to a given colonys legislature
13.
Movietone sound system
–
The Movietone sound system is an optical sound-on-film method of recording sound for motion pictures that guarantees synchronization between sound and picture. It achieves this by recording the sound as a variable-density optical track on the strip of film that records the pictures. Although sound films today use variable-area tracks, any motion picture theater can play a Movietone film without modification to the projector. As a student Theodore Case became interested in the use of modulated light to carry speech, and in 1916 set up a laboratory to study the photo-electric properties of materials. He developed the Thalofide cell, a photocell, which was used as part of an infra-red communication system by the U. S. Navy during. In 1922 Case and his assistant Earl I, Sponable turned their attention to talking pictures. In that same year Case was approached by Lee de Forest who had been attempting since 1919 to create a soundtrack for motion picture film in a system he called Phonofilm. De Forest was having little success and turned to Case for help, so from 1922 until 1925 Case, in 1925, therefore, Case and Sponable continued the development of their own system, now called Movietone. From 1924 onwards Sponable had turned his attention to the design of cameras, in which the sound. He asked Bell & Howell to modify one of their cameras to his design, consequently, the Wall machine shop in Syracuse, New York was asked to rebuild this camera and the results were much improved. Subsequently many single-system 35mm cameras were produced by Wall Camera Corporation, Wall initially converted some Bell & Howell Design 2709 cameras to single-system, but most were Wall designed and produced. Single-system cameras were produced by Mitchell Camera Corporation during World War II for the U. S. Army Signal Corps. It was used extensively by Hollywood and European studios between the late 1920s and May 1932, when the Academy Ratio of 1.37,1 was introduced to restore the effective shape of the silent frame. The 1950s brought the first 35mm kinescope camera with sound-on-film rather than separate, from Photo-Sonics and this camera was essential for TV network time-shifting in the years before Videotape. The sound galvanometer was made by RCA and was designed for good to excellent results when the negative was projected. The Davis mechanism was a Western Electric development, with a few exceptions this has remained the standard speed for professional sound films ever since. At this point, the Movietone system was adopted by the AMPAS as the Academys standard and it and the later RCA Photophone system were interchangeable in most respects. See RCA Photophone for technical details and lists of the industry adopters, Movietone entered commercial use when William Fox of the Fox Film Corporation bought the entire system including the patents in July 1926
14.
Wall Street Crash of 1929
–
The crash, which followed the London Stock Exchanges crash of September, signaled the beginning of the 12-year Great Depression that affected all Western industrialized countries. The Roaring Twenties, the decade that followed World War I and led to the crash, was a time of wealth, while the American cities prospered, the overproduction of agricultural produce created widespread financial despair among American farmers throughout the decade. This would later be blamed as one of the key factors that led to the 1929 stock market crash, despite the dangers of speculation, many believed that the stock market would continue to rise forever. On March 25,1929, after the Federal Reserve warned of excessive speculation, two days later, banker Charles E. Mitchell announced his company the National City Bank would provide $25 million in credit to stop the markets slide. Mitchells move brought a halt to the financial crisis and call money declined from 20 to 8 percent. Despite all these economic trouble signs and the breaks in March and May 1929, stocks resumed their advance in June. The market had been on a run that saw the Dow Jones Industrial Average increase in value tenfold. Shortly before the crash, economist Irving Fisher famously proclaimed, Stock prices have reached what looks like a high plateau. The optimism and financial gains of the bull market were shaken after a well publicized early September prediction from financial expert Roger Babson that a crash was coming. The initial September decline was thus called the Babson Break in the press and this was the start of the Great Crash, although until the severe phase of the crash in October, many investors regarded the September Babson Break as a healthy correction and buying opportunity. On September 20, the London Stock Exchange crashed when top British investor Clarence Hatry and many of his associates were jailed for fraud, the London crash greatly weakened the optimism of American investment in markets overseas. In the days leading up to the crash, the market was severely unstable, periods of selling and high volumes were interspersed with brief periods of rising prices and recovery. On October 24, the market lost 11 percent of its value at the bell on very heavy trading. Several leading Wall Street bankers met to find a solution to the panic and chaos on the trading floor. The meeting included Thomas W. Lamont, acting head of Morgan Bank, Albert Wiggin, head of the Chase National Bank and they chose Richard Whitney, vice president of the Exchange, to act on their behalf. With the bankers financial resources behind him, Whitney placed a bid to purchase a block of shares in U. S. Steel at a price well above the current market. As traders watched, Whitney then placed similar bids on other blue chip stocks and this tactic was similar to one that ended the Panic of 1907. It succeeded in halting the slide, the Dow Jones Industrial Average recovered, closing with it down only 6.38 points for the day
15.
Brooklyn
–
Brooklyn is the most populous borough of New York City, with a Census-estimated 2,636,735 residents in 2015. It borders the borough of Queens at the end of Long Island. Today, if New York City dissolved, Brooklyn would rank as the third-most populous city in the U. S. behind Los Angeles, the borough continues, however, to maintain a distinct culture. Many Brooklyn neighborhoods are ethnic enclaves, Brooklyns official motto, displayed on the Borough seal and flag, is Eendraght Maeckt Maght which translates from early modern Dutch as Unity makes strength. Since 2010, Brooklyn has evolved into a hub of entrepreneurship and high technology startup firms. The history of European settlement in Brooklyn spans more than 350 years, the neighborhood of Marine Park was home to North Americas first tidal mill. It was built by the Dutch, and the foundation can be seen today, however, the area was not formally settled as a town. Many incidents and documents relating to this period are in Gabriel Furmans early compilation, what is today Brooklyn left Dutch hands after the final English conquest of New Netherland in 1664, a prelude to the Second Anglo–Dutch War. The English reorganized the six old Dutch towns on southwestern Long Island as Kings County on November 1,1683 and this tract of land was recognized as a political entity for the first time, and the municipal groundwork was laid for a later expansive idea of Brooklyn identity. On August 27,1776 was fought the Battle of Long Island, the first major engagement fought in the American Revolutionary War after independence was declared, and the largest of the entire conflict. British troops forced Continental Army troops under George Washington off the heights near the sites of Green-Wood Cemetery, Prospect Park. The fortified American positions at Brooklyn Heights consequently became untenable and were evacuated a few days later, One result of the Treaty of Paris in 1783 was the evacuation of the British from New York City, celebrated by residents into the 20th century. The New York Navy Yard operated in Wallabout Bay for the entire 19th century, the first center of urbanization sprang up in the Town of Brooklyn, directly across from Lower Manhattan, which saw the incorporation of the Village of Brooklyn in 1817. Reliable steam ferry service across the East River to Fulton Landing converted Brooklyn Heights into a town for Wall Street. Ferry Road to Jamaica Pass became Fulton Street to East New York, Town and Village were combined to form the first, kernel incarnation of the City of Brooklyn in 1834. Industrial deconcentration in mid-century was bringing shipbuilding and other manufacturing to the part of the county. Each of the two cities and six towns in Kings County remained independent municipalities, and purposely created non-aligning street grids with different naming systems and it later became the most popular and highest circulation afternoon paper in America. The publisher changed to L. Van Anden on April 19,1842, on May 14,1849 the name was shortened to The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, on September 5,1938 it was further shortened to Brooklyn Eagle
16.
Nickelodeon (movie theater)
–
The nickelodeon was the first type of indoor exhibition space dedicated to showing projected motion pictures. Usually set up in converted storefronts, these small, simple theaters charged five cents for admission, Nickelodeon was concocted from nickel, the name of the U. S. For unknown reasons, in 1949 the lyricist of a popular song, incorporated the refrain Put another nickel in, in the nickelodeon…, evidently referring to either a jukebox or a mechanical musical instrument such as a coin-operated player piano or orchestrion. The meaning of the word has been muddied ever since, the earliest films had been shown in peep show machines or projected in vaudeville theaters as one of the otherwise live acts. Nickelodeons drastically altered film exhibition practices and the habits of a large segment of the American public. Although they were characterized by continuous performances of a selection of short films, film historian Charles Musser wrote, It is not too much to say that modern cinema began with the nickelodeons. The name Nickelodeon was first used in 1888 by Austins Nickelodeon, however, the term was popularized by Harry Davis and John P. Harris, who opened their small storefront theatre with that name on Smithfield Street in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on June 19,1905. They called it the Nickelodeon, joining nickel with the Greek word for an enclosed theater adopted by the 18th-century Odéon in Paris. Although it was not the first theater to show films, in 1919 a news article stated that it was the first theater in the world devoted exclusively to exhibition of moving picture spectacles, larger nickelodeons sometimes had the capacity for well over 1000 people. Other well-known nickelodeon owners were the Skouras Brothers of St. Louis, nickelodeons radically altered the mode of representation that corresponded with changes in the modes of distribution and the types of films being made. Around 1903, longer multi-shot films became prevalent, and this shift brought about important innovations in the distribution of films with the establishment of film exchanges. Film exchanges would buy films from manufacturers and then rent them out to exhibitors, with a steady supply of different films, exhibitors finally had the possibility to open venues where films were the central attraction. They did not have to worry about finding new audiences because the audience would return again and again to watch different films. Exhibition practices greatly varied and programs lasted anywhere from ten minutes to an hour, often, programs ran continuously and patrons would join a program already in progress when they arrived and stay as long as they liked. While some nickelodeons only showed films, others offered shows that combined films with vaudeville acts or illustrated songs, the desirability of longer films, which enabled nickelodeons to grow the way they did, was the result of a number of factors. For one, economic competition between film production companies put pressure on them to more elaborate, and often longer, films. Also, longer films were more attractive as the price paid by exhibitors depended on a length and the longer a film. Directors had a desire to make longer films because it meant greater artistic innovation as they tried to find new ways to engage audiences
17.
Release print
–
A release print is a copy of a film that is provided to a movie theater for exhibition. Workprints, sometimes called cutting copies, are, like rush prints and they are used for editing before the negative itself is conformed, or cut to match the edited workprint. A Showprint is a high quality projection print made for screening at special events such as gala premieres. As a showprint is at least two generations closer to the camera negative than a typical release print, the definition and saturation in the projected image is significantly higher. Showprints have been referred to as EKs, since Showprint is a tradename of DeLuxe. In short, a release print is three generations removed from the cut camera negative. This procedure eliminates at least one generation of analogue duplication and usually results in a significant higher quality of release prints, as of March 2015, Eastman Kodak is the only remaining manufacturer of colour release print stock in the world. Along with Kodak, ORWO of Germany also sells black-and-white print stock, the person operating the printer on which the release print is struck must take several factors into consideration in order to achieve accurate color. At the theater, release prints are projected through an aperture plate, sometimes a hard matte is used in printing to ensure that only the area of the frame shot in the camera that is intended to be projected is actually present on the release print. The audience may be confused when significant action appears on the edges of the picture. Director Brad Bird expressed frustration at this practice, which some theaters applied to his film The Incredibles, for example, in the United States, it is not unusual for each one to cost around $1,500 to print and ship to theaters around the country. The cost of a print is determined primarily by its length, the type of print stock used. Laser subtitling release prints of foreign language films adds significantly to the cost per print, due to the fear of piracy, distributors try to ensure that prints are returned and destroyed after the movies theatrical run is complete. A significant number of films have been preserved this way, via prints eventually being donated to film archives, the polyester film base is often recycled. EKs are even more expensive as they are almost completely made by hand, perhaps only five EKs will be made of a widely distributed feature, compared to thousands of standard prints. They are intended primarily for first-run and Academy-consideration theatrical runs in Los Angeles and this accounts for two of the typically five produced. Two EKs are usually reserved for the films producer, the remaining EK is usually archived by the films distributor. SFIFF, Brad Birds State of Cinema Address
18.
Biograph Studios
–
Biograph Studios was an early film studio and laboratory complex, built in 1912 by the Biograph Company at 807 East 175th Street, in The Bronx, New York City, New York. The set-up was similar to Thomas Edisons Black Maria in West Orange, New Jersey, as of 1988, the foundations of this machinery were still extant. The company moved in 1906 to a brownstone at 11 East 14th Street near Union Square and it was at this location that D. W. Griffith began as a director, and quickly became the studios focus. Griffith left the company in 1913, and it moved its facilities to 807 East 175th Street in The Bronx. Without Griffith, the studio did not prosper, and the company was dissolved in 1915, the studio facilities were acquired by one of Biograph Companys creditors, the Empire Trust Company, although Biograph continued to manage it. Herbert Yates acquired the Biograph Studios properties and Film laboratory facilities in 1928, Biograph Studios facilities in The Bronx was made a subsidiary of his Consolidated Film Industries. However, the principal activity in that decade was the production of shorts for Universal, Columbia. At this time, the remaining Biograph film collection was donated to the department of the Museum of Modern Art. The Soundies Distributing Corporation filmed at the Biograph Studios in 1944, Empire Trust later assigned management of the property to one of its own subsidiaries, The Actinograph Corp. which held it until 1948. Martin Poll restored Biograph Studios and reopened it in 1956 as the Gold Medal Studios, Gold Medal Studios became the largest film studio in the United States outside of Los Angeles at the time of its 1956 reopening. Poll sold the property in 1961, when it was incorporated into a company, Biograph Studios, Inc. in 1961. The television series Naked City, Car 54, Where Are You, Biograph Studios went dormant again in the 1970s before the studio facilities burned down in 1980. The site is now occupied by a New York City Department of Sanitation garage, hollywood on the Hudson, Film and Television in New York from Griffith to Sarnoff, Rutgers University Press,2008
19.
Essanay Studios
–
The Essanay Film Manufacturing Company was an American motion picture studio. It is best known today for its series of Charlie Chaplin comedies of 1915, the studio was founded in 1907 in Chicago, United States by George K. Spoor and Gilbert M. Anderson, originally as the Peerless Film Manufacturing Company. On August 10,1907, the name was changed to Essanay, Essanay was originally located at 496 Wells Street. Essanays first film, An Awful Skate, or The Hobo on Rollers, starring Ben Turpin, produced for only a hundred dollars. The studio prospered and in 1908 moved to its more famous address at 1333–45 W. Argyle St in Uptown, the mainstays of the organization, however, were studio co-owner G. M. Anderson, starring in the very popular Broncho Billy westerns, and Charlie Chaplin. Allan Dwan was hired by Essanay Studios as a screenwriter and developed into a famous Hollywood director, louella Parsons was also hired as a screenwriter and went on to be a Hollywood gossip columnist. Both George K. Spoor and Gilbert M. Broncho Billy Anderson received Oscars, specifically Academy Honorary Awards and this included locations in San Rafael and Santa Barbara. Colorado is the finest place in the country for Wild West stuff, Essanay opened the Essanay-West studio in Niles, California, in 1912, at the foot of Niles Canyon, where many Broncho Billy westerns were shot, along with The Tramp featuring Charlie Chaplin. Eventually the studio moved all operations to Los Angeles, the Chicago studio, as well as the new Niles studio, continued to produce films for another five years, reaching a total of well over 1,400 Essanay titles during its ten-year history. Essanay also produced some of the very first cartoons. In late 1914 Essanay succeeded in hiring Charlie Chaplin away from Mack Sennetts Keystone Studios, offering Chaplin a higher salary, Chaplin made 14 short comedies for Essanay in 1915, at both the Chicago and Niles studios, plus a cameo appearance in one of the Broncho Billy westerns. Chaplins Essanays are more disciplined than the chaotic roughhouse of Chaplins Keystones, with better story values, the landmark film of the Chaplin series is The Tramp, in which Chaplins vagabond character finds work on a farm and is smitten with the farmers daughter. Chaplin injected moments of drama and pathos unheard of in slapstick comedies, audiences responded to the humanity of Chaplins character, and Chaplin continued to explore serious or sentimental themes within comic situations. Chaplin disliked the weather of Chicago, and left after only one year for more money. His departure caused a rift between founders Spoor and Anderson, Chaplin was the studios biggest moneymaker, and Essanay resorted to creating new Chaplin comedies from file footage and out-takes. Finally, with Chaplin off the Essanay scene for good, Essanay signed French comedian Max Linder, Linder failed to match Chaplins popularity in America. In a last-ditch effort to save the studio, Essanay joined in a four-way merger orchestrated by Chicago distributor George Kleine in 1918, kleines new combine, V-L-S-E, Incorporated, was an amalgam of the Vitagraph, Lubin, Selig, and Essanay companies. Only the Vitagraph brand name continued into the 1920s, and was absorbed by Warner Brothers in 1925
20.
Kalem Company
–
The Kalem Company was an American film studio founded in New York City in 1907 by George Kleine, Samuel Long, and Frank J. Marion. The company was named for their initials K, L, and M, the company immediately joined other studios in the Motion Picture Patents Company that held a monopoly on production and distribution. Frank Marion had been the manager at Biograph Studios and Samuel Long was the manager of the Biograph production facility at Hoboken. Needing to raise capital, the two experienced filmmakers approached Chicago businessman George Kleine to come in as a partner. The company began operations from an office in a loft building at 131 West 24th Street in New York City. The partners were able to lure general manager and director Sidney Olcott away from Biograph who eventually became the Kalem Companys president and was rewarded with one share of its stock, Kalem had no indoor studios, so most of its films were shot on location. In February 1907, the company made its first motion picture, while Kalem scored success after success in their first year, the rate of production at the once-powerful Biograph stagnated, hampered by the loss of important personnel. Under the direction of Sidney Olcott, Kalem made a number of significant films, including the first adaptation of Ben Hur, in 1910 Olcott gave actress Alice Joyce her first acting job in his production of The Deacons Daughter. The parties reached a settlement in 1911, in which Kalem paid the estate $25,000 – an extremely large amount for the time. The action helped to establish the necessity of film studios obtaining motion picture rights to the properties used for their stories. In 1910 the company shot a film in Ireland, making Kalem the first movie studio to travel outside the United States to film on location. There, they notably filmed A Lad from Old Ireland plus they made a number of shorts in Blarney Castle, Glengarriff. Olcott and Valentine Grant, his wife, and others from the studio returned to Ireland for most of the summer in the next two years. Later on, only the outbreak of World War I prevented Olcott from following through with his plans to build a permanent studio in Beaufort, the Irish films led to Olcott taking a crew to Palestine in 1912 to make the first five-reel film. Titled From the Manger to the Cross, it told the story of Jesus. According to Turner Classic Movies, it is considered the most important silent film to deal with the life of Christ, in 1998 the film was selected for the National Film Registry of the United States Library of Congress. Kalem was also one of the first studios to regularly film year-round by setting up facilities in Florida during the winter, in the fall of 1910, Kalem began organizing other studio locations. In November 1910, William Wright, company treasurer, was sent to the West Coast to assess the feasibility of a permanent studio for the making of Western style films
21.
Lubin Manufacturing Company
–
The Lubin Manufacturing Company, was an American motion picture production company that produced silent films from 1902 to 1916. Lubin films were distributed with a Liberty Bell trademark, the Lubin Manufacturing Company was formed in 1902 and incorporated in 1909 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania by Siegmund Lubin. The company was the offspring of Lubins film equipment and film distribution and production business, known as Pop Lubin, he constructed his own combined camera/projector he called a Cineograph and his lower price and marketing know-how brought reasonable success. In 1897 Lubin began making films for commercial release, certain his business could prosper, the following year he rented low-cost space on the roof of a building in Philadelphias business district. He exhibited his new equipment at the 1899 National Export Exposition in Philadelphia, the insatiable appetite of the American public for motion picture entertainment saw Lubins film company undergo enormous growth. At the time, it was one of the most modern studios in the world, complete with a huge artificially lit stage, editing rooms, laboratories, the facility allowed several film productions to be undertaken simultaneously. The Lubin Manufacturing Company expanded production beyond Philadelphia, with facilities at 750 Riverside Avenue in Jacksonville, Florida, Los Angeles, and then in Coronado, California. In 1912, Lubin purchased a 350-acre estate in Betzwood, in what was rural countryside in the northwest outskirts of Philadelphia and converted the property into a studio. Lubin films also marked the first film appearance of Oliver Hardy, hardys first onscreen appearance was in the 1914 movie, Outwitting Dad where he was billed as O. N. Hardy. In many of his films at Lubin, he was billed as “Babe Hardy. ”He was most often cast as “the heavy” or the villain and had roles in comedy shorts. However, the companys downfall came even faster than its meteoric rise, Lubin was not as adroit as its competitors in shifting to quality feature-length films. Also, a fire at its main studio in June 1914, damaged nearby buildings, and destroyed the negatives for a number of unreleased new films. When World War I broke out in Europe in September of that year, Lubin Studios, in 1915, the Lubin company entered into an agreement with Vitagraph Studios, Selig Polyscope Company, and Essanay Studios to form a film distribution partnership known as V-S-L-E. However, the decline of the Lubin operations continued and the United States Supreme Court rulings against the monopoly of the Motion Picture Patents Company spelled the end of Lubins business. After making more than a motion pictures the corporation was forced into bankruptcy. Eventually Lubin gave up the fight with Edison and became part of the Motion Picture Patents Company. S. Lubin at the Internet Movie Database Lubin Manufacturing Company at the Internet Movie Database - filmography THE KING OF THE MOVIES - Film Pioneer, see Betzwood Film Archive below for updated work by Eckhardt. Betzwood Film Archive A new site dedicated to Lubin and his film studios from the Libraries and Archives of Montgomery County Community College with professor emeritus Joseph Eckhardt, the History Of The Discovery Of Cinematography An Illustrated Chronology History Detectives
22.
Selig Polyscope Company
–
The Selig Polyscope Company is an American motion picture company that was founded in 1896 by William Selig in Chicago. Selig Polyscope is noted for establishing Southern Californias first permanent movie studio, the company produced hundreds of early, widely distributed commercial moving pictures, including the first films starring Tom Mix, Harold Lloyd, Colleen Moore, and Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle. The business gradually became a zoo attraction in East Los Angeles. Selig had worked as a magician and minstrel show operator on the west coast of California, later on in Chicago he attempted to enter the film business using his own photographic equipment, free from patent restrictions imposed through companies controlled by Thomas Edison. In 1896, with help from Union Metal Works and Andrew Schustek, he shot his first film, Tramp and he went on to successfully produce local actualities, slapstick comedies, early travelogues and industrial films. In 1908 Selig Polyscope was involved in the production of The Fairylogue and Radio-Plays, by 1909 Selig had studios making short features in Chicago and the Edendale district of Los Angeles. The company also distributed stock film footage and titles from other studios and that year, Roscoe Arbuckles first movie was a Selig comedy short. The companys early existence was fraught with turmoil over disputes with lawyers representing Thomas Edisons interests. In 1909 Selig and several other studio heads settled with Edison by creating an alliance with the inventor, effectively a cartel, Motion Picture Patents Company dominated the industry for a few years until the Supreme Court ruled the firm was an illegal monopoly. In 1910 Selig Polyscope produced a wholly new filmed version of the The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, although Selig Polyscope produced a wide variety of moving pictures, the company was most widely known for its wild animal shorts, historical subjects and early westerns. An early production there was The Count of Monte Cristo, Edendale soon became Selig Polyscopes headquarters, but in 1911 Boggs was murdered by a Japanese gardener who also wounded Selig. The company produced hundreds of features at Edendale, including many early westerns featuring Tom Mix. Selig Polyscope made dozens of highly successful short movies involving wild animals in exotic settings, in 1914 Selig made 14 short experimental talking pictures with Scottish actor Harry Lauder. In 1913, through a partnership with the Chicago Tribune, Selig produced The Adventures of Kathlyn. Each chapters story was published in the newspaper. A combination of animals, clever dramatic action and Kathlyn Williams screen presence resulted in significant success. The Tribune’s circulation reportedly increased by 10% and both a dance and cocktail were named after Williams, whose likeness was sold on over 50,000 postcards. In 1917 Selig sold the Edendale facility to producer William Fox, Selig Polyscope became insolvent and ceased operations in 1918
23.
Vitagraph Studios
–
Vitagraph Studios, also known as the Vitagraph Company of America, was a United States motion picture studio. It was founded by J. Stuart Blackton and Albert E. Smith in 1897 in Brooklyn, New York, by 1907 it was the most prolific American film production company, producing many famous silent films. It was bought by Warner Bros. in 1925, 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, 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 companys 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 companys 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 propaganda. In 1897 Vitagraph produced The Humpty Dumpty Circus, which was the first film to use the stop-motion technique, 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 movies—a sensation for that time. In 1909 it was one of the ten production companies included in Edisons attempt to corner movie-making. Major stars included Florence Turner, Maurice Costello, Harry T. Morey, Jean and such stars as Helen Hayes, Viola Dana, Dolores Costello, Norma Talmadge, Constance Talmadge. Larry Trimble was a director of films for Turner and Jean. The first Les Miserables film adaptation, a short silent historical drama starring Maurice Costello as Jean Valjean, the film consists of four reels, each released over the course of three months beginning on 4 September to 27 November 1909. In 1910 a number of houses showed the five parts of the Vitagraph serial The Life of Moses consecutively. A long series of Shakespeare adaptations were the first done of the Bards works in the U. S. In 1911, Vitagraph produced the first aviation film, The Military Air-Scout, directed by William J. Humphrey, the 1915 feature The Battle Cry of Peace 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, World War I spelled the beginning of the end for Vitagraph. With the loss of foreign distributors and the rise of the monopolistic Studio system, on January 28,1925, it left the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America, the owner, Albert E
24.
Vaudeville
–
Vaudeville is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment. It was especially popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, a typical vaudeville performance is made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill. A vaudeville performer is often referred to as a vaudevillian, Vaudeville developed from many sources, including the concert saloon, minstrelsy, freak shows, dime museums, and literary American burlesque. Called the heart of American show business, vaudeville was one of the most popular types of entertainment in North America for several decades, the origin of this term is obscure, but is often explained as being derived from the French expression voix de ville. A second speculation is that it comes from the songs on satire by poet Olivier Basselin. Some, however, preferred the term variety to what manager Tony Pastor called its sissy. Thus, vaudeville was marketed as variety well into the 20th century, with its first subtle appearances within the early 1860s, vaudeville was not initially a common form of entertainment. The form gradually evolved from the saloon and variety hall into its mature form throughout the 1870s and 1880s. This more gentle form was known as Polite Vaudeville, in the years before the American Civil War, entertainment existed on a different scale. Certainly, variety theatre existed before 1860 in Europe and elsewhere, in the US, as early as the first decades of the 19th century, theatregoers could enjoy a performance consisting of Shakespeare plays, acrobatics, singing, dancing, and comedy. As the years progressed, people seeking diversified amusement found a number of ways to be entertained. Vaudeville was characterized by traveling companies touring through cities and towns, a significant influence also came from Dutch minstrels and comedians. Vaudeville incorporated these various itinerant amusements into a stable, institutionalized form centered in Americas growing urban hubs, pastors experiment proved successful, and other managers soon followed suit. B. F. Keith took the step, starting in Boston. Later, E. F. Albee, adoptive grandfather of the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Edward Albee, circuits such as those managed by Keith-Albee provided vaudevilles greatest economic innovation and the principal source of its industrial strength. They enabled a chain of allied vaudeville houses that remedied the chaos of the booking system by contracting acts for regional and national tours. These could easily be lengthened from a few weeks to two years, Albee also gave national prominence to vaudevilles trumpeting polite entertainment, a commitment to entertainment equally inoffensive to men, women and children. Acts that violated this ethos were admonished and threatened with expulsion from the remaining performances or were canceled altogether
25.
Academy of Music (New York City)
–
The Academy of Music was a New York City opera house, located on the northeast corner of East 14th Street and Irving Place in Manhattan. The 4, 000-seat hall opened on October 2,1854, the review in The New York Times declared it to be an acoustical triumph, but In every other aspect. The Academys opera season became the center of life for New Yorks elite. The Academy of Music has been described as the first successful dedicated opera house in the United States, by May 1853, the interior has been dismantled and the furnishings sold off, with the shell of the building sold to the Mercantile Library Association. The stages proscenium opening was 48 feet, with an additional 35 feet in the wings, the height of the proscenium opening was 30 feet. Its first opera season was from October through December 1854, the Max Maretzek Italian Opera Company was engaged by US actor James Henry Hackett. The company performed Bellinis Norma for the inauguration of the theatre with Giulia Grisi in the title role, Maretzeks company performed an annual season at the Academy through 1878. His company was not the group active at the opera house as the theater during this time. Musicologist George Whitney Martin writes, New Yorks Academy of Music, from 1854 to 1883 the citys leading house for opera, because it was primarily a real estate venture run by a board of investors seeking the highest rent possible. The Academy hosted several American premieres, including Rigoletto, Il trovatore, La traviata, Aida, Lohengrin, Die Walkure, in 1860 it was the site of a reception for the Prince of Wales. These balls were covered by the press, which did little to dim the enthusiasm or ribald behavior of the participants, one reporter wrote that women were thrown in the air and then sexually assaulted amid the jeers and laughter of the other drunken wretches on the floor. Not a whisper of shame in the crowd and these spectacles grew in size over the following decades, in 1876, one such ball was attended by over 4000 people. Still, it was the season that made the Academy the mainstay of social life for New Yorks uppertens. This emblem of social prominence was passed down generation to generation. The Metropolitans new opera house at Broadway and 39th Street, twice the size of the Academy and it contained three tiers of elegant boxes to display the wealth of the citys new economic leaders. The new opera house was an instant success with New York society and music lovers alike, in 1888 the Academy began to offer vaudeville. From January 28 to March 1901, a revival of Clyde Fitchs play Barbara Frietchie appeared there, the venue was rented by labor organizations in the early 1900s and used to stage rallies. In 1926 it was demolished, along with its neighbor Tammany Hall, on the south side of 14th Street across from the site of the opera house, a movie theatre opened in 1927 which took the name the Academy of Music
26.
General Film Company
–
The General Film Company was a motion picture distribution company in the United States. Between 1909 and 1920, the company distributed almost 12,000 silent era motion pictures, the General Film Company was formed by the Motion Picture Patents Company in an attempt to monopolize distribution. In 1909, the General Film Company tried to seize the equipment of independent distribution companies to discourage their activities, using their control over several film patents, the General Film Company and MPPC tried to force independent distribution companies to sell out or lose their patent licenses. Competing organizations, such as the Motion Picture Distributing and Sales Company, the National Independent Moving Picture Alliance and the Film Service Association, emerged to challenge the trust. By 1912, the power of the General Film Company had declined and the U. S. Justice Department started prosecution of the MPPC and the General Film Company under the Sherman Act. On March 30,1918, the General Film Company was sold, along with the MPPC, thomas Edison reacquired these assets when the Lincoln & Parker Company went bankrupt, and sold them to producer Robert L. Giffen in October 1919. General Film Company at the Internet Movie Database
27.
Monopoly
–
A monopoly exists when a specific person or enterprise is the only supplier of a particular commodity. The verb monopolise or monopolize refers to the process by which a company gains the ability to raise prices or exclude competitors, in economics, a monopoly is a single seller. In law, a monopoly is an entity that has significant market power, that is. Although monopolies may be big businesses, size is not a characteristic of a monopoly, a small business may still have the power to raise prices in a small industry. A monopoly is distinguished from a monopsony, in there is only one buyer of a product or service. Likewise, a monopoly should be distinguished from a cartel, in which several providers act together to coordinate services, prices or sale of goods. Monopolies, monopsonies and oligopolies are all situations in one or a few entities have market power and therefore interact with their customers. Monopolies can be established by a government, form naturally, or form by integration, in many jurisdictions, competition laws restrict monopolies. A government-granted monopoly or legal monopoly, by contrast, is sanctioned by the state, patents, copyrights, and trademarks are sometimes used as examples of government-granted monopolies. The government may also reserve the venture for itself, thus forming a government monopoly, There are four basic types of market structures in traditional economic analysis, perfect competition, monopolistic competition, oligopoly and monopoly. A monopoly is a structure in which a single supplier produces, if there is a single seller in a certain market and there are no close substitutes for the product, then the market structure is that of a pure monopoly. Sometimes, there are many sellers in an industry and/or there exist many close substitutes for the goods being produced and this is termed monopolistic competition, whereas in oligopoly the companies interact strategically. Most economic textbooks follow the practice of explaining the perfect competition model. The boundaries of what constitutes a market and what does not are relevant distinctions to make in economic analysis, in a general equilibrium context, a good is a specific concept including geographical and time-related characteristics. Most studies of market structure relax a little their definition of a good, price Maker, Decides the price of the good or product to be sold, but does so by determining the quantity in order to demand the price desired by the firm. High Barriers, Other sellers are unable to enter the market of the monopoly, single seller, In a monopoly, there is one seller of the good, who produces all the output. Therefore, the market is being served by a single company, and for practical purposes. Price Discrimination, A monopolist can change the price or quantity of the product and he or she sells higher quantities at a lower price in a very elastic market, and sells lower quantities at a higher price in a less elastic market
28.
Sherman Antitrust Act
–
The Sherman Antitrust Act is a landmark federal statute in the history of United States antitrust law passed by Congress in 1890. In the general sense, a trust is a form of a contract whereby one party entrusts its property to a second party. These are commonly used to hold inheritances for the benefit of children, in most countries outside the United States, antitrust law is known as competition law. The law attempts to prevent the raising of prices by restriction of trade or supply. Innocent monopoly, or monopoly achieved solely by merit, is perfectly legal, over time, the Act has also been used more broadly, to oppose the combination of entities that could potentially harm competition, such as monopolies or cartels. The Sherman Act is divided into three sections, Section 1 delineates and prohibits specific means of anticompetitive conduct, while Section 2 deals with end results that are anti-competitive in nature. Thus, these sections supplement each other in an effort to prevent businesses from violating the spirit of the Act, Section 3 simply extends the provisions of Section 1 to U. S. territories and the District of Columbia. The Robinson–Patman Act of 1936 amended the Clayton Act, the amendment proscribed certain anti-competitive practices in which manufacturers engaged in price discrimination against equally-situated distributors. The federal government began filing cases under the Sherman Antitrust Act in 1890, some cases were successful and others were not, many took several years to decide, including appeals. Notable cases filed under the act include, United States v. Workingmens Amalgamated Council of New Orleans, hale v. Henkel also reached the Supreme Court. Precedent was set for the production of documents by an officer of a company, hale was an officer of the American Tobacco Co. Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v. United States, which broke up the company based on geography, United States v. American Tobacco Co. which split the company into four. Federal Baseball Club v. National League in which the Supreme Court ruled that Major League Baseball was not interstate commerce and was not subject to the anti-trust law, United States v. National City Lines, related to the General Motors streetcar conspiracy. United States v. AT&T Co. which was settled in 1982, United States v. Microsoft Corp. was settled in 2001 without the breakup of the company. The law directs itself not against conduct which is competitive, even severely so, according to its authors, it was not intended to impact market gains obtained by honest means, by benefiting the consumers more than the competitors. Senator George Hoar of Massachusetts, another author of the Sherman Act, who merely by superior skill and intelligence. got the whole business because nobody could do it as well as he could was not a monopolist. It involved something like the use of means which made it impossible for other persons to engage in fair competition, at Apex Hosiery Co. v. Leader 310 U. S.469,310 U. S. 492-93 and n. In 1890, when the Sherman Act was adopted, there were only a few federal statutes imposing penalties for obstructing or misusing interstate transportation
29.
Balboa Amusement Producing Company
–
The Balboa Amusement Producing Company was a film production company in Long Beach, California from 1913 to 1918 that produced more than 1000 films, around 90% of which have been lost. Some of the silent film stars who worked at the studios during this time are Fatty Arbuckle. Charlie Chaplin also made three visits to the studios to visit Arbuckles film shoots and to study studio management for his newly formed United Artists company, in 1910, the California Motion Picture Manufacturing Company built the first movie studio in the city of Long Beach. This was also the first studio west of Chicago, since the hub of film-making at that time was in New York. In April 1913, H. M. Horkheimer invested their inheritance in the purchase of the built by the California Motion Picture Manufacturing Company at the corner of 6th Street. This became the center of their Balboa Amusement Producing Company, a contract between Balboa and Jack London was signed on April 28,1913, allowing the studio to make film adaptations of his novels. In the beginning of August, Variety announced a contract between the Bosworth Company and Jack London to produce versions of Londons novels. The first release would be The Sea Wolf, the Balboa company would advertise that they would be the first to release the film and announced their own version of The Sea Wolf and several other adaptations of Londons works. In an article in Motion Picture News in which Hobart Bosworth stated the production would be ready by October 1, the publication received a telegram from Jack London confirmed that Balboas contract had lapsed because of a failure to produce four films by the stipulated date. London also stated that the first film had not even completed by this point. The judge allowed the case to be re-opened and the Authors League of America announced a desire to take it to the United States Supreme Court if necessary, London would win and the case would influence the United States Congress to change the copyright law in the writers favor. Prohibition Madness, Life and Death in and Around Long Beach, California, Balboa Films, A History and Filmography of the Silent Film Studio. The New Historical Dictionary of the American Film Industry, Balboa Amusement Producing Company at the Internet Movie Database
30.
Winsor McCay
–
Zenas Winsor McCay was an American cartoonist and animator. He is best known for the comic strip Little Nemo and the animated film Gertie the Dinosaur, for contractual reasons, he worked under the pen name Silas on the comic strip Dream of the Rarebit Fiend. From a young age, McCay was a quick, prolific and he started his professional career making posters and performing for dime museums, and began illustrating newspapers and magazines in 1898. He joined the New York Herald in 1903, where he created comic strips such as Little Sammy Sneeze. In 1905, his signature strip Little Nemo in Slumberland debuted, the strip demonstrated McCays strong graphic sense and mastery of color and linear perspective. McCay experimented with the elements of the comic strip page, arranging and sizing panels to increase impact. McCay also produced numerous detailed editorial cartoons and was a performer of chalk talks on the vaudeville circuit. McCay was an animation pioneer, between 1911 and 1921 he self-financed and animated ten films, some of which survive only as fragments. The first three served in his act, Gertie the Dinosaur was an interactive routine in which McCay appeared to give orders to a trained dinosaur. McCay and his assistants worked for months on his most ambitious film, The Sinking of the Lusitania. Lusitania did not enjoy as much success as the earlier films. In his drawing, McCay made bold, prodigious use of perspective, particularly in detailed architecture. He textured his editorial cartoons with copious fine hatching, and made color a central element in Little Nemo and his comic strip work has influenced generations of cartoonists and illustrators. The technical level of McCays animation—its naturalism, smoothness, and scale—was unmatched until Walt Disneys feature films arrived in the 1930s and he pioneered inbetweening, the use of registration marks, cycling, and other animation techniques that were to become standard. McCays paternal grandparents, farmers Donald and Christiana McKay, immigrated from Scotland to Upper Canada in the mid-1830s, McCays father, Robert McKay was born in Woodstock, Upper Canada, the third of six children. McCays maternal grandparents, Peter and Mary Murray, were also Scottish immigrants and their daughter Janet was the third of nine children. Robert was a member of King Solomons No.43 Masonic Lodge in Woodstock, in 1862, Robert first traveled to the U. S. Robert and the twenty-five-year-old Janet married on January 8,1866, at Woodstocks Methodist Episcopal Church. The couple moved across the Canada–US border later in the year and settled in Spring Lake, Michigan, Robert was employed by American entrepreneur Zenas G. Winsor, with whom he had made contact in Canada
31.
Gertie the Dinosaur
–
Gertie the Dinosaur is a 1914 animated short film by American cartoonist and animator Winsor McCay. It is the earliest animated film to feature a dinosaur, McCay first used the film before live audiences as an interactive part of his vaudeville act, the frisky, childlike Gertie did tricks at the command of her master. McCays employer William Randolph Hearst later curtailed McCays vaudeville activities, so McCay added an introductory sequence to the film for its theatrical release. McCay abandoned a sequel, Gertie on Tour, after producing about a minute of footage, although Gertie is popularly thought to be the earliest animated film, McCay had earlier made Little Nemo and How a Mosquito Operates. The American J. Gertie was the first film to use techniques such as keyframes, registration marks, tracing paper, the Mutoscope action viewer. It influenced the next generation of such as the Fleischer brothers, Otto Messmer, Paul Terry. John Randolph Bray unsuccessfully tried to patent many of McCays animation techniques and is said to have been behind a plagiarized version of Gertie that appeared a year or two after the original. Gertie is the best preserved of McCays films—some of which have been lost or survive only in fragments—and has been preserved in the US National Film Registry. Winsor McCay had worked prolifically as a commercial artist and cartoonist by the time he started making comic strips such as Dream of the Rarebit Fiend. In 1906, McCay began performing on the circuit, doing chalk talks—performances in which he drew before live audiences. Inspired by the books his son brought home, McCay came to see the possibility of making moving pictures of his cartoons. He claimed that he was the first man in the world to make animated cartoons, though he was preceded by the American James Stuart Blackton, McCays first film starred his Little Nemo characters and debuted in movie theatres in 1911, he soon incorporated it into his vaudeville act. He followed it in 1912 with How a Mosquito Operates, in which a giant, McCay gave the mosquito a personality and balanced humor with the horror of the nightmare situation. McCay conferred with the American Historical Society in 1912, and announced plans for the presentation of pictures showing the great monsters that used to inhabit the earth and he spoke of the serious and educational work that the animation process could enable. McCay considered a number of names before settling on Gertie, his production notebooks used Jessie the Dinosaurus. in a sweet voice. He thought it was a name, but wanted it to be a girls name instead of a boys. Gertie the Dinosaur is the earliest animated film to feature a dinosaur and its star Gertie does tricks much like a trained elephant. She is animated in a naturalistic style unprecedented for the time, she breathes rhythmically, she shifts her weight as she moves, McCay imbued her with a personality—while friendly, she could be capricious, ignoring or rebelling against her masters commands
32.
Eclair (company)
–
Éclair was a film production, film laboratory and movie camera manufacturing company established in Épinay-sur-Seine, France by Charles Jourjon in 1907. Originally a production company, they started building cameras in 1912, among their early models was the Caméréclair of 1928, then the Camé300 Réflex, both successful studio cameras. Their real breakthrough design, the Caméflex introduced in 1947, played a part in the French New Wave by allowing for a freer form of shooting 35mm fiction films. Later 16mm silent models such as the 1960 Eclair NPR and the 1971 Eclair ACL were documentary cinema favorites, NPR stands for Noiseless Portable Reflex and ACL comes from the letters of the names of its designers Agusti Coma and Jacques Lecoeur. The last models designed by Eclair in the early-1980s came too late to save the company from bankruptcy and were produced, if at all, the Eclair EX16. An Eclair 16 was used by L. M. Kit Carson in Jim McBrides ground-breaking film, two years later, the NPR was chosen by director Michael Wadleigh to shoot his documentary Woodstock. That they succeeded so spectacularly is a testament to the NPRs sturdiness, the ACL model used a focal plane shutter for exposure and a side-to-side oscillating mirror for reflex viewing to keep the camera body size to a minimum. A handheld Eclair camera was used in the scene in the 1960 film. The company was acquired in late 1968 by British film producer Harry Saltzman who then founded the Éclair-Debrie Ltd company, the film processing and post-production side of Éclair continues to operate. Eclair 16mm Community site A blog post dedicated to the eclair ACL eclair ACL manuals BBC Documentary, The Camera That Changed the World
33.
Staten Island
–
Staten Island /ˌstætən ˈaɪlənd/ is one of the five boroughs of New York City in the U. S. state of New York. In the southwest of the city, Staten Island is the southernmost part of both the city and state of New York, with Conference House Park at the tip of the island. The borough is separated from New Jersey by the Arthur Kill and the Kill Van Kull, with a 2015 Census-estimated population of 474,558, Staten Island is the least populated of the boroughs but is the third-largest in area at 58 sq mi. Staten Island is the borough of New York with a non-Hispanic White majority. The borough is coextensive with Richmond County, and until 1975 was the Borough of Richmond and its flag was later changed to reflect this. Staten Island has been called the forgotten borough by inhabitants who feel neglected by the city government. The East Shore is home to the 2. 5-mile F. D. R, Boardwalk, the fourth-longest in the world. The South Shore, site of the 17th-century Dutch and French Huguenot settlement, the West Shore is the least populated and most industrial part of the island. Motor traffic can reach the borough from Brooklyn via the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and from New Jersey via the Outerbridge Crossing, Goethals Bridge, and Bayonne Bridge. Staten Island has Metropolitan Transportation Authority bus lines and an MTA rapid transit line, the Staten Island Railway, Staten Island is the only borough that is not connected to the New York City Subway system. The free Staten Island Ferry connects the borough to Manhattan and is a popular tourist attraction, providing views of the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, and Lower Manhattan. The landfill is being redeveloped as Freshkills Park, a devoted to restoring habitat. As in much of North America, human habitation appeared in the island fairly rapidly after the retreat of the ice sheet, archaeologists have recovered tool evidence of Clovis culture activity dating from about 14,000 years ago. This evidence was first discovered in 1917 in the Charleston section of the island, various Clovis artifacts have been discovered since then, on property owned by Mobil Oil. The island was abandoned later, possibly because of the extirpation of large mammals on the island. Rossville points are a type of arrowhead that defines a Native American cultural period that runs from the Archaic period to the Early Woodland period. They are named for the Rossville section of Staten Island, where they were first found near the old Rossville Post Office building, at the time of European contact, the island was inhabited by the Raritan band of the Unami division of the Lenape. In Lenape, one of the Algonquian languages, Staten Island was called Aquehonga Manacknong, meaning as far as the place of the bad woods, or Eghquhous, the area was part of the Lenape homeland known as Lenapehoking
34.
Life's Shop Window
–
Lifes Shop Window is a 1914 American silent drama film directed by J. Gordon Edwards and starring Claire Whitney and Stuart Holmes. It is a adaptation of the eponymous 1907 novel by Annie Sophie Cory. The film depicts the story of English orphan Lydia Wilton, although Wiltons marriage is legitimate, it was conducted in secret, and she is accused of having a child out of wedlock. Forced to leave England, she reunites with her husband in Arizona, there, she is tempted by infidelity with an old acquaintance, Eustace Pelham, before seeing the error of her ways and returning to her family. Lifes Shop Window was the first film produced, rather than simply distributed, by William Foxs Box Office Attractions Company, several reviewers approved of the films expurgated treatment of the novels plot, although opinions of the quality of the film itself were mixed. It proved very popular upon its release in New York. Like many of Foxs early works, it was likely lost in the 1937 Fox vault fire, Bernard Chetwin is a boarder at John Andersons farm in England. He is unimpressed by Andersons spoiled daughter Bella, but is attracted to their orphaned servant and she tells him of her dreams for a happier life, and they fall in love. Wilton also meets Eustace Pelham, who introduces her to his philosophy of lifes shop window, Chetwin marries Wilton in a secret ceremony. Intending to establish a farm to support his new family, Chetwin leaves the English countryside for Arizona, concerned about the dangers of frontier territory, he travels without his newlywed wife, intending to send for her later. When she gives birth to Chetwins child, Andersons wife refuses to accept evidence of her marriage and she takes the infant with her to Arizona and reunites with Chetwin at his ranch. The demands of managing the ranch consume all of Chetwins time, One day, a traveler is injured near the ranch, whom she recognizes as Pelham. Pelham courts her, taking advantage of her loneliness, although she admits she does not love him, he convinces her to abandon her family and run away with him. As she is preparing to depart, she is confronted by Starlight, an Indian woman who works as a servant on the ranch and she spurns Pelham and returns to her family. Eventually, Chetwin forgives her and devotes more of his time to her, Pelham may have been killed by Starlight, although his ultimate fate is left unclear. Adultery and female sexuality are common themes in her works, which reversed the expected gender roles of the time. Elizabeth Bisland described Lydia, the character of Corys 1907 novel Lifes Shop Window, as a very modernist heroine. Like many of Crosss novels, it attracted controversy, and was banned for a time by the Circulating Libraries Association in the United Kingdom, Lifes Shop Window had already become the basis of a successful play, based on an expurgated version of the novels plot
35.
Theda Bara
–
Theda Bara was an American silent film and stage actress. Bara was one of the most popular actresses of the silent era and her femme fatale roles earned her the nickname The Vamp. Bara made more than 40 films between 1914 and 1926, but most were lost in the 1937 Fox vault fire, after her marriage to Charles Brabin in 1921, she made two more feature films and retired from acting in 1926 having never appeared in a sound film. She died of cancer on April 7,1955, at the age of 69. She was born Theodosia Burr Goodman in the Avondale section of Cincinnati and her father was Bernard Goodman, a prosperous Jewish tailor born in Poland. Her mother, Pauline Louise Françoise, was born in Switzerland, Bernard and Pauline married in 1882. She had two siblings, Marque and Esther, who became a film actress as Lori Bara. She was named after the daughter of US Vice President Aaron Burr, Bara attended Walnut Hills High School graduating in 1903. After attending the University of Cincinnati for two years, she worked mainly in theater productions, but did explore other projects, after moving to New York City in 1908, she made her Broadway debut in The Devil. Most of Baras early films were shot around the East Coast, primarily at the Fox Studios in Fort Lee, Bara lived with her family in New York City during this time. The rise of Hollywood as the center of the American film industry forced her to relocate to Los Angeles to film the epic Cleopatra, no known prints of Cleopatra exist today, but numerous photographs of Bara in costume as the Queen of the Nile have survived. Between 1915 and 1919, Bara was Fox studios biggest star and her final Fox film was The Lure of Ambition. In 1920, she turned briefly to the stage, appearing on Broadway in The Blue Flame, Baras fame drew large crowds to the theater, but her acting was savaged by critics. Her career suffered without Fox studios support, and she did not make another film until The Unchastened Woman for Chadwick Pictures Corporation. Bara retired after making one more film, the short comedy Madame Mystery, made for Hal Roach and directed by Stan Laurel. At the height of her fame, Bara earned $4,000 per week and she was one of the most popular movie stars, ranking behind only Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford. Baras best-known roles were as the vamp, although she attempted to avoid typecasting by playing wholesome heroines in films such as Under Two Flags and she also appeared as Juliet in a version of Shakespeares Romeo and Juliet. Although Bara took her seriously, she was too successful as an exotic wanton woman to develop a more versatile career
36.
Film studio
–
The majority of firms in the entertainment industry have never owned their own studios, but have rented space from other companies. The largest film studio in the world is Hengdian World Studios, in Zhejiang and he distributed these movies at vaudeville theaters, penny arcades, wax museums, and fairgrounds. The pioneering Thanhouser film studio was founded in New Rochelle, New York in 1909 by American theatrical impresario Edwin Thanhouser, the company produced and released 1,086 films between 1910 and 1917, successfully distributing them around the world. The first film ever, Million Dollar Mystery, was released by the Thanhouser company in 1914. In the early 1900s, companies started moving to Los Angeles, although electric lights were by then widely available, none were yet powerful enough to adequately expose film, the best source of illumination for motion picture production was natural sunlight. Some movies were shot on the roofs of buildings in Downtown Los Angeles, early movie producers also relocated to Southern California to escape Edisons Motion Picture Patents Company, which controlled almost all the patents relevant to movie production at the time. The first movie studio in the Hollywood area was Nestor Studios, in the same year, another 15 independents settled in Hollywood. Other production companies eventually settled in the Los Angeles area in such as Culver City, Burbank. Five large companies, 20th Century Fox, RKO Pictures, Paramount Pictures, smaller studios operated simultaneously with the majors. Together with smaller outfits such as PRC TKO and Grand National, the Big Fives ownership of movie theaters was eventually opposed by eight independent producers, including Samuel Goldwyn, David O. Selznick, Walt Disney, Hal Roach, and Walter Wanger. In 1948, the government won a case against Paramount in the Supreme Court. This decision, reached after years of litigation, hastened the end of the studio system. By the 1950s, the components of a typical major film studio had become standardized. Movement in and out of the studio is normally limited to specific gates, Studio premises generally feature multiple sound stages along with an outside backlot, as well as offices for studio executives and production companies. There is normally a studio commissary, which is the term in the film industry for what other industries call a company cafeteria. With the growing diversification of studios into such fields as video games, television, theme parks, home video and publishing, instead the studios transformed into financing and distribution entities for the films made by their affiliated production companies. With the decreasing cost of CG and visual effects, many studios sold large chunks of their once massive studio spaces or backlots to private real-estate developers. Century City in Los Angeles was once part of the 20th Century Fox backlot, in most cases portions of the backlots were retained and are available for rental by various film and television productions
37.
Edendale, Los Angeles
–
Edendale is a historical name for a district in Los Angeles, California, northwest of Downtown Los Angeles, in what is known today as Echo Park, Los Feliz and Silver Lake. In the opening decades of the 20th century, in the era of silent movies, Edendale was widely known as the home of most major movie studios on the West Coast. Among its many claims, it was home to the Keystone Kops, and the site of many firsts, including Charlie Chaplins first movie, the first feature-length comedy. The Edendale movie studios were concentrated in a four-block stretch of Allesandro Street. Allesandro Street was later renamed Glendale Boulevard, Edendales hilly streets and nearby lake lent themselves to many silent movie gags. The districts heyday as the center of the picture industry was in the 1910s. By the 1920s, the studios had moved elsewhere, mostly to Hollywood, in the years prior to World War II, Edendale had a large artist community and a large communist community. Many of its residents were transplants from the Eastern United States or the Soviet Union, the red car ran down the median of Allesandro Avenue, which was double-tracked, and even triple-tracked between Sunset and Effie, as the tracks were also used by the interurban Glendale-Burbank Line. After 1940, the Edendale Line as such ceased, though service continued in the form of service on the Glendale-Burbank Line. Rail service on that line ended completely in 1955, and the tracks have been abandoned, soon after, the region was cut in two by the construction of the Glendale Freeway. The name Edendale is no used as a place name. A few remnants of the name are the local post office, a library branch, an urban farm called Edendale Farm. In its July 1911 issue, movie trade publication Motography described Edendale this way and it is the motion picture center of the Pacific Coast. With clear air and sunshine three hundred days out of the year, conditions are ideal for perfect picture making, the scenic advantages of the location, too, are unique. Within a short distance of Edendale may be found every known variety of national scenery, in 1909, the Selig-Polyscope Company established the first permanent Los Angeles motion picture studio at the northeast corner of Clifford and Allesandro in Edendale. The company was founded by Colonel William Selig in Chicago, and it was his associate, within a few years, Selig had shifted most of his operations to Los Angeles. Cowboy movie star Tom Mix made his first movies with Selig-Polyscope out of their Edendale studio, the studio was originally completed in 1910, and featured a mission-style façade on the front entrance patterned after the bells at Mission San Gabriel. This mission-style entrance set a style that was echoed by other Edendale studios, in 1913, Selig acquired 32 acres of land in Lincoln Heights and began shifting operations to the new location
38.
Sound-on-film
–
Sound-on-film processes can either record an analog sound track or digital sound track, and may record the signal either optically or magnetically. Earlier technologies were sound-on-disc, meaning the films soundtrack would be on a phonograph record. The most prevalent current method of recording sound on a film print is by stereo variable-area recording. A two-channel audio signal is recorded as a pair of running parallel with the films direction of travel through the projector. The lines change area depending on the magnitude of the signal, the projector shines light from a small lamp, called an exciter, through a perpendicular slit onto the film. The image on the slice of exposed track modulates the intensity of the light, which is collected by a photosensitive element, a photocell. These LED or laser exciters are backwards-compatible with older tracks, earlier processes, used on 70 mm film prints and special presentations of 35 mm film prints, recorded sound magnetically on ferric oxide tracks bonded to the film print, outside the sprocket holes. 16 mm and Super 8 formats sometimes used a magnetic track on the camera film. Film of this form is no longer manufactured, but single-perforated film without the track or, in the case of 16 mm. Three different digital systems for 35 mm cinema release prints were introduced during the 1990s. Almost all sound formats used with motion-picture film have been sound-on-film formats, including, RCA Photophone, a variable-area format now universally used for optical analog soundtracks—since the late 1970s, usually with a Dolby encoding matrix. Tri-Ergon, the patent of this Berlin based company was bought by Fox in 1926 and this was a system developed by RCA and Disney Studios with a multi-channel soundtrack recorded on a separate strip of film from the picture
39.
Sony Music Studios
–
Sony Music Studios was a well-known former music recording and mastering facility in New York City. The five story red brick building was a music and broadcasting complex that was located at 460 W. 54th Street, at 10th Avenue and it opened in 1993, and closed in August 2007. In addition to being the facility for new popular, classical and other albums, it was also used as space for soundtrack recording and mixing, post-production. Sony Music Studios also had facilities for live and taped television broadcasts, prior to its acquisition by Sony in 1993, the industrial red-brick barn, was owned by Camera Mart for 20 years, and leased the space to movie and television producers. William Fox, President of the Fox Film Corporation, had worked with inventor Theodore W. Case to develop a method for capturing sound on film eventually becoming the Movietone sound system. On April 30,1927, the first talking Fox Movietone subject debuted in New York, by the end of 1928, Movietone was churning out four talking newsreels a week, and a string of film shorts soon thereafter. The March of Time documentary film series began in rented space on the floor from 1934-1936. Fox Movietone newsreels ceased production in 1963, but by then the studio had become popular for film and commercial production. Among the features made there, Miracle on 34th Street, On The Waterfront, Middle of the Night, Fail Safe, The Pawnbroker, The Group, The Owl and The Pussycat, Wheres Poppa. Fox leased out the complex to various independent film and television such as. Productions with such TV series as Inner Sanctum, The Reporter, the famous I Love New York ad was filmed there in 1978. Printed records are murky on precisely when Twentieth Century Fox divested itself of the property, in 1968, Manhattan Sound Studios ran a short-lived “Manhattan ‘54” operation there. After this it appears to have been bought by Camera Mart, for one brief year,1979, Stage One became a major dance and ballet performance space. Camera Mart owned the property until selling to Sony in 1993, other programs recorded or aired live from the Sony Music Studios included MTV Unplugged, Sessions at West 54th, Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn and VH1’s Hard Rock Live. Sony Music was also home to the current version of the word game Chain Reaction, millionaire and Chain Reaction, both packaged by Michael Davies, are the only two daily national quiz shows currently produced in New York. Sony Music Studios also hosted America, A Tribute to Heroes, a telethon held 10 days after the September 11,2001 attacks on the World Trade Center. The special also featured segments from CBS Television City in Los Angeles, neither location was disclosed before air time because of security concerns. On June 7,2007, after an attempt by Sony Music Executive Vice President/Studio Head Andy Kadison stalled
40.
Movietone News
–
Movietone News is a newsreel that ran from 1928 to 1963 in the United States, and – as British Movietone News – from 1929 to 1979 in the United Kingdom. It evolved from an earlier established by Fox Films called Fox News which was founded in 1919. When Fox entered talkies with Mother Knows Best the name Fox Movietone was applied to Foxs sound productions. It is known in the U. S. as Fox Movietone News, produced cinema, sound newsreels from 1928 to 1963 in the U. S. from 1929 to 1979 in the UK, and from 1929 to 1975 in Australia. One of the earliest in the series featured George Bernard Shaw Talks to Movietone News, sir Harry Lauder also appeared in test sound films made at the Fox Studios in New York City during the winter-spring of 1927. One installment, Fox Grandeur News, was released on May 26,1929, in Foxs short-lived widescreen process Grandeur, hearst Metrotone News initially leased the Case Research Lab patents from William Fox for its sound newsreels. Each of these studios used this system of recording sound film for news items because it was an easily transported single-system of sound-on-film recording, a regular narrator of the newsreels was broadcaster/journalist Lowell Thomas. After Fox Films merged with 20th Century Pictures in 1935 to form 20th Century-Fox, in Australia, Movietone and Cinesound were competitors for newsreel coverage, but have now combined under the Movietone News name. The University of South Carolina Moving Image Research Collections has a portion of the Fox Movietone newsreel collection, the rest of it is owned and managed by the Fox Film Corporations corporate successor, Fox News Channel. During its early years, Fox News Channel had a show which played the newsreels. British Movietone is owned separately by the films successor-in-interest, operating under the name British Movietonews Ltd, British Movietone is represented by AP Archive in the UK. In the United States, licensing of those newsreels is handled by ABC News, in September 2016, it was announced that the British Movitone archive had been acquired by Associated Press. The Academy Film Archive houses the 20th Century Fox Movietone Shorts and Documentaries Series Collection
Media related to Fox Film Corporation at Wikimedia Commons