Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. (also known as Warner Bros. Pictures , or simply Warner Bros. —the shortened form of the former official, sometimes still used, formal corporate name: Warner Brothers ) is an American producer of film and television entertainment.
One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank, California and New York City. Warner Bros. has several subsidiary companies, including Warner Bros. Studios, Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, Warner Bros. Television, Warner Bros. Animation, Warner Home Video, New Line Cinema, TheWB.com and DC Comics. Warner owns half of The CW Television Network.
Founded in 1918 by Jewish immigrants from Poland, Warner Bros. is the third-oldest American movie studio in continuous operation, after Paramount Pictures, founded in 1912 as Famous Players, and Universal Studios, also founded in 1912. Some of its most notable actors include Bette Davis, James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart, Doris Day and more recently, Clint Eastwood.
History
1903–1925: Founding
The corporate name honors the four founding Warner brothers (born Wonskolaser)—Harry (born Hirsz), Albert (born Aaron), Sam (born Szmul), and Jack (born Itzhak), Jews who emigrated from Poland to Ontario, Canada. The three elder brothers began in the exhibition business, having acquired a movie projector with which they showed films in the mining towns of Pennsylvania and Ohio. They opened their first theater, the Cascade, in New Castle, Pennsylvania in 1903. (The site of the Cascade is now the Cascade Center, a shopping, dining and entertainment complex honoring its Warner Bros. heritage.) In 1904, the Warners founded the Pittsburgh-based Duquesne Amusement & Supply Company, the precursor to Warner Brothers Pictures (now Warner Bros. Pictures subsidiary of Warner Entertainment) to distribute films.
Within a few years this led to the distribution of pictures across a four-state area. In 1912, Harry Warner hired an auditor named Paul Ashley Chase. By the time of World War I they had begun producing films, and in 1918 the brothers opened the Warner Bros. studio on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Sam and Jack Warner produced the pictures, while Harry and Albert Warner and their auditor and now controller Chase handled finance and distribution in New York City. It was during World War I and their first nationally syndicated film was My Four Years in Germany based on a popular book by former American Ambassador James W. Gerard. On April 4, 1923, with help from a loan given to Harry Warner by his banker Motley Flint, they formally incorporated as Warner Brothers Pictures, Incorporated .
The first important deal for the company was the acquisition of the rights to Avery Hopwood's 1919 Broadway play, The Gold Diggers from theatrical impresario David Belasco. However, what really put Warner Bros. on the Hollywood map was a dog, Rin Tin Tin, brought from France after World War I by an American soldier. Rin Tin Tin debuted in the short Where the North Begins . The short was so successful Jack Warner agreed to sign the dog to star in more short films for $1,000 per week. Rin Tin Tin became the top star at the studio. Jack Warner nicknamed him "The Mortgage Lifter" and the success boosted Darryl F. Zanuck's career. Zanuck eventually became a top producer for the studio and between 1928 and 1933 served as Jack Warner's right-hand man and executive producer, with responsibilities including the day-to-day production of films. More success came after Ernst Lubitsch was hired as head director; Harry Rapf left the studio and accepted an offer to work at MGM. Lubitsch's film The Marriage Circle was the studio's most successful film of 1924, and was on The New York Times best list for the year.
Despite the success of Rin Tin Tin and Lubitsch, Warners was still unable to achieve star power. As a result, Sam and Jack decided to offer Broadway actor John Barrymore the lead role in Beau Brummell . The film was so successful, Harry Warner agreed to sign Barrymore to a generous long-term contract; like The Marriage Circle , Beau Brummell was named one of the ten best films of the year by The New York Times . By the end of 1924, Warner Bros. was arguably the most successful independent studio in Hollywood, but it still competed with "The Big Three" Studios (First National, Paramount Pictures, and MGM). As a result, Harry Warner — while speaking at a convention of 1,500 independent exhibitors in Milwaukee, Wisconsin — was able to convince the filmmakers to spend $500,000 in newspaper advertising, and Harry saw this as an opportunity to finally be able to establish theaters in big cities like New York and Los Angeles.
As the studio prospered, it gained backing from Wall Street, and in 1924 Goldman Sachs arranged a major loan. With this new money, the Warners bought the pioneer Vitagraph Company which had a nation-wide distribution system. In 1925, Warners also experimented in radio, establishing a successful radio station, KFWB Los Angeles.
1925–1935: Sound, color, style
Warner Bros. was a pioneer of films with synchronized sound (then known as "talking pictures" or "talkies"). In 1925, at the urging of Sam, the Warners agreed to expand their operations by adding this feature to their productions. Harry, however, opposed it, famously wondering, "Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" By February 1926, the studio suffered a reported net loss of $333,413.
After a long period of refusing to accept Sam's request for sound, Harry now agreed to accept Sam's demands, as long as studio's usage of synchronized sound was for background music purposes only. The Warners then signed a contract with the sound engineer company Western Electric and established Vitaphone. In 1926, Vitaphone began making films with music and effects tracks, most notably, in the feature Don Juan starring John Barrymore. The film was silent, but it featured a large number of Vitaphone shorts at the beginning. To hype Don Juan' s release, Harry Warner also acquired the large Piccadilly Theater in Manhattan, New York and renamed it the Warner Theater.
Don Juan premiered at the Warner Theater in New York on August 6, 1926. Throughout the early history of film distribution, theater owners hired orchestras to attend film showings and provide soundtracks. Through Vitaphone, however, Warner Bros. produced eight Vitaphone shorts (which aired at the beginning of every showing of Don Juan across the country) in 1926, and got many film production companies to question the necessity. While Don Juan was a success at the box office, it did not earn back its production cost and Lubsitch left Warner for MGM. By April 1927, the Big Five studios (First National, Paramount, MGM, Universal, and Producers Distributing) had put the Warner brothers in financial ruin, and Western Electric renewed Warner's Vitaphone contract with terms that allowed other film companies to test sound.
As a result of the financial problems the studio was having, Warners took the next step and released The Jazz Singer starring Al Jolson. This movie, which has very little sound dialog but does feature sound segments of Jolson singing, was a sensation. It signaled the beginning of the era of "talking pictures" and the twilight of the silent era. However, as Sam died, the brothers were at his funeral and could not attend the premiere. Jack became sole head of production. Sam's death also had a great effect on Jack's emotional state, as Sam was arguably Jack's inspiration and favorite brother. In the years to come, Jack ran the studio with an iron fist. Firing of studio employees soon became his trademark. Among those whom Jack fired were Rin Tin Tin (in 1929) and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. -- who had served as First National's top star since the brothers acquired the studio in 1928—in 1933.
Thanks to the success of The Jazz Singer , the studio was suddenly flush with cash. Jolson's next film for the company, The Singing Fool was also a success. With the success of these first talkies ( The Jazz Singer , Lights of New York , The Singing Fool , and The Terror), Warner Bros. became one of the top studios in Hollywood and the brothers were now able to move out from the Poverty Row section of Hollywood and acquire a big studio in Burbank, California. They were also able to expand studio operations by acquiring the Stanley Corporation, a major theater chain. This gave them a share in rival First National Pictures, of which Stanley owned one-third. In a bidding war with William Fox, Warners bought more First National shares on September 13, 1928; Jack Warner also appointed producer Darryl Zanuck as the studio's manager of First National Pictures.
In 1929, Warners also bought the St. Louis-based theater chain Skouras Brothers. Following this take-over, Spyros Skouras, the driving force of the chain, became general manager of the Warner Brothers Theater Circuit in America. He worked successfully in that post for two years and managed to eliminate the losses and eventually even increase the profits. This was a welcome gain given the financial hardships occasioned by the Great Depression.
In addition, Harry Warner was also able to acquire a string of music publishers and form Warner Bros. Music. Despite failing to also purchase Brunswick Records,
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