 Final logo, used from 1931 to 1935 | |
| Industry | Film |
|---|---|
| Predecessors |
|
| Founded | February 1, 1915; 110 years ago (1915-02-01) inFort Lee, New Jersey |
| Founder | William Fox |
| Defunct | May 31, 1935; 90 years ago (1935-05-31) |
| Fate | Merged withTwentieth Century Pictures to form20th Century-Fox |
| Successor | 20th Century-Fox |
| Subsidiaries |
|
TheFox Film Corporation (also known asFox Studios) was an Americanindependent company that produced motion pictures and was formed in 1915 by the theater "chain" pioneerWilliam Fox. It was the corporate successor to his earlier Greater New York Film Rental Company and Box Office Attraction Company (founded 1913).
The company's first film studios were set up inFort Lee, New Jersey, but in 1917, William Fox sentSol M. Wurtzel toHollywood, California, to oversee the studio's newWest Coast production facilities, where the climate was more hospitable for filmmaking. On July 23, 1926, Fox Studios bought thepatents of theMovietone sound system for recording sound ontofilm.
After theWall Street crash of 1929, William Fox lost control of the company in 1930, during ahostile takeover. Under new president Sidney R. Kent, the new owners merged the company withTwentieth Century Pictures to formTwentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation in 1935.
William Fox entered the film industry in 1904 when he purchased a one-third share of aBrooklynnickelodeon for $1,667.[a][1] He reinvested his profits from that initial location, expanding to fifteen similar venues in the city, and purchasingprints from the major studios of the time:Biograph,Essanay,Kalem,Lubin,Pathé,Selig, andVitagraph.[2] After experiencing further success presenting livevaudeville routines along with motion pictures, he expanded into larger venues beginning with his purchase of the disused Gaiety theater,[b] and continuing with acquisitions throughout New York City and New Jersey, including theAcademy of Music.[3]
Fox invested further in the film industry by founding the Greater New York Film Rental Company as afilm distributor.[4] The major film studios responded by forming theMotion Picture Patents Company in 1908 and theGeneral Film Company in 1910, in an effort to create amonopoly on the creation and distribution of motion pictures. Fox refused to sell out to the monopoly, and sued under theSherman Antitrust Act, eventually receiving a $370,000[c] settlement, and ending restrictions on the length of films and the prices that could be paid for screenplays.[4]
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In 1914, reflecting the broader scope of his business, he renamed it the Box Office Attraction Company.[5] He entered into a contract with theBalboa Amusement Producing Company film studio, purchasing all of their films for showing in hisNew York area theaters and renting the prints to other exhibitors nationwide.[6] He also continued to distribute material from other sources, such asWinsor McCay's early animated filmGertie the Dinosaur.[7][8] Later that year, Fox concluded that it was unwise to be so dependent on other companies, so he purchased theÉclair studio facilities inFort Lee, New Jersey, along with property inStaten Island,[9][10] and arranged for actors and crew. The company became afilm studio, using the name Box Office Attraction Company; its first release wasLife's Shop Window.[11]
Always more of an entrepreneur than a showman, Fox concentrated on acquiring and building theaters; pictures were secondary. The company's first film studios were set up inFort Lee where it and many other earlyfilm studios inAmerica's first motion picture industry were based at the beginning of the 20th century.[12][13][14]
That same year, in 1914, Fox Film began making motion pictures in California, and in 1915 decided to build its own permanent studio. The company leased the Los AngelesEdendale studio of theSelig Polyscope Company until its own studio, located at Western Avenue and Sunset Boulevard, was completed in 1916.[15] In 1917, William Fox sentSol M. Wurtzel to Hollywood to oversee the studio'sWest Coast production facilities where a more hospitable and cost-effective climate existed for filmmaking. Between 1915 and 1919, Fox Films earned millions of dollars through films featuringTheda Bara, known as "The Vamp" due to her unique ability to display exoticism.[16] Fox also produced 85 films featuring lead Western actorTom Mix, who joined Fox in 1917.[17] The popularity of Mix's Western films earned Fox large sums of money, and he eventually was paid $17,000 per week.[17]
With the introduction of sound technology, Fox moved to acquire the rights to asound-on-film process. In the years 1925–26, Fox purchased the rights to the work ofFreeman Harrison Owens, the U.S. rights to theTri-Ergon system invented by three German inventors, and the work ofTheodore Case. This resulted in theMovietone sound system later known as "Fox Movietone" developed at theMovietone Studio. Later that year, the company began offering films with a music-and-effects track, and the following year Fox began the weeklyFox Movietone News feature, that ran until 1963. The growing company needed space, and in 1926 Fox acquired 300 acres (1.2 km2) in the open country west of Beverly Hills and built "Movietone City", the best-equipped studio of its time.
Because William Fox opted to remain in New York, much of the Hollywood filmmaking at the Fox Film Corporation was instead managed by Fox's movie makers.[18]Janet Gaynor would also become one of the company's most prominent stars by the late 1920s.[18]
When rivalMarcus Loew died in 1927, Fox offered to buy the Loew family's holdings. Loew's Inc. controlled more than 200 theaters, as well as theMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studio. The Loew family agreed to the sale, and the merger of Fox and Loew's Inc. was announced in 1929. However, MGM studio bossesLouis B. Mayer andIrving Thalberg were not included in the deal; despite their status at MGM, they were only employees. Meyer and Thalberg fought back with their powerful political connections. Mayer called upon theJustice Department'santitrust unit to delay giving final approval to the merger. William Fox was badly injured in a car crash in the summer of 1929, and by the time he recovered, he had lost most of his fortune in thestock market crash of 1929, ending any chance of the Fox/Loew's merger being approved, even without the Justice Department's objections.
Overextended and close to bankruptcy, Fox was stripped of his empire in 1930[19] and later ended up in jail onbribery and perjury charges. 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. William Fox resented the way he was forced out of his company and portrayed it as an active conspiracy against him in the 1933 bookUpton Sinclair Presents William Fox.
Under new president Sidney Kent, the new owners began negotiating with the upstart, but powerful independentTwentieth Century Pictures in the early spring of 1935. Twentieth Century had begun in theSamuel Goldwyn Studios in 1932 under foundersJoseph Schenck andDarryl F. Zanuck. The two companies merged that spring of 1935 and became Twentieth Century-Fox. The company was purchased byNews Corporation in 1985, becoming "20th Century Fox" without the hyphen, and in 2019 was acquired byThe Walt Disney Company as part of Disney'spurchase of 20th Century Fox's owner and was renamed 20th Century Studios in 2020. 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, marking its 75th rather than 95th anniversary in 2010.[20]
A1937 fire in a Fox film storage facility destroyed over 40,000 reels ofnegatives and prints, including the best-quality copies of every Fox feature produced prior to 1932;[21] although copies located elsewhere allowed many to survive in some form, over 75% of Fox's feature films from before 1930 are completelylost.[22]
In 1919, Fox began a series of silentnewsreels, competing with existing series such asHearst Metrotone News,International Newsreel, andPathé News.Fox News premiered on October 11, 1919, with subsequent issues released on the Wednesday and Sunday of each week.Fox News gained an advantage over its more established competitors when PresidentWoodrow Wilson endorsed the newsreel in a letter, in what may have been the first time an American president commented on a film.[23] In subsequent years,Fox News remained one of the major names in the newsreel industry by providing often-exclusive coverage of major international events, including reporting onPancho Villa, the airshipRoma, theKu Klux Klan, and a 1922 eruption ofMount Vesuvius.[24] The silent newsreel series continued until 1930.[25]
In 1926, a subsidiary, Fox Movietone Corporation, was created, tasked with producing newsreels using Fox's recently acquired sound-on-film technology. The first of these newsreels debuted on January 21, 1927. Four months later, the May 25 release of a sound recording ofCharles Lindbergh's departure on histransatlantic flight was described by film historian Raymond Fielding as the "first sound news film of consequence".[26]Movietone News was launched as a regular newsreel feature December 3 of that year.[27] Production of the series continued after the merger with Twentieth Century Pictures, until 1963, and continued to serve 20th Century Fox after that, as a source for film industry stock footage.[25]
Unlike Fox's early feature films, theFox News andFox Movietone News libraries have largely survived. The earlier series and some parts of its sound successor are now held by theUniversity of South Carolina, with the remainingFox Movietone News still held by the company.[25]
Fox Film briefly experimented withserial films, releasing the 15-episodeBride 13 and the 20-episodeFantômas in 1920. William Fox was unwilling to compromise on production quality in order to make serials profitable, however, and none were produced subsequently.[28]
Hundreds of one- and two-reelshort films of various types were also produced by Fox. Beginning in 1916,[29] theSunshine Comedy division created two-reelcomedy shorts. Many of these, beginning with 1917'sRoaring Lions and Wedding Bliss, starringLloyd Hamilton, wereslapstick, intended to compete withMack Sennett's popular offerings.[30] Sunshine releases continued until the introduction of sound.[31] Other short film series includedImperial Comedies,Van Bibber Comedies (withEarle Foxe),O'Henry,Married Life of Helen and Warren, andFox Varieties.[32] Fox's expansion into Spanish-language films in the early 1930s also included shorts.[33]
Media related toFox Film Corporation at Wikimedia Commons