.jpg) Logo in 1945 | |
| Industry | Film studio |
|---|---|
| Predecessor | Producers Distributing Corporation |
| Founded | 1939; 87 years ago (1939) |
| Defunct | 1947; 79 years ago (1947) |
| Fate | Folded |
| Successor | Eagle-Lion Films (1950) United Artists (1955) |
| Headquarters | Poverty Row |
Key people | Sigmund Neufeld Sam Newfield George R. Batcheller, Jr. Leon Fromkess |
| Owner | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (Amazon MGM Studios) (Amazon) |
| Parent | United Artists Corporation (Amazon MGM Studios) (Amazon) |
Producers Releasing Corporation (generally known asPRC) was the smallest and least prestigious of the 11 Hollywoodfilm companies of the 1940s.[1] It was considered a prime example of what was called "Poverty Row": a low-rent stretch ofGower Street in Hollywood where shoestring film producers based their operations. However, PRC was more substantial than the usual independent companies that made only a few low-budget movies and then disappeared. PRC was an actual Hollywood studio – albeit the smallest – with its own production facilities and distribution network, and it even accepted imports from theUK. PRC lasted from 1939 to 1947, churning out low-budgetB movies for the lower half of adouble bill or the upper half of aneighborhood theater showing second-run films. The studio was originally located at 1440 N. Gower St. (on the lot that eventually became part ofColumbia Pictures) from 1936 to 1943. PRC then occupied the formerGrand National Pictures physical plant at 7324Santa Monica Blvd.,[2] from 1943 to 1947. This address is now an apartment complex.[citation needed]
PRC produced 179 feature films[3] and almost never spent more than $100,000 on any of them; most of its films actually cost considerably less. Only the 1944 musicalMinstrel Man had enhanced production values; it showed such excellent progress during filming that its planned $80,000 budget was nearly tripled.[4]
The company evolved from the earlier Producers Distributing Corporation (PDC), begun in 1939 by exhibitor Ben Judell (Benjamin Nathaniel Judell; 1890–1974), who had hired producerSigmund Neufeld and his brother, directorSam Newfield, to make the studio's films. After the collapse of PDC, Judell became an independent producer and the company was reorganized as Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC) under formerPathé executive O. Henry Briggs. Briggs was succeeded in January 1941 by George R. Batcheller Jr.,[5] son of formerChesterfield Pictures presidentGeorge R. Batcheller. The studio relied on Sam Newfield to direct most of its early features; Newfield actually adopted two other names ("Peter Stewart" and "Sherman Scott") to create the illusion that the PRC had an entire staff of directors.[6]
Most of PRC's movies were made within the genres of other studios of the 1940s, but on much lower budgets, and each generally took a week or less to shoot. They includedwesterns, actionmelodramas, andhorror movies. A low-budget feature from a major studio would cost between $300,000 and $500,000 to produce, but a PRC feature of the early 1940s cost $70,000 or less. Author Tom Reeder reports that the PRC comedyDanger! Women at Work (1943) came in at $37,389 -- 14%over its original budget.[7] PRC westerns were cheapest of all, usually budgeted at about $20,000 each.
PRC president Batcheller followed the Chesterfield business model that had served his father successfully during the Depression years. Chesterfield had catered to small-town owners of neighborhood theaters, who couldn't afford the big studios' first-run movies. Chesterfield product was made on low budgets with actors who had been dropped from the rosters of larger studios, but still had name value. A few then-current stars worked for PRC (Bela Lugosi,Buster Crabbe,Bob Steele,Frances Langford,Ralph Byrd,Edward Everett Horton), but generally the company couldn't afford star salaries and had to make do with less expensive "name" talent. PRC cast its starring roles with featured players (J. Edward Bromberg,George Zucco,Neil Hamilton,Lyle Talbot,Gladys George,Mary Carlisle,Noel Madison,Douglas Fowley,Iris Adrian,Patsy Kelly,Virginia Vale,Frank Albertson,Wallace Ford,Ralph Morgan,Henry Armetta,Chick Chandler,Pauline Moore,Bruce Bennett,John Carradine,Frank Jenks,Eddie Dean); stars who were idle (Harry Langdon,Lee Tracy,Anna May Wong,Mary Brian,Glenda Farrell,Freddie Bartholomew,Fifi D'Orsay,El Brendel,Slim Summerville,Armida); or celebrities from other fields (burlesque queenAnn Corio, Broadway headlinerBenny Fields, animal hunterFrank Buck, radio announcerHarry Von Zell, radio comedianBert Gordon,Miss America (of 1941)Rosemary LaPlanche).
Some of PRC's hits wereThe Devil Bat with Bela Lugosi and a sequel,Devil Bat's Daughter;Misbehaving Husbands with silent-comedy star Harry Langdon; andJungle Man andNabonga, Buster Crabbe jungle thrillers withJulie London in the latter.
DuringWorld War II, PRC made severalwar films such asCorregidor,They Raid by Night,A Yank in Libya, a pair of films set in China —Bombs over Burma andLady from Chungking, both starringAnna May Wong — and a patriotic musical,The Yanks Are Coming.
Author Don Miller, in his 1973 bookB Movies, devotes two chapters to PRC. He usually comments on how very cheap the studio's early productions were, but does offer kind words for certain pictures: "Most of the remainder of the 1942 PRC product dealt with gangsters, crime, or whodunit puzzles, reliable standbys of the indie companies catering to action and grind theater houses.Baby Face Morgan played it for laughs, withRichard Cromwell as a rube posing as a tough racketeer.Robert Armstrong,Chick Chandler, andMary Carlisle lent strong support, and while it never scaled any heights it was a passable spoof of the genre."[6]
In 1943,Robert R. Young, a railroad magnate who also owned American Pathé's film processing laboratory,[8] acquired the studio, and the films generally became more substantial. PRC grew in standing, with the company securing big-city exposure and critical praise for many of its features. The executive in charge of production was now Leon Fromkess.
The Benny Fields musicalMinstrel Man was a watershed event: it was the first elaborately mounted PRC picture, and the first to receive Academy Award nominations (Ferde Grofé andLeo Erdody for best musical score, andHarry Revel andPaul Francis Webster for best original song). Theater chains that formerly would not play PRC pictures were now showingMinstrel Man first-run across America, opening the door for PRC to book more of its features into first-run situations. The children's fantasyThe Enchanted Forest, filmed inCinecolor, was a surprise hit for the studio, and led to several major studios filming their own movies in the process.[9]
Austrian directorEdgar G. Ulmer directed threefilm noir classics for PRC:Bluebeard (1944),Strange Illusion (1945), andDetour (1945). All three — especiallyDetour — have acquired reputations as artistic achievements.
PRC was purchased by Pathé Industries, and the films were now labeled "TheNew PRC Pictures." The company continued to flourish within its own element until theaftermath of World War II. Two new detective series were launched:Hugh Beaumont asMichael Shayne (five entries) andWilliam Wright orAlan Curtis asPhilo Vance (three entries), as well as a comedy series,The Gas House Kids, an attempt to create its own version ofThe Bowery Boys (three entries).
PRC also engaged in transactions with other studios. Its 1944exploitation filmHitler's Madman (1944), directed byDouglas Sirk, was topical enough to be picked up byMGM for distribution. The 1946 thrillerThe Brute Man had been filmed byUniversal but two factors clouded its release: its star,acromegaly victimRondo Hatton, had just died; and Universal was then undergoing a corporate shakeup and discontinuing all B-picture production.[10] Universal, preferring not to publicize a deceased star and no longer bothering with low-budget films, soldThe Brute Man to PRC.
Since PRC's inception, the studio had always produced inexpensive westerns, and there was a definite market for them. Among PRC's westerns were theLone Rider series starring operatic and Broadway star turned singing cowboyGeorge Houston; aBilly the Kid film series with the lead alternating betweenBuster Crabbe andBob Steele; andThe Frontier Marshals, similar toRepublic Pictures' andMonogram Pictures' cowboy trio series.[11]
Buster Crabbe was PRC's leading western star until he quit in 1945, alarmed by the budgets sinking to new lows: "First we did them in 14, 16 days. When the unions got stronger -- more money for the grips, more money for the cameramen, whatever -- in order to counteract that, we were shooting in 12, 10, then eight days. My last western of the series was done starting on Monday and then Thursday night we wrapped the damned thing up. That's when I marched into the office and said that's it, no more westerns for me."[12]
Crabbe was succeeded by singing cowboyEddie Dean in the first B-western series filmed in Cinecolor. Dean was sometimes co-starred withLash LaRue, who went on to his own starring series. The PRC westerns were so popular that they actually outlasted the studio, which was absorbed byEagle-Lion. Although the studio's feature films would now bear the Eagle-Lion trademark, the low-budget westerns continued to be marketed with the PRC logo into 1948.
Eagle-Lion took over the distribution arm of the company in 1946; the production arm (and with it the entire company) followed suit shortly thereafter. PRC's final release wasThe Gas House Kids in Hollywood on August 23, 1947.
Madison Pictures Inc. released PRC's products for both television showings and theatrical re-releases until 1955. Madison, formed in late December 1945, was headed by Armand Schenck, a former supervisor of PRC's branch operations[13] and previously an executive with Commonwealth Film Corporation and later Pathé Laboratories, a subsidiary of Pathé Industries. Madison was bought byUnited Artists.[14]
As early as 1950, theCBS Television network was screening PRC films on television for the bargain-basement price of $1,750 per title.[15] Many PRC films are now in thepublic domain and appear on budget DVDs. Eighty-one films from the PRC library were acquired by National Telefilm Associates; they are currently owned by TV syndicator and video dealer Films Around The World, Inc.Strange Holiday, originally released by PRC, is now owned byParamount Pictures.