Post #2- How I Came Into The Movie Industry I arrived in Pasadena when I was seventeen thanks to my generous grandmother, who payed for my bus ticket and gave me one hundred dollars for emergencies. My goal going to Pasadena was to become a writer because I always had this sort of passion for it, so I decided I might as well act on it. I sold my first story to a pulp fiction magazine and then I decided to sell the story to a film studio. My girlfriend at the time suggested I joined the LA Athletic Club in order to create some connections within the movie industry, but I was rejected because they thought I was Jewish, which I wasn’t. I didn’t know however how much being rejected from that club would affect me in the future until I produced the movie Gentlemens Agreement in 1947. That film was the first Hollywood film dealing with anti-semitism and it actually won Academy Award for Best Motion Picture that year, which I was very proud of. I had very lucky starting out in Hollywood because by the time I was twenty-three, I wrote and sold my first Hollywood screenplay, Became a gag write for Mack Sennett, Charlie Chaplin and Harold Lloyd, I earned a job at Warner Brothers studio and write scripts for the Rin Tin Tin movies, and I became the head of productions for Warner Brothers. One of my biggest accomplishes was when I was twenty-five and I produced The Jazz Singer; one of the first films with sound in it. I didn’t know it at the time, but I created the film that brought the end to silent film. I soon married Virginia Fox, an actress, in 1924 and had three children named Darrylin, Susan and Richard. I wasn’t the most loyal husband, but I did care for my children very much. Everything was going well in Warner Brothers, but I came to the realization in 1933 that I would never amount to anything but an employee at Warner Brothers. I’m going to be honest and say I was a cocky guy who thought he deserved more than being an employee. I had great ambitions and I was definitely going to act on them. In April of that year I left Warner Brothers and formed 20th Century films with my good friends Joseph Schenck and William Goetz. We learned very soon how hard it was to be a studio and we all felt frustrated with the distribution of the films. I forget how it was, but someone brought up the idea of merging our studio with Fox Films and that lady and gentlemen was how 20th Century-Fox was created. The merger gave us some big-name stars such as Shirley Temple, Will Rogers, Janet Gaynor and much more. These new stars inspired me to try my best as a producer, so I was very hands-on in the process. People considered me the most hands-on mogul of the major movie studios and I considered myself talented as well especially remaking movies in the cutting room. I became known for the controversial films I produced. I was finally getting my life together and I was doing what I loved, but soon, my world came crashing down and I turned into something I never wanted to be. I turned into my father. To be continued...
Posted on: Sun, 07 Dec 2014 06:58:13 +0000
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