Samuel Goldwyn Productions
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| Company type | Independent |
|---|---|
| Industry | Film |
| Founded | 1923 |
| Founder | Samuel Goldwyn |
| Defunct | 1959 |
| Fate | Defunct |
| Successors | Company: The Samuel Goldwyn Company Library: Warner Bros. (United States only) Paramount Pictures (through Miramax) (Internationally, Paramount also handles the U.S. rights to The North Star only) Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (U.S. rights to The Hurricane only) Video-Cinema Films (Rights to Street Scene only) Public domain (U.S. only, pre-1929) |
| Headquarters | United States |
| Products | Motion pictures |
| Services | Film production |
Samuel Goldwyn Productions was an American film production company founded by Samuel Goldwyn in 1923, and active through 1959. Personally controlled by Goldwyn and focused on production rather than distribution, the company developed into the most financially and critically successful independent production company in Hollywood's Golden Age.
History
[edit]
After the sale of his previous firm Goldwyn Pictures, Samuel Goldwyn organized his productions beginning in February 1923, initially in a partnership with director George Fitzmaurice (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, created by merger in April 1924, bears Goldwyn's name, but he did not produce films there). Goldwyn Production's first release, Potash and Perlmutter, successfully opened in Baltimore on September 6, 1923.[1]
Some of the early productions bear the name "Howard Productions", named for Goldwyn's wife Frances Howard, who married Goldwyn in 1925. In the 1920s, Goldwyn released films through Associated First National. Throughout the 1930s, Goldwyn released most of his films through United Artists. Beginning in 1941, Goldwyn released most of his films through RKO Radio Pictures.
With consistently high production values and directors like John Ford and Howard Hawks, Goldwyn consistently received Academy Award for Best Picture nominations: Arrowsmith (1931), Dodsworth (1936), Dead End (1937), Wuthering Heights (1939), and The Little Foxes (1941). In 1946, he won best picture for The Best Years of Our Lives.
Through the 1940s and 1950s, many of Goldwyn's films starred Danny Kaye. Goldwyn's final production was the 1959 version of Porgy and Bess.
Elements for many films produced by Samuel Goldwyn Productions between 1929 and 1955 are held by the Academy Film Archive as part of the Samuel Goldwyn Collection.[2]
Filmography
[edit]
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| Release date | Title | Distributor | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| September 6, 1923 | Potash and Perlmutter | First National | |
| January 24, 1924 | The Eternal City | ||
| April 3, 1924 | Cytherea | ||
| September 29, 1924 | In Hollywood with Potash and Perlmutter | ||
| May 3, 1925 | His Supreme Moment | ||
| June 18, 1925 | A Thief in Paradise | ||
| September 27, 1925 | The Dark Angel | ||
| November 16, 1925 | Stella Dallas | United Artists | |
| February 15, 1926 | Partners Again | ||
| October 14, 1926 | The Winning of Barbara Worth | ||
| January 27, 1927 | The Night of Love | ||
| September 18, 1927 | The Magic Flame | ||
| November 3, 1927 | The Devil Dancer | ||
| March 23, 1928 | Two Lovers | ||
| November 17, 1928 | The Awakening | ||
| January 12, 1929 | The Rescue | ||
| May 2, 1929 | Bulldog Drummond | ||
| June 22, 1929 | This Is Heaven | ||
| November 3, 1929 | Condemned | ||
| July 24, 1930 | Raffles | ||
| October 5, 1930 | Whoopee! | ||
| December 20, 1930 | The Devil to Pay! | ||
| January 14, 1931 | One Heavenly Night | ||
| September 5, 1931 | Street Scene | ||
| October 3, 1931 | Palmy Days | ||
| October 28, 1931 | The Unholy Garden | ||
| December 17, 1931 | Tonight or Never | ||
| December 26, 1931 | Arrowsmith | ||
| February 13, 1932 | The Greeks Had a Word for Them | ||
| November 17, 1932 | The Kid from Spain | ||
| December 24, 1932 | Cynara | ||
| September 3, 1933 | The Masquerader | ||
| December 29, 1933 | Roman Scandals | ||
| February 1, 1934 | Nana | ||
| November 1, 1934 | We Live Again | ||
| November 10, 1934 | Kid Millions | ||
| March 8, 1935 | The Wedding Night | ||
| September 8, 1935 | The Dark Angel | ||
| October 13, 1935 | Barbary Coast | ||
| November 22, 1935 | Splendor | ||
| January 24, 1936 | Strike Me Pink | ||
| March 18, 1936 | These Three | ||
| September 23, 1936 | Dodsworth | ||
| November 6, 1936 | Come and Get It | ||
| December 25, 1936 | Beloved Enemy | ||
| May 7, 1937 | Woman Chases Man | ||
| August 6, 1937 | Stella Dallas | ||
| August 27, 1937 | Dead End | ||
| November 9, 1937 | The Hurricane | ||
| February 4, 1938 | The Goldwyn Follies | ||
| April 15, 1938 | The Adventures of Marco Polo | ||
| November 17, 1938 | The Cowboy and the Lady | ||
| April 7, 1939 | Wuthering Heights | ||
| August 18, 1939 | They Shall Have Music | ||
| September 29, 1939 | The Real Glory | ||
| December 29, 1939 | Raffles | ||
| September 20, 1940 | The Westerner | ||
| August 29, 1941 | The Little Foxes | RKO Radio Pictures | |
| December 2, 1941 | Ball of Fire | ||
| July 14, 1942 | The Pride of the Yankees | Inducted into the National Film Registry in 2024 | |
| January 27, 1943 | They Got Me Covered | ||
| June 12, 1943 | Spitfire | [3] | |
| November 4, 1943 | The North Star | ||
| February 17, 1944 | Up in Arms | ||
| November 17, 1944 | The Princess and the Pirate | ||
| June 8, 1945 | Wonder Man | ||
| March 21, 1946 | The Kid from Brooklyn | ||
| November 21, 1946 | The Best Years of Our Lives | ||
| August 4, 1947 | The Secret Life of Walter Mitty | ||
| December 9, 1947 | The Bishop's Wife | ||
| October 19, 1948 | A Song Is Born | ||
| December 11, 1948 | Enchantment | ||
| August 18, 1949 | Roseanna McCoy | ||
| December 25, 1949 | My Foolish Heart | ||
| July 27, 1950 | Our Very Own | ||
| August 2, 1950 | Edge of Doom | ||
| December 22, 1951 | I Want You | ||
| November 25, 1952 | Hans Christian Andersen | ||
| November 3, 1955 | Guys and Dolls | Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer | |
| June 24, 1959 | Porgy and Bess | Columbia Pictures |
Distribution
[edit]In 2012, the distribution rights of Samuel Goldwyn films from the library were transferred to Warner Bros.,[4] with Miramax managing global licensing; the latter was handled by StudioCanal as part of a deal with Miramax until 2021, when Paramount Global (then ViacomCBS), under its flagship studio Paramount Pictures, acquired a 49% stake in Miramax and worldwide distribution rights to its content library.[5] U.S. rights to The Hurricane, which had since reverted back to United Artists, are currently owned by its parent company, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, now part of Amazon MGM Studios. Rights to The North Star were not initially renewed due to its controversial subject matter, thus had fallen in to the public domain. Currently, U.S. rights to the film are handled by Paramount as a successor to National Telefilm Associates, which distributed a re-cut version in 1957 as Armored Attack, one of the few Goldwyn titles not included in the Warner–Miramax arrangement. Studio Distribution Services, LLC., a joint venture between Warner Bros. Home Entertainment and Universal Pictures Home Entertainment, distributes the entire Samuel Goldwyn catalog on home video, including The Hurricane, via a distribution deal with MGM Home Entertainment. Rights to Street Scene were retained by the estate of its author Elmer Rice, which would transfer ownership to Video-Cinema Films in 2004.[6]
See also
[edit]- Goldwyn Pictures, the film production and distribution company active from 1916 and merged with Metro Pictures and Louis B. Mayer Pictures to form Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer on April 16, 1924.
- Samuel Goldwyn Studio, informal name for the Pickford-Fairbanks Studios lot in Hollywood.
- The Samuel Goldwyn Company, founded by Samuel Goldwyn Jr. in 1979, active through 1997.
- Samuel Goldwyn Films, founded by Goldwyn Jr. in 2000.
References
[edit]- ^ Goldwyn: A Biography, A. Scott Berg
- ^ "Samuel Goldwyn Collection". Academy Film Archive. 5 September 2014. Archived from the original on 5 April 2020. Retrieved 9 April 2020.
- ^ "Of Local Origin". The New York Times. June 9, 1943. Archived from the original on 2023-11-18. Retrieved 2015-12-14.
- ^ "Warner Brothers Acquires Rights to Films from the Samuel Goldwyn Library".
- ^ "Miramax to Manage Films from Samuel Goldwyn's Library". 2 April 2012. Archived from the original on 10 November 2013. Retrieved 18 February 2020.
- ^ US Copyright Office Document No. V3511D054 / 2004-06-01