The story
Founded by Charlie Chaplin, D. W. Griffith, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford on Feb 5, 1919, in Hollywood.1
Early years
In 1918, Charlie Chaplin could not get his parent company First National Pictures to increase his production budget despite being one of their top producers. Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks had their own contracts, with First National and Famous Players–Lasky respectively, but these were due to run out with no clear offers forthcoming. Sydney Chaplin, brother and business manager for Charlie, deduced something was going wrong, and contacted Pickford and Fairbanks. Together they hired a private detective, who discovered a plan to merge all production companies and to lock in "exhibition companies" to a series of five-year contracts.
Chaplin, Pickford, Fairbanks, and D. W. Griffith incorporated United Artists as a joint venture company on February 5, 1919. Each held a 25% stake in the preferred shares and a 20% stake in the common shares of the joint venture, with the remaining 20% of common shares held by lawyer and advisor William Gibbs McAdoo. The idea for the venture originated with Fairbanks, Chaplin, Pickford and cowboy star William S. Hart a year earlier. Already Hollywood veterans, the four stars talked of forming their own company to better control their own work.
They were spurred on by established Hollywood producers and distributors who were tightening their control over actor salaries and creative decisions, a process that evolved into the studio system. With the addition of Griffith, planning began, but Hart bowed out before anything was formalized. When he heard about their scheme, Richard A. Rowland, head of Metro Pictures, apparently said, "The inmates are taking over the asylum." The four partners, with advice from McAdoo (son-in-law and former Treasury Secretary of then-President Woodrow Wilson), formed their distribution company. Hiram Abrams was its first managing director, and the company established its headquarters at 729 Seventh Avenue in New York City.
The original terms called for each star to produce five pictures a year. By the time the company was operational in 1921, feature films were becoming more expensive and polished, and running times had settled at around ninety minutes (eight reels). The original goal was thus abandoned.
UA's first production, His Majesty, the American, written by and starring Fairbanks, was a success. Funding for movies was limited. Without selling stock to the public like other studios, all United had for finance was weekly prepayment installments from theater owners for upcoming movies. As a result, production was slow, and the company distributed an average of only five films a year in its first five years.
By 1924, Griffith had dropped out, and the company was facing a crisis. Veteran producer Joseph Schenck was hired as president. He had produced pictures for a decade, and brought commitments for films starring his wife, Norma Talmadge, his sister-in-law, Constance Talmadge, and his brother-in-law, Buster Keaton. Contracts were signed with independent producers, including Samuel Goldwyn, and Howard Hughes. In 1933, Schenck organized a new company with Darryl F. Zanuck, called Twentieth Century Pictures, which soon provided four pictures a year, forming half of UA's schedule.
Schenck formed a separate partnership with Pickford and Chaplin to buy and build theaters under the United Artists name. They began international operations, first in Canada, and then in Mexico. By the end of the 1930s, United Artists was represented in over 40 countries.
When he was denied an ownership share in 1935, Schenck resigned. He set up 20th Century Pictures' merger with Fox Film Corporation to form 20th Century-Fox. Al Lichtman succeeded Schenck as company president. Other independent producers distributed through United Artists in the 1930s including Walt Disney, Alexander Korda, Hal Roach, David O. Selznick, and Walter Wanger. As the years passed, and the dynamics of the business changed, these "producing partners" drifted away. Samuel Goldwyn Productions and Walt Disney Productions went to RKO Radio Pictures and Wanger to Universal Pictures.
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In the late 1930s, UA turned a profit. Goldwyn was providing most of the output for distribution. He sued United several times for disputed compensation leading him to leave. MGM's 1939 hit Gone with the Wind was supposed to be a UA release except that Selznick wanted Clark Gable, who was under contract to MGM, to play Rhett Butler. Also that year, Fairbanks died.
UA became embroiled in lawsuits with Selznick over his distribution of some films through RKO. Selznick considered UA's operation sloppy, and left to start his own distribution arm.
In the 1940s, United Artists was losing money because of poorly received pictures. Cinema attendance continued to decline as television became more popular. The company sold its Mexican releasing division to Crédito Cinematográfico Mexicano, a local company.
Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers (1940s and 1950s)
In 1941, Pickford, Chaplin, Disney, Orson Welles, Goldwyn, Selznick, Alexander Korda, and Wanger—many of whom were members of United Artists—formed the Society of Independent Motion Picture Producers (SIMPP). Later members included Hunt Stromberg, William Cagney, Sol Lesser, and Hal Roach.
The Society aimed to advance the interests of independent producers in an industry controlled by the studio system. SIMPP fought to end what were considered to be anti-competitive practices by the seven major film studios—Loew's (MGM), Columbia Pictures, Paramount Pictures, Universal Pictures, RKO Radio Pictures, 20th Century-Fox, and Warner Bros./First National—that controlled the production, distribution, and exhibition of motion pictures.
In 1942, SIMPP filed an antitrust suit against Paramount's United Detroit Theatres. The complaint accused Paramount of conspiracy to control first-and subsequent-run theaters in Detroit. This was the first antitrust suit brought by producers against exhibitors that alleged monopoly and restraint of trade. In 1948, the U.S. Supreme Court Paramount Decision ordered the major Hollywood movie studios to sell their theater chains and to end certain anti-competitive practices. This court ruling ended the studio system.
By 1958, SIMPP had achieved many of the goals that led to its creation, and the group ceased operations.
Krim and Benjamin
Needing a turnaround, Pickford and Chaplin hired Paul V. McNutt in 1950, a former governor of Indiana, as chairman and Frank L. McNamee as president. McNutt did not have the skill to solve UA's financial problems and the pair was replaced after only a few months.
On February 15, 1951, lawyers-turned-producers Arthur B. Krim (of Eagle-Lion Films), Robert Benjamin and Matty Fox approached Pickford and Chaplin with an idea: let them take over United Artists for ten years. If UA was profitable in one of the next three years, they would have the option to acquire half the company by the end of the ten years and take full control. 20th Century-Fox president Spyros Skouras extended United Artists a $3 million loan through Krim and Benjamin's efforts.
In taking over UA, Krim and Benjamin created the first studio without an actual "studio". Primarily acting as bankers, they offered money to independent producers. UA leased space at the Pickford/Fairbanks Studio but did not own a studio lot. Thus UA did not have the overhead, the maintenance, or the expensive production staff at other studios.
Among their first clients were Sam Spiegel and John Huston, whose Horizon Productions gave UA one major hit, The African Queen (1951) and a substantial success, Moulin Rouge (1952). Besides The African Queen UA also had success with High Noon in their first year, earning a profit of $313,000 compared to a loss of $871,000 the previous year. Other clients followed, among them Stanley Kramer, Otto Preminger, Hecht-Hill-Lancaster Productions, and actors newly freed from studio contracts and seeking to produce or direct their own films.
With the instability in the film industry due to theater divestment, the business was considered risky. In 1955, movie attendance reached its lowest level since 1923. Chaplin sold his 25% share during this crisis to Krim and Benjamin for $1.1 million, followed a year later by Pickford who sold her share for $3 million.
In the late 1950s, United Artists produced two modest films that became financial and critical successes for the company. The company made Marty which won 1955's Palme d'Or and Best Picture in the Oscars, and 12 Angry Men (1957), which according to Krim before home video, was being seen on television 24 hours a day, 365 days a year some place in the world. By 1958, UA was making annual profits of $3 million a year.
Public company
United Artists went public in 1957 with a $17 million stock and debenture offering. The company was averaging 50 films a year. In 1958, UA acquired Ilya Lopert's Lopert Pictures Corporation, which released foreign films that attracted criticism or was censoed elsewhere.
In 1957, UA created United Artists Records Corporation and United Artists Music Corporation after an unsuccessful attempt to buy a record company. In 1968, UA Records merged with Liberty Records, along with its many subsidiary labels such as Imperial Records and Dolton Records. In 1972, the group was consolidated into one entity as United Artists Records and in 1979, EMI acquired the division which included Blue Note Records.
In 1959, after failing to sell several pilots, United Artists offered its first ever television series, The Troubleshooters, and later released its first sitcom, The Dennis O'Keefe Show.
In the 1960s, mainstream studios fell into decline and some were acquired or diversified. UA prospered while winning 11 Academy Awards, including five for Best Picture, adding relationships with the Mirisch brothers, Billy Wilder, Joseph E. Levine and others. In 1961, United Artists released West Side Story, which won ten Academy Awards (including Best Picture).
In 1960, UA purchased Ziv Television Programs. UA's television division was responsible for shows such as Gilligan's Island, The Fugitive, Outer Limits, and The Patty Duke Show. The television unit had begun to build up a profitable rental library, including Associated Artists Productions, owners of Warner Bros.' pre-1950 features, shorts and cartoons and 231 Popeye cartoon shorts purchased from Paramount Pictures in 1958, becoming United Artists Associated, its distribution division.
In 1963, UA released two Stanley Kramer films, It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and A Child Is Waiting. In 1964, UA introduced U.S. film audiences to the Beatles by releasing A Hard Day's Night (1964) and Help! (1965).
At the same time, it backed two expatriate North Americans in Britain, who had acquired screen rights to Ian Fleming's James Bond novels. For $1 million, UA backed Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli's Dr. No in 1963 and launched the James Bond franchise. The franchise outlived UA's time as a major studio, continuing half a century later. Other successful projects backed in this period included the Pink Panther series, which began in 1964, and Spaghetti Westerns, which made a star of Clint Eastwood in the films of A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.
In 1964, the French subsidiary, Les Productions Artistes Associés, released its first production That Man from Rio.
In 1965, UA released the anticipated George Stevens' production of The Greatest Story Ever Told and was at the time, the most expensive film which was budgeted at $20 million. Max Von Sydow, in the role of Jesus Christ, led an all-star cast which included Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowell, Martin Landau, Dorothy McGuire, Sal Mineo, Ina Balin, Joanna Dunham, David McCallum, Nehemiah Persoff, Donald Pleasence, José Ferrer and Ed Wynn. The film did not make back its budget and was released to mixed critical reception. However, it has since been acclaimed as a classic by audiences around the world for being admirably inspired in its attempt to be faithful to the four books of the New Testament in the Holy Bible as well as the book of the same name by Fulton Oursler and the radio program which ran from 1947 to 1956. The Greatest Story Ever Told received five Academy Award nominations in 1965 and was also listed among the "Top 10 Films of the Year" by the National Board of Review.
Transamerica subsidiary
On the basis of its film and television hits, in 1967, Transamerica Corporation purchased 98% of UA's stock. Transamerica selected David and Arnold Picker to lead its studio. UA debuted a new logo incorporating the parent company's striped T emblem and the tagline "Entertainment from Transamerica Corporation". This wording was later shortened to "A Transamerica Company". The following year, in 1968, United Artists Associated was reincorporated as United Artists Television Distribution. In 1970, UA lost $35 million, and the Pickers were pushed aside for the return of Krim and Benjamin.
UA released another Best Picture Oscar winner in 1967, In the Heat of the Night and a nominee for Best Picture, The Graduate, an Embassy production that UA distributed overseas.
Other successful pictures included the 1971 screen version of Fiddler on the Roof. However, the 1972 film version of Man of La Mancha was a failure. New talent was encouraged, including Woody Allen, Robert Altman, Sylvester Stallone, Saul Zaentz, Miloš Forman, and Brian De Palma. With UA being the distributor for Woody Allen's Bananas (1971), it started as the distributor for a series of Woody Allen films. With the James Bond, Pink Panther, and Woody Allen films, UA had a series of films based on well known characters in the 1970s.
In 1973, United Artists took over the sales and distribution of MGM's films in Anglo-America. Cinema International Corporation assumed international distribution rights for MGM's films and carried on to United International Pictures (made from CIC and UA's International assets being owned by partner MGM) in the 1980s. As part of the deal, UA acquired MGM's music publishing operation, Robbins, Feist, Miller.
In 1975, Harry Saltzman sold UA his 50% stake in Danjaq, the holding-company for the Bond films.
UA agreed to release One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest in 1975, after many other studios turned it down. Producer Michael Douglas later said "United Artists, respectfully, was like your last choice in those days but they made us a decent deal". The film won the Best Picture Academy Award and was UA's highest-grossing film, with a gross of $163 million. UA followed with the next two years' Best Picture Oscar winners, Rocky and Annie Hall, becoming the first studio to win the award for three years running and also to become the studio with the most Best Picture winners at that time, with 11.
However, Transamerica was not pleased with UA's releases such as Midnight Cowboy and Last Tango in Paris that were rated X by the Motion Picture Association of America. In these instances, Transamerica demanded the byline "A Transamerica Company" be removed on the prints and in all advertising. At one point, the parent company expressed its desire to phase out the UA name and replace it with Transamerica Films. Krim tried to convince Transamerica to spin off United Artists, but he and Transamerica's chairman could not come to an agreement. Finally in 1978, following a dispute with Transamerica chief John R. Beckett over administrative expenses, UA's top executives, including chairman Krim, president Eric Pleskow, Benjamin and other key officers walked out. Within days they announced the formation of Orion Pictures, with backing from Warner Bros. The departures concerned several Hollywood figures enough that they took out an ad in a trade paper warning Transamerica that it had made a fatal mistake in letting them go. Later that year, it entered into a partnership with Lorimar Productions, whereas United Artists would distribute Lorimar's feature films theatrically, while Lorimar was planning to produce television series and miniseries adaptations from UA's feature film library.
Transamerica inserted Andy Albeck as UA's president. United had its most successful year with four hits in 1979: Rocky II, Manhattan, Moonraker, and The Black Stallion.
The new leadership agreed to back Heaven's Gate, a project of director Michael Cimino, which vastly overran its budget and cost $44 million. This led to the resignation of Albeck, who was replaced by Norbert Auerbach. United Artists recorded a major loss for the year due almost entirely to the box-office failure of Heaven's Gate. It destroyed UA's reputation with Transamerica and the greater Hollywood community. However, it may have saved the United Artists name; UA's final head before the sale, Steven Bach, wrote in his book Final Cut that there had been talk about renaming United Artists to Transamerica Pictures.
In 1980, Transamerica decided to exit the film making business, and put United Artists on the market. Kirk Kerkorian's Tracinda Corp. purchased the company in 1981. Tracinda also owned Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
United Artists Classics
In 1981, United Artists Classics, which formerly re-released library titles, was turned into a first-run art film distributor by Nathaniel T. Kwit, Jr. Tom Bernard was hired as the division director, as well as handling theatrical sales, and Ira Deutchman was hired as head of marketing. Later the division added Michael Barker and Donna Gigliotti. Deutchman left to form Cinecom, and Barker and Bernard formed Orion Classics and Sony Pictures Classics. The label mostly released foreign and independent films such as Cutter's Way, Ticket to Heaven and The Grey Fox, and occasional first-run reissues from the UA library, such as director's cuts of Head Over Heels. When Barker and Bernard left to form Orion Classics, the label was briefly rechristened in 1984 as MGM/UA Classics before it ceased operating in the late 1980s.
MGM/UA Entertainment Company
The merged studios became known as the MGM/UA Entertainment Company, and in 1982 began launching new subsidiaries: the MGM/UA Home Entertainment Group, MGM/UA Classics and MGM/UA Television Group. Kerkorian also bid for the remaining, outstanding public stock, but dropped his bid, facing lawsuits and vocal opposition.
In 1981, Fred Silverman and George Reeves via InterMedia Entertainment struck a deal with the studio to produce films and television shows.
After the purchase, David Begelman's duties were transferred from MGM to MGM/UA. Under Begelman, MGM/UA produced unsuccessful films and he was fired in July 1982. Of the 11 films he put into production, by the time of his termination only Poltergeist proved to be a hit.
As part of the consolidation, in 1983, MGM closed United Artists' long time headquarters at 729 Seventh Avenue in New York City. MGM/UA sold the former UA music publishing division to CBS Songs in 1983.
WarGames and Octopussy made substantial profits for the new MGM/UA in 1983, but were not sufficient for Kerkorian. It did not help that WarGames was briefly caught in a legal dispute with EMI Films concerning the film's funding and international rights. A 1985-restructuring led to independent MGM and UA production units with the combined studio leaders each placed in charge of a single unit. Speculation from analysts was that one of the studios, most likely UA, would be sold to fund the other's (MGM) stock buy-back to take that studio private. However, soon afterwards, one unit's chief was fired and the remaining executive, Alan Ladd, Jr., took charge of both.
From Wikipedia’s article on United Artists, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4