News for
D.W. Griffith

photos

board

add

contact

details

IMDbPro offers the latest entertainment industry news from the Hollywood Reporter. Sign-up for a two-week free trial today. Click here for a free trial!

Note
30 April 2008 (StudioBriefing)
In Tuesday's edition of Studio Briefing, we mentioned that United Artists was founded in 1919 by actors Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks. We neglected to mention that a fourth founder was the director D.W. Griffith.

UA About To Be Reborn
27 February 2007 (StudioBriefing)
Tom Cruise is reportedly close to raising the money needed to bring United Artists, the studio founded 86 years ago by Charlie Chaplin, D.W. Griffith, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, back to life. According to today's (Tuesday) Los Angeles Times, Cruise and his producing partner Paula Wagner, have raised the nearly $500 million that it will take to finance a slate of films for the now dormant UA, 65 percent of which is owned by MGM and the remainder, by Cruise and Wagner. The money is reportedly coming from a group of Wall Street investors led by Merrill Lynch. According to the Times, UA's first production under the deal with Cruise and Wagner is the Robert Redford-directed political drama Lions for Lambs, starring Cruise and Meryl Streep. The director and two stars agreed to defer most of their upfront fees -- the entire movie is budgeted at just $35 million -- in return for a cut of the gross less production and marketing costs.

MGM Unites With Cruise
3 November 2006 (StudioBriefing)
MGM is bringing United Artists back from history and handing it over to Tom Cruise and his production partner, Paula Wagner, to run it. The company, once again manifesting its determination to remain an independent entity following its acquisition by an investment consortium that included Sony Films, said that Cruise and Wagner were being given a "substantial ownership" of UA and would have full control over the company's production slate. In what was regarded as a slap at Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone, who had declared only last week that he had cut his company's ties to Cruise because "stars don't make a picture, the script does," the MGM announcement said that it wanted to recognize "what made UA great in the first place -- studio management by creative talent who can best encourage and support other creative talent." UA was founded by actors Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks and director D.W. Griffith in 1919. "We welcome the opportunity to contribute to that legacy," said Cruise in a statement. Redstone issued a statement, too, saying, "I wish Tom and his associates the greatest good fortune on their new venture."

MGM Teams with Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner to Resurrect United Artists
2 November 2006 (IMDb News Flash)
MGM announced today that United Artists, the classic studio recently thought to be officially defunct, will be reborn once again - with Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner at the helm. According to a statement released by MGM, Cruise and Wagner (who formed the Cruise/Wagner production company in 1993) will drive the re-establishment of the studio, with Wagner as CEO overseeing day-to-day operations and Cruise starring in and producing films for the studio. In addition to setting the production slate, Cruise and Wagner will also hold "substantial ownership" in the studio, which was originally founded 85 years ago by Douglas Fairbanks, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford and D.W. Griffith. The original United Artists' vision was to create a studio run by creative talent for creative talent as a way to help foster filmmaking outside the regimented studio system, a sentiment that was echoed in today's press release by all parties involved. Harry E. Sloan, Chairman and CEO of MGM, stated, "Partnering with Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner, we have the ideal creative foundation from which to reintroduce the United Artists brand… United Artists is once again the haven for independent filmmakers and a vital resource in developing quality filmed entertainment consistent with MGM's modern studio model." Cruise and Wagner also expressed their commitment to maintaining United Artists' unique vision, with Cruise stating, "It's our desire to create an environment where filmmakers can thrive and see their visions realized," and Wagner saying, "This is a great opportunity for Tom and me to re-establish the United Artists brand and to work closely with the creative community. As studio partner-operators, we will provide a supportive environment and infrastructure for filmmakers that will allow them to do their best work." The agreement between MGM and Cruise/Wagner, effective immediately, will have the new UA set to produce four films each year (a number that may increase in the future), with marketing and distribution handled by MGM. No new projects have yet been announced.

Denver Library Allows Movie Downloads
22 March 2006 (StudioBriefing)
The Denver Public Library on Tuesday became the first library to allow patrons to download movies and television programs over the Internet to their PCs or portable media players, Home Media Retailing magazine reported. The initial films made available by the library online are limited to a few classic films, including Federico Fellini's 8 1/2, Vittorio De Sica's The Bicycle Thief, and D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation. The software is timed to void the movies after the lending period is over. The Denver library's Michelle Jeske said, "Downloadable video gives our patrons 24/7 online access to exceptional films and allows [us] to have this type of format without the space, handling, and damage issued normally associated with DVDs and tapes."

Boston Columnist Condemns 'Birth of a Nation' Protest
17 August 2004 (StudioBriefing)
The pop culture columnist of the Boston Globe has sharply criticized the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP for spearheading a protest that forced an L.A. silent movie theater to cancel a screening of D.W. Griffith's 1915 film The Birth of a Nation. Renée Graham, who is black, observed that she first saw the film when enrolled in a class on the African-American image in film and was revolted by the images. "Still, even though it's unlikely I'll ever sit through this film again, I do not believe it should be consigned to some dusty closet, never to be shown in public again," she wrote in today's (Tuesday) editions. Responding to the claim that the film could inflame racial hatred, Graham commented: "If a film, especially one made nearly 90 years ago, can send this nation into racist convulsions, then we're in a lot more trouble than we think." Moreover, she writes, banning the film "also discards any chance to discuss early 20th-century representations of African-Americans in popular culture and to assess what progress has been made -- yes, we now have Denzel Washington as the hero in The Manchurian Candidate, but how do we rectify the stereotypical buffoonery of Soul Plane or the modern-day minstrel act of the Fox TV show Method and Red? (And why aren't people protesting those current images, instead of a near 90-year-old film few have seen?)"

Protests Force Cancellation of 'Birth of a Nation'
10 August 2004 (StudioBriefing)
The owner of the Silent Movie Theater in Hollywood canceled a planned screening of D. W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation after the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP and a group called the National Alliance for Positive Action vowed to picket the theater. Although owner Charlie Lustman had planned to show the film with a disclaimer stating that he does not endorse the racist content of the film but wants to honor its place in cinema history, the two groups had charged that the film would continue to poison race relations. Lustman said that he had also received threatening phone calls and was concerned about the safety of patrons and 92-year-old Bob Mitchell, the onetime leader of the famed Mitchell Boys Choir, who was to provide organ music to accompany the film.

Rarely Screened 'Birth af a Nation' To Be Shown in L.A.
9 August 2004 (StudioBriefing)
Four years after angry protests by the Los Angeles branch of the NAACP and other groups forced him to yank his planned showing of D.W. Griffith's 1915 film The Birth of a Nation, the owner of the Silent Movie Theater in Los Angeles has vowed to screen the film beginning tonight (Monday). Charlie Lustman, who describes the film as both "a cultural and artistic monument" and a "shameful stain" on the history of U.S. race relations, told Saturday's Los Angeles Times that he intended to launch a series on the most important silent films with Nation because he regarded it as "the biggest and most cinematic gem in history." (He intends to show the film with a disclaimer stating that he does not endorse the racist content of the film but wants to honor its place in cinema history, the Times observed.) However, L.A. NAACP President Geraldine Washington told the newspaper that she still opposes the screening. "This movie has no positive value whatsoever," she said. "And it runs the risk of creating unrest and hate crimes. It's just too risky to take a chance."

DGA To Discontinue D.W. Griffith Award, Citing Griffith's Racism
15 December 1999 (StudioBriefing)
Bowing to political correctness, the Directors Guild of America announced on Tuesday that it is discontinuing its most prestigious award, the D.W. Griffith Award, indicating that it was doing so because of the racist images its namesake director employed in his 1915 classic, Birth of a Nation, The (1915) (originally titled The Clansman). In a statement, DGA president Jack Shea said, "As we approach a new millennium, the time is right to create a new ultimate honor for film directors that better reflects the sensibilities of our society at this time in our national history." Griffith's defenders have long maintained that the director should be judged for his contributions to the art of movie making, not on his racist views, a product of his Southern upbringing. But in his biography of Richard Griffith Schickel, the Time magazine critic, wrote: "To put the matter simply, Griffith should have known better. And if he had, he would not have had to pass the rest of his life in the knowledge that his first masterpiece, the screen's first masterpiece, was a profoundly tainted one."

L.A. Film Collection Winds Up In U.K.
20 August 1997 (StudioBriefing)
British media group Carlton Communications has acquired the Raymond Rohauer Film Collection, a library of classic films that the late Los Angeles art house exhibitor screened at the Esquire and Coronet Theaters from the '50s until his death in 1987.The collection includes 600 silent films, including comedies by Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd and W.C. Fields as well as the original Phantom of the Opera with Lon Chaney, D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation, The (1915), and Thief of Bagdad, The (1924) with Douglas Fairbanks. Terms of the deal were not announced, but published reports in London put the price at between $17 million and $25 million. It is believed that the collection could serve as the backbone of a new movie channel for Carlton.