Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., also referred to as Columbia Pictures, is an American film production and distribution label. It is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group,[2] a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the major film studios and a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony Group Corporation.[3] Columbia Pictures is one of the leading film studios in the world, and was one of the so-called "Little Three" among the eight major film studios of Hollywood's "Golden Age".[4]
On June 19, 1918, brothers Jack and Harry Cohn and their business partner Joe Brandt founded the studio as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn (CBC) Film Sales Corporation.[5] It adopted the Columbia Pictures name on January 10, 1924 (operating as Columbia Pictures Corporation until December 23, 1968), went public two years later, and eventually began to use the image of Columbia, the female personification of the United States, as its logo. The studio was acquired by the Coca-Cola Company in 1982,[6] then by Sony Corporation of Japan in 1989.[7] Columbia Pictures is presently headquartered at the Irving Thalberg Building on the former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (currently known as the Sony Pictures Studios) lot in Culver City, California, since 1990.
In its early years, Columbia was a minor player in Hollywood, but began to grow in the late 1920s, spurred by a successful association with director Frank Capra. With Capra and others such as the most successful two-reel comedy series, The Three Stooges, Columbia became one of the primary homes of the screwball comedy. In the 1930s, Columbia's major contract stars were Jean Arthur and Cary Grant. In the 1940s, Rita Hayworth became the studio's premier star and propelled their fortunes into the late 1950s. Rosalind Russell, Glenn Ford and William Holden also became major stars at the studio. The company was also primarily responsible for distributing Disney's Silly Symphony film series as well as the Mickey Mouse cartoon series from 1929 to 1932.
Columbia Pictures is currently one of the five live-action labels of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, alongside TriStar Pictures, Screen Gems, Sony Pictures Classics, and 3000 Pictures. Columbia also releases most films produced by Sony Pictures Animation intended for a theatrical release.
History
Early years as CBC Film Sales (1918–1924)
The studio was founded on June 19, 1918, as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn (CBC) Film Sales by brothers Jack and Harry Cohn and Jack's best friend Joe Brandt, and released its first feature film More to Be Pitied Than Scorned on August 20, 1922. The film, with a budget of $20,000, was a success, bringing in $130,000 in revenue for the company.[8] Brandt was president of CBC Film Sales, handling sales, marketing and distribution from New York along with Jack Cohn, while Harry Cohn ran production in Hollywood. The studio's early productions were low-budget short subjects: Screen Snapshots, the Hallroom Boys (the vaudeville duo of Edward Flanagan and Neely Edwards), and the Charlie Chaplin-imitator Billy West.[9] The start-up CBC leased space in a Poverty Row studio on Hollywood's famously low-rent Gower Street. Among Hollywood's elite, the studio's small-time reputation led some to joke "CBC" stood for "Corned Beef and Cabbage".[5]
International film production
In 1998, Columbia Pictures began launching local-language film units to produce local films in Brazil, Germany, Russia, Asia, India and had short-lived units in Spain and Mexico.[117]
Deutsche Columbia Pictures Filmproduktion produces films for German-speaking territories. The unit's first film was Anatomy, which became the highest-grossing German-language film of 2000. However, after the box office failures of What to Do in Case of Fire?, Viktor Vogel – Commercial Man, Big Girls Don't Cry and Anatomy 2, the unit was closed down in 2003.[118] The unit was later relaunched in 2008, with its first film Friendship! being released in 2010.[119]
Columbia Pictures Film Production Asia produces films for Chinese-language territories and was based in Hong Kong.[120] The unit's notable productions are Not One Less,
Logo
The Columbia Pictures logo, featuring the Torch Lady, a woman carrying a torch and wearing a drape (representing Columbia, a personification of the United States), has gone through six major changes.[122][123][124] It has often been compared to the Statue of Liberty, which was an inspiration to the Columbia Pictures logo.[124]
History
Originally in 1924, Columbia Pictures used a logo featuring a female Roman soldier holding a shield in her left hand and a stick of wheat in her right hand, which was based on actress Doris Doscher (known as the model for the statue on the Pulitzer Fountain) as the Standing Liberty quarter used from 1916 to 1930, though the studio's version was given longer hair.[125]
Filmography
Highest-grossing films
‡ Includes theatrical reissue(s).
See also
Bibliography
Further reading
External links
Websites
Papers
Metadata
- SonyPictures.net (list of worldwide sites)
- Columbia Pictures - Lost n Found Films
- Columbia Pictures: The History of a Logo – the Lady with the Torch at Reel Classics
- Columbia Pictures Still Photographer Contract 1945 at The Ned Scott Archive
References
- Ghost Corps, Inc., a subsidiary of Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. SonyPictures.com, retrieved January 30, 2020^
- Divisions – Sony Pictures sonypictures.com, retrieved June 7, 2015^
- Sony, Form 20-F, Filing Date Jun 28, 2011 secdatabase.com, retrieved March 27, 2013