Keystone Studios

Coordinates: 34°05′10.37″N 118°15′34.80″W / 34.0862139°N 118.2596667°W / 34.0862139; -118.2596667
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

34°05′10.37″N 118°15′34.80″W / 34.0862139°N 118.2596667°W / 34.0862139; -118.2596667

Keystone Studios
IndustryFilm studio
Founded1912 (as Keystone Pictures Studio)
FounderMack Sennett
Defunct1935
HeadquartersEdendale, Los Angeles

Keystone Studios was an early

Mutual Film Corporation between 1912 and 1915.[4] The Keystone film brand declined rapidly after Sennett went independent in 1917.[5]

The name Keystone was taken from the side of one of the cars of a passing Pennsylvania Railroad train (Keystone State being the nickname of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania) during the initial meeting of Sennett, Kessel and Baumann in New York.[6]

The original main building, the first totally enclosed film stage and studio in history, is still standing. It is located at 1712 Glendale Blvd in

Echo Park, Los Angeles and is now being used as a Public storage facility.[7]

Production

The "Sennett Bathing Beauties"

The studio is especially remembered for its

Echo Park – in 1912. The original main building which was the first totally enclosed film stage and studio ever constructed, is still there today. Known as Sennett's Fun Factory,[8] it was here that he created the slapstick antics of the Keystone Cops (from 1912) and the Sennett Bathing Beauties (beginning in 1915). Keystone comedies were noted for their hair-raising car chases and custard pie warfare, especially in the Keystone Cops series. Charlie Chaplin got his start in films at Keystone when Sennett hired him in 1914, fresh from his vaudeville career, to make silent films, in which he rapidly became a star performer and film director, participating in thirty-five films within the single year he worked there.[9] Other actors who worked at Keystone toward the beginning of their film careers include Marie Dressler, Harold Lloyd, Mabel Normand, Roscoe Arbuckle, Gloria Swanson, Louise Fazenda, Raymond Griffith, Ford Sterling, Ben Turpin, Harry Langdon, Al St. John and Chester Conklin
.

In 1915, Keystone Studios became an autonomous production unit of the Triangle Film Corporation with D. W. Griffith and Thomas Ince. Sennett left in 1917 to produce his own independent films (eventually distributed through Paramount), after which Keystone's business declined. Keystone Studios eventually closed after bankruptcy in 1935.[5]

Scene in Mabel's Dramatic Career (1913) with two moviegoers ("Fatty" Arbuckle and Sennett) arguing while watching Mabel Normand on screen
PLAY copy of Keystone's
short A Little Hero released in 1913 in Netherlands with Dutch intertitles
; running time: 00:04:31.

Legacy

Much of the lighting and studio equipment from Keystone was bought by Reymond King, who started the "Award Cinema Movie Equipment" company in

Venice, CA in November, 1935.[citation needed
]

"Keystone Studios" is the fictional studio in the

Swimming With Sharks
(1994).

In 2007, when the independent film studio Cineville merged with the DVD distributor Westlake Entertainment, the companies named their joint enterprise Keystone.[10]

The original Keystone Studios lot was an explorable location, as well as a major plot element, in the 2011 video game L.A. Noire, published by Rockstar Games.

Gallery

See also

References

  1. ^ Internet Movie Databse
  2. ^ Silent Era.com
  3. ^ "MovieMoviesite.com". Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved August 10, 2014.
  4. ^ Mutual Film Corporation at Silent Era. Retrieved 2012-01-30.
  5. ^
    ISBN 978-0810874596
    .
  6. ^ "HOW KEYSTONE GOT ITS NAME". LA Times. January 7, 1917. p. 24 (of Part 3).
  7. ^ Bengtson, John (2010). Silent Traces: Discovering Early Hollywood Through the Films of Charlie Chaplin. Lobster Films [fr]. 11:30 minutes in.
  8. ISBN 978-0786457076
    .
  9. ISBN 978-0786431939
    .
  10. ^ Robertson, Willa (2007-07-18). "Cineville, Westlake create Keystone". Variety. Retrieved 2018-08-15.

Further reading

External links

Media related to Keystone Studios at Wikimedia Commons

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Keystone_Studios&oldid=1156700018"