130:, corresponding to a general collapse in studio box-office receipts. As such, Sax’s task was to reorganize production of Warners one- and two-reel shorts, “films that could be sold without difficulty anywhere in the country”, so as to maximize short-term profits. Indeed, many of the major studios curtailed feature production in favor of shorts during the financial crisis, limited mostly to comedies and light musicals. Most of these were produced in the New York area due to its local talent pool, including Broadway cast members enlisted to appear in screen talkies. The organizational methods Sax included highly structured and disciplined work schedules enforced by the trade unions, which banned overtime and providing film product delivered at or under budget.
142:“We work unlike any other studio in the country. We keep factory hours - 9 to 5 - and turn out a steady amount of movie footage, rain or shine, come what may. Our schedule calls for two shorts per week. And we haven’t slipped up on this in the six years I’ve been running this place for Warner Brothers. We start a picture Monday morning, finish it Wednesday evening....And we’re ready to start shooting the next one bright and early Thursday morning, finishing up Saturday evening, which gives the carpenters time to build the new sets. Everyone has a holiday Sunday-and we try to folks get legal holidays- a most unusual thing in the movie business.”
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shorts annually, in addition to his contracted talent of over 600. In an effort to profitably utilize all available footage, Sax devised the assembly of “vaudeville compilations”, unrelated snippets of “one forgotten act after another” used to create entertaining shorts that had little thematic unity. Comedian
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The
Vitaphone operations were greatly enhanced by the abundant entertainment troupes and entertainers who could moonlight briefly on film short productions, without compromising their stage or vaudeville commitments. Sax reported that as many as five thousand of these entertainers appeared in his
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Koszarski, 2008 p. 157: “...there would be no more dramatic playlets...no arty experimentation...” And p. 158 and p. 390: See here for studio investments in short films. And p. 401: See here for high quality of local stage and musical entertainment personnel available to film studios in New
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By 1938, Sax was presiding over the filming of about 140 reels of shorts per year for
Warners, each with an average screen duration of 5 or 6 minutes. As to the quality of these shorts, film historian Richard Koszarski observes “Sax proved to be the most consistently successful producer of
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Baxter, 1970 p. 70: “In 1929, Warner
Brothers was still endorsed with odd combinations of the Vitagraph, Warners and First National brand marks…” By the early 1930s “Warners Brothers” was their dominant name, except for their Vitaphone productions on the East
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Sam Sax emerged as an outstanding practitioner of the studio “factory” system for short film production in
Brooklyn, rivaling Hollywood production methods. In 1935, Sax defended his “film factory” approach to filmmaking in a
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Hutchinson, 2018: “As the
Brooklyn studio was closing in 1939, Sam Sax sent Henabery to England for a new directing opportunity. Warners’ Teddington Studios was producing “quota quickie” features.”
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Warner brothers, despite a major investment in a 26,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art studio in
Brooklyn, was already relocating short film operations to their
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Hutchinson, 2018: Vitagraph, soon
Vitaphone, was “modernized and wired for sound in late 1928 to take advantage of nearby vaudeville, radio, Broadway stars…”
95:(September 5, 1880 –January 2, 1962) was an American film producer. He produced 80 films between 1925 and 1946, including the last films of
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Koszarski, 2008 p. 482: Koszarski only notes that Sax was sent to
Britain when the Warner’s Brooklyn operations were shut down.
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outfit, Gotham
Studios. In late 1931 Sax, considered “a no-nonsense studio executive of the old school”, began work with
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logo under Sax’s auspices and were well-received. Arbuckle died shortly after completing these comedies and before his
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studio. By April 15, 1939, the move was complete. Sax was transferred to England to manage Warners’
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Vitaphone View: Vitaphone’s Most Prolific Director, Joseph Henabery
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Sax embarked upon his duties during the severest phase of the
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During the late silent film era, Sax owned his own Hollywood
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in London. In 1940 Sax was back in Hollywood promoting
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325:The Woman Who Did Not Care
728:Hollywood in the Thirties
627:describing his work rules
309:The Phantom of the Forest
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56:Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
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333:Mountains of Manhattan
221:The Shadow on the Wall
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737:. Classic Movie Hub.
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75:Hollywood, California
726:Baxter, John. 1970.
533:His Brother's Keeper
301:The Sign of the Claw
197:Selected filmography
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163:(1933), directed by
413:United States Smith
172:Burbank, California
445:The Silent Partner
357:The Silent Avenger
349:Catch-As-Catch-Can
341:Quarantined Rivals
269:The Winning Wallop
245:His Master's Voice
237:One of the Bravest
213:The Part Time Wife
176:Teddington Studios
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113:poverty row
779:Categories
766:Samuel Sax
541:Hoots Mon!
405:Bare Knees
261:Silent Pal
123:facility.
93:Samuel Sax
48:1880-09-05
36:Samuel Sax
550:Footnotes
461:Hey, Pop!
189:in 1945,
121:Vitaphone
86:1925-1946
721:Sources
493:Tomalio
161:Tomalio
18:Sam Sax
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593:Coast.
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614:York.
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770:IMDb
750:ISBN
64:Died
42:Born
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