Studio Heads From Classic Hollywood Who Were Actually Terrible People
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- Опубликовано: 5 авг 2024
- Did you know that Howard Hughes was seen as being even too creepy for his Hollywood peers, and did you know that David O. Selznick dedicated the last years of his life to making a bizarre film about his mistress that everyone hated? In recent years, it seems that a lot of progress has been made in Hollywood in regards to how talent is treated by those in positions of power. However, Old Hollywood was filled with studio heads that abused their power in many different ways, with those ways generally being sexual.
▬Contents of this video▬
00:00 - Intro
00:26 - Louis B. Mayer
02:39 - Howard Hughes
04:04 - David O. Selznick
04:46 - Jack Warner
06:20 - Harry Cohn
08:02 - Outro
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The classic days of Hollywood were filled with studio heads that were not only ruthless but weren’t above using their power to secure sexual favors from those under their employ. One of the worst offenders of the lot was Harry Cohn, who many credits with popularizing the idea of a studio head asking for sexual favors in return for offering a role.
Besides Harry Cohn, other infamous studio heads from Hollywood’s Golden Age include Louis B. Mayer, Howard Hughes, and Jack Warner. Louis B. Mayer was the head of MGM during the days that the studio released such classics as The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind. The star of the prior film was Judy Garland, and she was one of the ones who received Louis’ abusive behaviors the worst.
Howard Hughes was better known for his work in the aviation industry before venturing into film, though he seems to have turned Hollywood into his own sexual buffet upon his entrance. The studio head was incredibly controlling of the women he employed and ruined many lives. Jack Warner was one of the titular brothers that founded Warner Bros., and he ended up scamming his three brothers out of their shares of the studio, possibly resulting in one of their deaths. Join Facts Verse as we explore studio heads from classic Hollywood who were actually terrible people.
Studio Heads From Classic Hollywood Who Were Actually Terrible People 
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Harry Cohn really screwed over the 3 Stooges. The short films they made kept the entire studio afloat, and Harry paid them peanuts (not to mention constantly attacking their self-esteem to keep the Stooges from learning the truth about how popular they really were).
Curly Howard suffered for it. Probably the most celebrated and memorable of the 3 Stooges. Had a stroke (his acting and mannerisms were evident in the last couple shorts he was in) and had to be replaced by Shemp Howard, who worked with Moe and Larry until he had a heart attack.
Two of Cohn's actors attended his funeral which was held on the largest sound stage on the Columbia lot. They were amazed at the huge crowd paying their respects to their mean old boss. Seeing an audience numbering in the thousands, one turned to the other and said, "Give the people want they want." 😉
That's a Red Skelton joke, actually.
@@akrenwinkle Thanks. I couldn't remember which actor said that. But it was said about that SOB studio head Cohn!
Yes, I grew up in Hollywood and heard that story, along with another one from the funeral. I'm not sure who said it but some one remarked at the surprising amount of attendees, another responded that the reason was that they all wanted to be absolutely sure Cohen was really dead! It might have been Bob Hope.
Mayer was an excellent executive who built MGM into the most successful studio in Hollywood. Elizabeth Taylor hated him, but Joan Crawford described him as "the best friend I ever had." June Allyson liked him and called him "Pops." Greer Garson also liked him because he built her into a star. No one is perfect, and compared to some characters in the film industry, Mayer was a saint.
Alfred Hitchcock famously despised Selznick. He even needled him by writing insider bits into scripts. In ‘North By Northwest,’ Eva Marie Saint asks Cary Grant what the “O” in “Roger O. Thornhill stands for?” Grant says, “nothing.”
And it's not a coincidence that Raymond Burr as the villain in Rear Window was made up to look a lot like Selznick....
Interesting, thank you for sharing this info 😊
Three of the most seductive scenes in cinima history. Scenes 2 & 4 the train North By Northwest.
The slow motion kiss
Grace Kelly Rear Window. Brilliant !
Selznick was good.
Hitchcock was decades ahead of his time
Hitchcock despised working for him but they actually remained on friendly terms for the rest of Selznick's life.
@@ricardocantoral7672how do you guys know this?
One of my favorite Hollywood stories was when Harry Cohn tried to grope Joan Crawford. She responded, "Keep it in your pants, Harry. I'm having lunch with Joan [Harry Cohn's wife] and the boys tomorrow."
Jack Benny once said that "Jack Warner would rather tell a bad joke than make a good picture."
Interesting, thanks for sharing these stories 👍
That does sound like something Joan Crawford would have said. She was known to be rather feisty. This is a woman who once told the Board of Directors of the Pepsi-Cola company, "Don't f*** with me!"
It's too bad that she could be pretty terrible herself sometimes. You don't believe me, ask her daughter, Christina.
I'm seventy one years old and lived through those times. Some of the shenanigans by the men in Hollywood were known even then to the public but there were no official investigations or punishments because those studio heads were extremely powerful. Thankfully it's a better situation now but make no mistake, wherever there is wealth and or power nefarious deeds take place. Once again a well done video, thank you.
Harry Cohn in particular bullied Sammy Davis Jr's father after Sammy Davis Jr had an affair with Kim Novak, who was probably the biggest star at Columbia during that time. Harry had connections with the Mafia and had someone try to rough up Sammy Davis Sr.
Rumor has it that Harry Cohn was also highly racist, as I'm sure all the studio heads were back then.
Luise Rainer remembered that Mayer considered his contract players to be cogs in his machine rather than people, and she had to stand up for herself and say “I’m not going to sit on your knee, sir.”
On another note, Margaret Hamilton told a funny story about the first time she saw Louis B Mayer at a ball game with her agent, who said “Maggie, that’s Mr. Mayer,” and she replied “of what town?”
It's kinda ironic that Warner bros is still treating some of the people who used to work for them like trash
I heard that Sam Goldwyn said that after Mayer died, people came to his funeral not to pay their respects, but to make sure the SOB was really dead.
He was talking about Harry Cohn of Columbia. Mayer had a quiet funeral, not attended by one of his daughters, Edith.
Mayer is the reason Judy Garland died at such a young age....he turned her into an addict during Wizard of Oz. The Acresses were subject to the "casting couch".
That man was truly a monster
Those actresses made the choice in order to become famous. Sad
@@arthurbrumagem3844Nope. Judy Garland was forced into the entertainment industry by her carless,greedy-ass, stage mother.
Around 1993 when I would be 36 I had a home improvement job in Culver City, California for a hairdresser who did Hollywood stars at the time like Chevy Chase and Robin Williams during his Captain Hook movie. Chevy only wore toupees when acting and Steven Robinette, the hairdresser, showed me a styrofoam head with a toupee belonging to Chevy for some movie he was doing at the time. He said it cost $2000 and when the movie was done it would be trashed. He would often golf with Robin on the weekends, sneaking away down the driveway carrying his golf bags, with his wife yelling, " Steve, you're staying home and doing stuff around the house " as he snickered and emtered his vehicle, driving away. 🤣
Anyway, he had an 84 year old lady neighbor, who weighed about the same, 84 lbs. She had me do some work at her house too and told me she used to be Mayer's personal secretary. I often wondered if she was one of his sex toys, she would have been tiny like a child, maybe a preference of his.
They created great films and worked with legendary stars. I didn't know about all the corruption going on behind the curtain.
From _Get Happy_ the Judy Garland autobiography:
_Between the ages of sixteen and twenty, Judy herself was to be approached for sex - and approached again and again. ‘Don’t think they all didn’t try,’ she said. Top on the list was (Louis B.) Mayer himself. Whenever he complimented her on her voice - she sang from the heart, he said - Mayer would invariably place his hand on her left breast to show just where her heart was. ‘I often thought I was lucky,’ observed Judy, ‘that I didn’t sing with another part of my anatomy.’ That scenario, a compliment followed by a grope, was repeated many times until, grown up at last, Judy put a stop to it. ‘Mr. Mayer, don’t you ever, ever do that again,’ she finally had the courage to say. ‘I just will not stand for it.’”_
Selznick DID make “Gone With the Wind”
You forgot to mention Louie tried to end his life after Jean Howard who he was obsessed with rejected him. Unfortunately he didn't succeed
I think you might be talking about Jean Harlow, not Howard.
David O. Selznick was a compulsive gambler and had to sell his interest in GONE WITH THE WIND to backer Jock Whitney for $500,000 - Whitney turned around and sold his interest to MGM for $2,800,000 - according to what I have read. Why Selznick did not sell directly to MGM is a mystery. Selznick was a benzedrine addict and often worked for 72 hours straight when he had a film in production. He died of heart failure at age 63, which is not surprising.
Always good and interesting stuff👍Thank you for sharing this
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Why did a random picture of James Cagney pop up?
To keep us engaged I suspect
Because it was during the Warner Brothers segment. Cagney was one of Warner Bros’ biggest stars.
Interesting info! Thank you 😊 it's always interesting to see how old Hollywood pressures affected so many individual actors. Sad and it's even worse today.
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@@FactsVerse A vid on what happened to the Lost In Space cast, unless you have already produced one.
Ezra Miller is a mental case today. Seems Hollywood has always attracted the mentally unstable people, and the old studio heads from several decades past are no exception.
Very Intriguing Video!
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The Three Stooges worked for Cohn for over a decade and never got a raise. if you want a good inside look at Mayer's MGM, read "The Fixers" by E. J. Fleming.
Intriguing, thank you so much for sharing this information. We'll check The Fixers 👍
@@FactsVerse You will enjoy it. Backs up much of what you said. You might also read "Holloywood Be Thy Name", story of the Warner Brothers by one of Harry's granddaughters.
They mentioned that in a Made-For-TV movie biography about the Three Stooges, which also told about how Harry Cohn actually failed to inform the boys about how much money they were making from their movies. He even tried to prevent them from appearing in full-length feature films, insisting that they were only good enough for their two-reel short subjects.
David O Selznick produced Gone with the Wind; he didn’t lose the rights. Also you credit Gone with Wind to Mayer and MGM, though MGM merely released it. They had nothing to do with its production.
This video is a total joke in comments about "Gone With the Wind." You comment that GWTW was a MGM production which is completely incorrect and later when talking about David O Selznick You state that Selznick was the head of the studio that lost out on production GWTW. How mistaken can you be? The ENTIRE film was produced at Selznick International Pictures and Selznick himself paid $50.000.00 on July 30, 1936 for the film rights. Apparently you know little about Hollywood history!
As always interesting content. You just never know what goes on behind the scenes. I don't know how Bugs Bunny could work for Warner Brothers. LOL 😆 have a great day everyone
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Harry Cohn may have been abusive, but he was also a good executive who greenlighted some of Hollywood's finest films, such as FROM HERE TO ETERNITY. He was also a man of his word, and could be trusted to keep it. He built the limited-talent Kim Novak into a star to replace Hayworth. Hughes was a control phreak who treated women like slaves. He tried to do the same to Ava Gardner and she bashed him him over the head with a brass bell. Read the good book HOWARD HUGES IN HOLLYWOOD for an in depth report of his adventures in Filmtown.
Wow I had know idea that jack Warner did that to his brothers he really was a terrible man
It doesn't surprise me that Mr.Rooney would speak kindly of Mr.Mayer..Mayer was an abusive and controlling bully..but..people like Mr.Rooney treated him like a loving father..IMO That is a disgusting form of hypocrisy.
Hollywood Babylon is a book about how sleazy the entertainment industry is.The title might be an insult to Babylon.
How are you make good vidios keep up the work
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*videos
Selznick’s first wife Irene was the daughter of Louis B. Mayer
Sometimes the photos are random, compared to whom you are speaking of at the time.
Otherwise, I enjoy your narration even though I don't know what's really true.
Regarding Cohen, he did keep The Three Stooges shorts going until his death.
I thank him for that.
Some of the stairs loved/hated him......Hughes was even terrible Hitchcock was another one Jack Warner was another monster
Stairs? I hope you mean stars.
@@alexvaliansky7707 My bad I meant stars
You had a photo of James Cagney he was amazing actor known as a man of integrity and wasn't a movie mogel.
Excellent stories,but no surprises.On the upside their cinematic achievements is a great legacy,and proves there is goodness in worst of us.
That's true, at least sometimes. It's like how that famous architect, Stanford White, was such a talented designer of some of the most amazing pieces of architecture in New York City, like the Washington Square Arch and the original Madison Square Garden, but at the same time, White, although a married man, was a womanizer with a particular taste for adolescent girls, whom he would seduce in a private love nest in one of the towers in his own Madison Square Garden.
Unfortunately, not many people knew about White's private life until 1906, when he was shot to death while attending a musical show on the rooftop theater of M.S.G. The killer turned out to be eccentric millionaire playboy Harry K. Thaw, whose wife, Evelyn Nesbit Thaw, was one of White's former mistresses. Thaw, it was later discovered, had harbored a suppressed hatred against the architect ever since he found out that the latter had drugged and ravished Evelyn when she was only sixteen years old (before she married Harry).
Thaw was later tried for White's death, but was found not guilty on the grounds of "temporary insanity."
I recall reading somewhere that all these studio heads were born within a 500 mile radius of each other in Eastern Europe (Poland, Belarus, Ukraine).
@Bourg Productions
You forgot about the Keystone Kops. "Fatty" Arbuckle used to be one of them.
It's not going to go well for someone who is in a high position and uses it for their own purpose.
There's something called Karma. (IE People who go into organized crime learn what that means.)
With the "Me too" movement, revelations came up about men who used their position to fullest. (Harv)
What is not mentioned however is, -there were men in that industry, who never used their position to abuse anybody.
Could never get away with all that these days
they do
I got nothing against Sammy Davis Jr. but he kinda strikes me like a little bit creepy
I liked his dancing skill but thought he was a horrible actor and marginal singer.
Marginal singer? Are you nuts?
I don’t try to compare their business persona w/ the real life person. Although; the studio heads of yesteryear did terrible things to the stars of yesteryear.
Not much progress: Wienstein...
*Weinstein
Universal Studio founder & owner Carl Laemmle was a family man, And had all his relatives working at his Studio. He handed his son Carl junior the studio when he turned 21. Who knows what the honest truth really is about all of these studio owners unless you were there on the lot and in the room at the time. Most stories probably have some basis in fact. But these stories tend to grow exponentially decade after decade. I am not defending any of these guys, I'm sure their family & close friends really know how good or bad they were. And most of these guys were born in the end of the 19th & the beginning of the 20th century, And they have been gone for 50 or more years.
That's good one turned out good. I don't know how much is true of these guys but it's likely we'll never know.
There’s old video footage of actors talking about Harry Cohn and others dating from the 70’s - 80’s readily available on RUclips. There’s books from people who were around back then to see these studio heads in person.
Just because you guys weren’t around back then doesn’t mean you can’t read or listen to actual history from actors who experienced it and were nice enough to talk about it on talk shows.
Next thing you guys will say is the Holocaust doesn’t exist. Why? Because you just said it doesn’t exist because a RUclips channel with lots of subscribers said it.
That's American Business! Nothing has changed much over time...Just the generation(s) in charge at present🐻❄
From generation to generation, thiu art God!!
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It's way worse
Power. Corrupts & Absolute. Power Corruopts. Absolutely !.!.
A full length film could be devoted to these scoundrels!
So true these guys have ruined so many people's lives
🤫Howard Hughes dated all the top females stars of the day,including Lassie. Who was the only female 🤔to turn him down when it came to the 🛌 bedroom....
Yes, some of the more famous ones; Ginger Rogers, Katharine Hepburn and Jane Russell.
I wonder just how much of this video is based on facts or rumours, and gossip? Did Mayer actually molest Judy? Maybe, but we only have her word, and she was known to tell untruths. I don't doubt these men were unscrupulous, however this video makes the information out to be cold truth. Judy had problems before she set foot in Hollywood. Her mother was difficult and pushy, and her dad would come on to younger men, forcing them to keep moving towns. She probably had bipolar disorder or something.
ABSOLUTE POWER CORRUPTS ABSOLUTELY!!!
That is. Y. No one shuld be Allowed 2. .much. power
Mean and he had O.C.D..
👏👍
Why footage of Gal Gadot when you’re talking about Elizabeth Taylor? C’mon “Facts Verse”. I find at least one error in every video.
And showing a picture James Cagney while discussing the Warner brothers.
Even the thumbnail shows a picture of actor Lionel Barrymore. Certainly not a mogul.
Funny to see what kind of similiaties these people shared and what kind of people are still running the entertainment Industries lol. But of course, we're not allowed to point that out...
Perhaps the most notorious of the studio heads when it came to demanding sexual favors from starlets was Darryl F. Zanuck at Fox. Funnily enough, he wasn't one of those people.
you didnt know louie and howie was racist??????????
Not true.
Makes a little old slap a bit of NOTHING doesn't it!
Hello
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Quit padding your videos with that yellow screen at the end...
They were awful
Bunch of old farts
You'll be old one day.
@@YouChwb the option isn’t a good one 😂
@@arthurbrumagem3844 I was young many years ago when there was destain towards the elderly, but not as openly disrespectful as it is today. It really is troubling. I can only imagine what it is going to be like in 30 or 40 years from now when the kids of today are going to be treated even worse.
@@YouChwb the young today blame all their problems on “ boomers” . Not saying that generation didn’t do some things wrong but not intentionally I assure. They grew up with parents of the “ greatest generation “ and the “ Great Depression “. Boomers never forgot what made their parents stronger and more responsible
@@arthurbrumagem3844 There is that factor that is not highlighted to this day that the victims of war are not just the solders and civilians of that period, but those conflicts actually do a burden that goes on for generations.
IMO, it cripples nation's morale in which I think happened to the British and some countries of Europe. It really is a syndrome which I don't think yet to this day has a name to it.
I'm really serious about it that young people of today simply cannot grasp the realities of how blessed they really are.
This is not a gripe on the youth of today, but a hope that they do understand to try to understand the world of yesterday, as it is up to them to take care of tomorrow's future.
Yes. Most were Rwal. A..H...s !!
But. not. Howard Hughes !!
First
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Hughes. suffered from. Bi-Polar Germohobia.. his. Mother. Contributed w. Panic of. Spanish Flu .!.!
The original Weinstein and Epstein..
Amphetamine
Harry Cohn, Roy Cohn, and Mickey Cohen?
Covid and tuberculosis killed Vivien Leigh?
Christ reigns forever, not studio executives!!!
I think you're off base about Howard Hughes! Actresses admitted that he wanted to date them but when it came to having sex with them he didn't, because he was insecure about his abilities in the bedroom.
🤫🤔 this is not true. The only female 🎬 actress in Hollywood at that time ,to turn down Howard Hughes when it came to the 🛌 bedroom, was Lassie, she had too much class......
You forgot Walt Disney.
He was born in Russia n did not like Western Europeans
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