Mayer, the ground zero of this kind of abuse, had means, motive, opportunity and that. Mayer handled the business of running the studio, such as setting budgets and approving new productions, while Thalberg, still in his twenties, supervised all MGM productions. [35] Mayer issued statements to the press, calling Thalberg "the finest friend a man could ever have the guiding inspiration behind the artistic progress on the screen." The younger, Irene (19071990), was the first wife of producer David O. Selznick and became a successful theatrical producer. Louis B. Mayer (born Lazar Mier) was a Russian-Jewish immigrant who eventually became well known for founding the Metro Goldwyn Mayer film company. . [5] The fallout of his alleged abuse is claimed to have affected other people's professional careers as well: Mayer reportedly was in love with Jean Howard and pursued her energetically but without success. Jesus Christ, yes! As he explained to his daughter, "when. Legend has it that the first screening of Gone with the Wind took place in that projection room. Louis B. Mayer, born Eliezer Mayer, studio executive (born at Minsk, Russia ca 1885; died at Los Angeles, Ca 29 Oct 1957). "[97] And although he never spoke Yiddish at the office, he sometimes spoke Yiddish with "some of the relatives", said his daughter Irene. "I worship good women, honorable men, and saintly mothers", he told her. [48] In addition, MGM maintained a police force of fifty officerslarger than that of Culver City itself. [14], According to his personal details in the U.S. immigration documents,[15][16] the date was July 4, 1885. They were not found in her stomach. In 1947, 15-year-old Elizabeth Taylor told off her boss, MGM head honcho Louis B. Mayer, arguably the most powerful man in Hollywood, for being mean to her mother. He became enamored of the entertainment business. [37], After Thalberg died, many in Hollywood expected Mayer to "stumble and fall". Named after the founder of Metro Goldwyn Mayer film company, the Mayer Theatre was dedicated by actress Helen Hayes in 1975. Louis B. Mayer. Under Mayer's management, MGM became the film industry's most prestigious movie studio, accumulating the largest concentration of leading . This story first appeared in the Feb. 26 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. The Louis B. Mayer Research Laboratories building at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston opened in 1988. For nine years from 1937, when he earned $1,300,000equivalent to $24,504,398 today,[42]Mayer was the highest-paid man in the United States.[43]. Louis B. Mayer was born Lazar Meir in Dymer, a town in the Ukraine some 25 miles north of Kiev, on July 12, 1884. They don't like to be challenged or instructed, but comforted and entertained. By the time he recovered, the stock market crash had wiped out his fortune, destroying any chance of the deal going through even if the Justice Department had lifted its objections. When I send my pictures abroad, I want them to show America in the right lightand not that we are a nation chiefly of drunks, gangsters and prostitutes. I am not going to make pictures for the sake of awards or for the critics. He believed in wholesome entertainment and went to great lengths to discover new actors and develop them into major stars. [53] With executives, Mayer took more time before taking them, wanting to know them first on a personal level. "[65] When he hired writers, he made those objectives clear at the outset, once telling screenwriter Frances Marion that he never wanted his own daughters or his wife to be embarrassed when watching an MGM movie. He would prod you and question you and suck you dry of any knowledge."[57]. Two years later, Mayer moved to Los Angeles and formed his own production company, Louis B. Mayer Pictures Corporation. In addition the cost must be considered. [47][48] About 2,700 people ate in the commissary every day. Louis B. Mayer, film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, was born in the 1880s in czarist Russia but grew up in Saint John. A Holmby Hills home that hosted countless star-studded soirees during Hollywood's Golden Age is now on the market for $79 million. Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day. Placed in his proper perspective, he was probably the greatest single force in the development of the motion picture industry who brought it to the heights of prosperity and influence it finally attained. Nonetheless, Schenck believed Mayer had cost him a fortune and never forgave him, causing an already frigid relationship to become even worse. L.B. "Imagine making Louis B. Mayer cry," Porter later told friends.[60]. In 1907 he opened his first small nickelodeon in Haverhill, Massachusetts . Joseph M. Schenck was an alternate delegate at the convention. The jist of it is that Marilyn was receiving medication from two doctors at the same time, and they unfortunately didnt manage to coordinate it, which of course proved fatal for Marilyn. Mayer was pressured to tighten expenses by the studio's parent company, although Mayer's reputation as a "big-picture man" would make that difficult. There's also a . When she said, 'No way', and went off and married Charles K. Feldman, the agent, Mayer banned Charlie from the lot. At age 12, he dropped out of school to help in his father's scrap metal business. In 1914, the partners organized their own film distribution agency in Boston. By 1926, Louis B. Mayer was the West Coast chief at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and beginning to appreciate that Los Angeles was his city. [46] Mayer took Hearst's suggestion to build himself an office bungalow on the MGM lot, something Hearst said was appropriate for a studio head: "Everybody of distinction from all over the world comes to Los Angeles and everybody who comes wants to see your studio and they all want to meet you and do meet you, so put on a few airs son, and provide the atmosphere. After dinner, invitees adjourned to the aqua-blue living room for a performance by fellow guests (think Judy Garland duetting with Bing Crosby) or a movie screening. His parents were Jacob Meir and Sarah Meltzer (both Jewish) and he had two sisters Yetta, born in c. 1878 and Ida, born in c. 1883. Nicholas Schenck called Mayer and insisted that he "cut, cut", recalls director George Sidney. During the summer of 1929, Fox was severely injured in an auto accident. "It was a crappy childhood", said Mayer's nephew Gerald. Examining the possibility of the wide screen, Mayer said that it eliminates the intimacy allowed by the standard-sized screen. Edie always sat in the same corner of a sofa, and with the press of a button, the drapes would close, the lights would dim, a custom-composed fanfare would play from hidden speakers, a 20-foot-wide screen would be lowered from the ceiling and a panel on the opposite wall (on which a Monet and a Renoir were secured) would rise upward to reveal projection booth windows. He employed MGM art director Cedric Gibbons to design the Mediterranean-style dwelling and utilized studio electricians, artisans and carpenters to construct it. According to, According to Eyman the year is 1889, but according to the, Home of Peace Cemetery (East Los Angeles), Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows, "Louis B. Mayer | The Canadian Encyclopedia", "Mayer, Louis B. In the book Sweethearts, we learn that Jeanette first backed out of divorcing her husband, Gene Raymond, after serious threats were made against Nelson Eddy by the infamous Louie B . Although Mayer was often disliked and even feared by many in the studio, editor Sam Marx explains that "his reputation is far worse than it should be. New owners started building a 35,000-square-foot mansion, but they sold the property before it was finished. [citation needed], Mayer wanted the studio to nurture child stars for MGM's family-oriented productions. Mayer paid D.W. Griffith $25,000 for the exclusive rights to show The Birth of a Nation (1915) in New England. Mayer's father gave different dates for his birthplace at different times, so Mayer was not comfortable specifying a date; It was part of Mayer's sense of showmanship and being born on July 4 seemed to stand for patriotism and had a certain ring to it; "He needed to believe in a myth of self-creation which, in his case, was not far off the mark"; When Mayer was young, his family constantly moved around in the general area of Minsk. Mayer was moved to tears by the song, and told Eddy to sing it. You can read the whole history of Hollywood just from my book of menus, she once said. Louis B. Mayer: King of Hollywood (1999) is a documentary film directed by F. Whitman Trecartin that takes a look at life of filmmaker Louis B. Mayer, who as head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) studios, came to rule over movie stars.The film takes a look at the personal price that Mayer paid for that success. "[55], When meeting a new employee, he always told them to come to him personally for help with any problems. All the studios observed five minutes of silence, while MGM closed its studio for the entire day. "[101], Active in Republican Party politics, Mayer served as the vice chairman of the California Republican Party in 1931 and 1932, and as its state chairman in 1932 and 1933. [103] As a delegate to the 1928 Republican National Convention in Kansas City, Mayer supported Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover of California. "All right", he said. "[84], Defying those pleadings, MGM produced Mrs. Miniver, a simple story about a family in rural England trying to get by during the early years of the war. He filled the cast with MGM stars including Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, Van Johnson, Adolphe Menjou and Angela Lansbury, but the film only broke even. Discover Louis B. Mayer's Biography, Age, Height, Physical Stats, Dating/Affairs, Family and career updates. There was one man who used to show up with a Free Marilyn sign at the back fence. "Mr. Mayer was to me like a father", said Ricardo Montalbn. The home was completed in an astonishing six weeks time, by April 18, 1926, with builders literally working around the clock to finish. She liked Bobby but privately she called him punyand indeed he was in several respects, if you get my drift, despite the 13 kids. Film summary. An immigrant unskilled in any trade, he struggled to earn a living. It was considered one of the finest racing stables in the United States and raised the standards of the California racing business. But even as she was becoming a recognizable face, MGM's famously mercurial boss, Louis B. Mayer, didn't feel the need to reward her with a raise in salary. Used to getting his way, Mayer was much too impatient to deal with troublesome architects. Irene (who became a Broadway producer after divorcing David and had a decadeslong feud with her sister) once wrote: Entertaining became her career., Recalls Tina Sinatra, who was her fathers date at the Goetzes dinner parties in the 1960s, It was what Hollywood used to be, they personified that. Frank Sinatra and the Goetzes were close friends: Edie and Bill often flew on Sinatras private jet to his Las Vegas concerts. The meal included fried chicken, suckling pig, roast beef, spaghetti and meatballs and sauerkraut and frankfurters. On November 28, 1907 in Haverhill, Massachusetts . [12][13] In addition, Andrzej Krakowski suggested that the birthplace has been misinterpreted and Mayer was in fact from the town of Misk Mazowiecki in eastern Poland, which at the time was subjugated by the Russian Empire. [51] He also signed up dancing team Marge and Gower Champion and discovered Mario Lanza, then a young tenor from Philadelphia, who Mayer hoped to turn into a "singing Clark Gable". [93] Many assumed that his leaving meant the end of an era. Mayer has been portrayed numerous times in film and television including: William Saroyan wrote a short story about L. B. Mayer in his 1971 book, Letters from 74 rue Taitbout or Don't Go But If You Must Say Hello To Everybody. [65][78], Mayer knew that formula in his themes and stories usually works. Louis B. Mayer, a staunch Republican, did not read the script prior to production and was dismayed when he became aware of its content, as he believed it was an indictment of Hoover and an endorsement of recently elected Franklin D. Roosevelt. Mayer made himself head of production as well as studio chief. Located in Holmby Hills, his new spread measures a roomy 20,000 square feet and has 11 bedrooms. We hired geniuses at make-up, hair dressing, surgeons to slice away a bulge here and there, rubbers to rub away the blubber, clothes designers, lighting experts, coaches for everythingfencing, dancing, walking, talking, sitting and spitting. In an unpublished memoir, the famous actress described being molested by Louis B. Mayer and threatened by other men part of Hollywood's ugly history of harassment. [31]:46, Although their personalities were in many ways opposite, Mayer being more outspoken and nearly twice the younger man's age, Thalberg was hired as vice president in charge of production at Louis B. Mayer Productions. According to E.J., Warren Beatty also owned the property at one point in time and it was once rented by Led Zeppelin, as well. After one such episode, Mickey Rooney replied, "I won't do it. I would love to see pictures of the interior when the Mayers, and Lawfords owned it, but none seem to be available sadly. [70], After the studio fired her, she attempted suicide. 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