Essanay Studios
Encyclopedia
The Essanay Film Manufacturing Company was an American motion picture
studio
. It is best known today for its series of Charlie Chaplin
comedies of 1915.
, United States
by George K. Spoor
and Gilbert M. Anderson
, originally as the Peerless Film Manufacturing Company. On August 10, 1907, the name was changed to Essanay ("S and A").
Essanay was originally located at 496 Wells Street (modern numbering: 1300 N. Wells). Essanay's first film, An Awful Skate, or The Hobo on Rollers (July 1907), with Ben Turpin
(then the studio janitor), produced for only a couple hundred dollars, grossed several thousand dollars in release. The studio prospered and in 1908 moved to its more famous address at 1333-45 W. Argyle St in Uptown, Chicago
.
s with such stars (and stars of the future) as George Periolat
, Ben Turpin
, Wallace Beery
, Thomas Meighan
, Francis X. Bushman
, Gloria Swanson
, Bebe Daniels
, Tom Mix
, Ann Little
, Helen Dunbar
, Harold Lloyd
, Lester Cuneo
, Eugene Pallette
, Florence Oberle
, Virginia Valli
, Edward Arnold
, and Rod La Rocque
. The mainstays of the organization, however, were studio co-owner G. M. Anderson, starring in the very popular "Broncho Billy" westerns, and Charlie Chaplin
. Allan Dwan
was hired by Essanay Studios as a screenwriter and developed into a famous Hollywood director. Louella Parsons
was also hired as a screenwriter and went on to be a Hollywood gossip columnist. Both George K. Spoor (in 1948) and Broncho Billy Anderson (in 1958) received Oscars, specifically Academy Honorary Award
s, for their pioneering efforts with Essanay.
's seasonal weather patterns and the popularity of westerns, Gilbert Anderson took part of the company to California, moving from Northern to Southern California and back on a regular basis. This included locations in San Rafael
and Santa Barbara
. They opened the Essanay-West studio in Niles, California, in 1913, at the foot of Niles Canyon
, where many Broncho Billy westerns were shot, along with The Tramp
featuring Charlie Chaplin
. Eventually the studio moved all operations to Los Angeles
.
The Chicago studio, as well as the new Niles studio, continued to produce films for another five years, reaching a total of well over 1,400 Essanay titles during its ten-year history. The Chicago studio produced many of Essanay's famous movies, including the very first American Sherlock Holmes (1916), the first American A Christmas Carol
(1908) and the first Jesse James movie, The James Boys of Missouri (1908). Essanay also produced some of the world's very first cartoons (Dreamy Dud was the most popular character).
's Keystone Studios
, offering Chaplin a higher salary and his own production unit. Chaplin made 14 short comedies for Essanay in 1915, at both the Chicago and Niles studios, plus a cameo appearance in one of the Broncho Billy westerns. Chaplin's Essanays are more disciplined than the chaotic roughhouse of Chaplin's Keystones, with better story values and character development. The landmark film of the Chaplin series is The Tramp (1915), in which Chaplin's vagabond character finds work on a farm and is smitten with the farmer's daughter. Chaplin injected moments of drama and pathos unheard of in slapstick comedies (the tramp is felled by a gunshot wound, and then disappointed in romance). The film ends with the famous shot of the lonely tramp with his back to the camera, walking down the road dejectedly, and then squaring his shoulders optimistically and heading for his next adventure. Audiences responded to the humanity of Chaplin's character, and Chaplin continued to explore serious or sentimental themes within comic situations.
Chaplin's stock company at Essanay included Ben Turpin
, who disliked working with the meticulous Chaplin and only appeared with him in a couple of films; ingenue Edna Purviance
, who became his off-screen sweetheart as well; Leo White
, almost always playing a fussy continental villain; and all-purpose authority figures Bud Jamison
and John Rand
.
Chaplin disliked Essanay, and left after only one year for more money and more creative control elsewhere. His departure caused a rift between founders Spoor and Anderson. Chaplin was the studio's biggest moneymaker, and Essanay resorted to creating "new" Chaplin comedies from file footage and out-takes. Finally, with Chaplin off the Essanay scene for good, Essanay signed French comedian Max Linder
, whose clever pantomime was often compared to Chaplin's. Linder failed to match Chaplin's popularity in America. In a last-ditch effort to save the studio, Essanay joined in a four-way merger orchestrated by Chicago distributor George Kleine in 1918. Kleine's new combine, V-L-S-E, was an amalgam of the Vitagraph, Lubin
, Selig, and Essanay companies. Only the Vitagraph brand name continued into the 1920s, and was absorbed by Warner Brothers in 1925.
system in 1923, and Spoor-Berggren Natural Vision, a 65 mm widescreen
format, in 1930. He died in Chicago in 1953. G. M. Anderson became an independent producer, sponsoring Stan Laurel
in a series of silent comedies. Anderson died in Los Angeles in 1971.
The Essanay building in Chicago was later taken over by independent producer Norman Wilding, who made industrial films. Wilding's tenancy was actually much longer than Essanay's. In the early 70s a portion of the studio was offered to Columbia College (Chicago) for a dollar but the offer lapsed without action. Then it was given to a non-profit television corporation which sold it. One tenant was the midwest office of Technicolor. Today the Essanay lot is the home of St. Augustine's College
, and its main meeting hall has been named the Charlie Chaplin Auditorium.
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
studio
Movie studio
A movie studio is a term used to describe a major entertainment company or production company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to film movies...
. It is best known today for its series of Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE was an English comic actor, film director and composer best known for his work during the silent film era. He became the most famous film star in the world before the end of World War I...
comedies of 1915.
Founding
The studio was founded in 1907 in ChicagoChicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
by George K. Spoor
George K. Spoor
George Kirke Spoor was an early film pioneer who, with Broncho Billy Anderson, founded Essanay Studios in Chicago in 1907.-Biography:...
and Gilbert M. Anderson
Broncho Billy Anderson
Gilbert M. "Broncho Billy" Anderson was an American actor, writer, film director, and film producer, who is best known as the first star of the Western film genre.-Early life:...
, originally as the Peerless Film Manufacturing Company. On August 10, 1907, the name was changed to Essanay ("S and A").
Essanay was originally located at 496 Wells Street (modern numbering: 1300 N. Wells). Essanay's first film, An Awful Skate, or The Hobo on Rollers (July 1907), with Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin was a cross-eyed American comedian and actor, best remembered for his work in silent films.-Personal life:...
(then the studio janitor), produced for only a couple hundred dollars, grossed several thousand dollars in release. The studio prospered and in 1908 moved to its more famous address at 1333-45 W. Argyle St in Uptown, Chicago
Uptown, Chicago
Uptown is one of Chicago’s 77 community areas. Uptown has well defined boundaries. They are: Foster on the north; Lake Michigan on the east; Montrose , and Irving Park on the south; Ravenswood , and Clark on the west. Uptown borders three community areas and Lake Michigan...
.
Leading players
Essanay produced silent filmSilent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...
s with such stars (and stars of the future) as George Periolat
George Periolat
George Periolat was an American actor.Born in Chicago, Illinois, George Periolat began his career as a Broadway actor. Making his film debut with the Essanay Studios in Chicago, he moved to Hollywood in 1911 and starred in over 170 films throughout his career...
, Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin was a cross-eyed American comedian and actor, best remembered for his work in silent films.-Personal life:...
, Wallace Beery
Wallace Beery
Wallace Fitzgerald Beery was an American actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Bill in Min and Bill opposite Marie Dressler, as Long John Silver in Treasure Island, as Pancho Villa in Viva Villa!, and his titular role in The Champ, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor...
, Thomas Meighan
Thomas Meighan
Thomas Meighan was an American actor of silent films and early talkies. He played several leading man roles opposite popular actresses of the day including Mary Pickford and Gloria Swanson. At one point he commanded $10,000 a week....
, Francis X. Bushman
Francis X. Bushman
Francis Xavier Bushman was an American actor, film director, and screenwriter. His matinee idol career started in 1911 in the silent film His Friend's Wife, but it did not survive the silent screen era....
, Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson was an American actress, singer and producer. She was one of the most prominent stars during the silent film era as both an actress and a fashion icon, especially under the direction of Cecil B. DeMille, made dozens of silents and was nominated for the first Academy Award in the...
, Bebe Daniels
Bebe Daniels
Bebe Daniels was an American actress, singer, dancer, writer and producer. She began her career in Hollywood during the silent movie era as a child actress, became a star in musicals like 42nd Street, and later gained further fame on radio and television in Britain...
, Tom Mix
Tom Mix
Thomas Edwin "Tom" Mix was an American film actor and the star of many early Western movies. He made a reported 336 films between 1910 and 1935, all but nine of which were silent features...
, Ann Little
Ann Little
Ann Little was an American film actress whose career was most prolific during the silent film era of the early 1910s through the early 1920s.-Life and career:...
, Helen Dunbar
Helen Dunbar
Helen Dunbar was an American theatrical performer and silent film actress.-Career:Born Katheryn Burke Lackey in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, she first appeared with the Weber & Fields Stock Company, when it began its career on the New York stage...
, Harold Lloyd
Harold Lloyd
Harold Clayton Lloyd, Sr. was an American film actor and producer, most famous for his silent comedies....
, Lester Cuneo
Lester Cuneo
Lester H. Cuneo was an American stage and silent film actor. Born in Chicago, Illinois, he began acting in live theatre while still in his teens.-Career:...
, Eugene Pallette
Eugene Pallette
Eugene William Pallette was an American actor. He appeared in over 240 silent era and sound era motion pictures between 1913 and 1946....
, Florence Oberle
Florence Oberle
Florence Oberle was a stage andmotion picture actress from Tarrytown, New York.Oberle appeared on the New York City stage in Morosco Theatre and David Belasco productions until 1915...
, Virginia Valli
Virginia Valli
Virginia Valli was an American stage and film actress whose motion picture career started in the silent film era and lasted until the beginning of the sound film era of the 1930s....
, Edward Arnold
Edward Arnold (actor)
Edward Arnold was an American actor. He was born on the Lower East Side of New York City as Gunther Edward Arnold Schneider, the son of German immigrants Carl Schneider and Elizabeth Ohse.-Acting career:...
, and Rod La Rocque
Rod La Rocque
-Biography:He was born Roderick La Rocque in Chicago, Illinois. He began appearing in stock theater at the age of seven and eventually ended up at the Essanay Studios in Chicago where he found steady work until the studios closed. He then moved to New York City and worked on the stage until he was...
. The mainstays of the organization, however, were studio co-owner G. M. Anderson, starring in the very popular "Broncho Billy" westerns, and Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE was an English comic actor, film director and composer best known for his work during the silent film era. He became the most famous film star in the world before the end of World War I...
. Allan Dwan
Allan Dwan
Allan Dwan was a pioneering Canadian-born American motion picture director, producer and screenwriter.-Early life:...
was hired by Essanay Studios as a screenwriter and developed into a famous Hollywood director. Louella Parsons
Louella Parsons
Louella Parsons was the first American news-writer movie columnist in the United States. She was a gossip columnist who, for many years, was an influential arbiter of Hollywood mores, often feared and hated by the individuals, mostly actors, whose careers she could negatively impact via her...
was also hired as a screenwriter and went on to be a Hollywood gossip columnist. Both George K. Spoor (in 1948) and Broncho Billy Anderson (in 1958) received Oscars, specifically Academy Honorary Award
Academy Honorary Award
The Academy Honorary Award, instituted in 1948 for the 21st Academy Awards , is given by the discretion of the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to celebrate motion picture achievements that are not covered by existing Academy Awards, although prior winners of...
s, for their pioneering efforts with Essanay.
Westward expansion
Due to ChicagoChicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
's seasonal weather patterns and the popularity of westerns, Gilbert Anderson took part of the company to California, moving from Northern to Southern California and back on a regular basis. This included locations in San Rafael
San Rafael, California
San Rafael is a city and the county seat of Marin County, California, United States. The city is located in the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area...
and Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, California
Santa Barbara is the county seat of Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Situated on an east-west trending section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States, the city lies between the steeply-rising Santa Ynez Mountains and the Pacific Ocean...
. They opened the Essanay-West studio in Niles, California, in 1913, at the foot of Niles Canyon
Niles Canyon
Niles Canyon is a canyon in the San Francisco Bay Area formed by Alameda Creek. The canyon is largely in an unincorporated area of Alameda County, while the western portion of the canyon lies within the city limits of Fremont and Union City...
, where many Broncho Billy westerns were shot, along with The Tramp
The Tramp (film)
The Tramp is Charlie Chaplin's sixth film for Essanay Studios in 1915. Directed by Chaplin, it was the fifth and last film made at Essanay's Niles, California studio. The Tramp marked the beginning of The Tramp character most known today, even though Chaplin played the character in earlier films...
featuring Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin
Sir Charles Spencer "Charlie" Chaplin, KBE was an English comic actor, film director and composer best known for his work during the silent film era. He became the most famous film star in the world before the end of World War I...
. Eventually the studio moved all operations to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
.
The Chicago studio, as well as the new Niles studio, continued to produce films for another five years, reaching a total of well over 1,400 Essanay titles during its ten-year history. The Chicago studio produced many of Essanay's famous movies, including the very first American Sherlock Holmes (1916), the first American A Christmas Carol
A Christmas Carol (1908 film)
A Christmas Carol, is a 1908 silent film produced by Essanay Studios in Chicago, and is one of the earliest film adaptations of Charles Dickens' famous 1843 novella. It starred Tom Ricketts as Ebenezer Scrooge....
(1908) and the first Jesse James movie, The James Boys of Missouri (1908). Essanay also produced some of the world's very first cartoons (Dreamy Dud was the most popular character).
Chaplin
In late 1914 Essanay succeeded in hiring Charlie Chaplin away from Mack SennettMack Sennett
Mack Sennett was a Canadian-born American director and was known as the innovator of slapstick comedy in film. During his lifetime he was known at times as the "King of Comedy"...
's Keystone Studios
Keystone Studios
Keystone Studios was an early movie studio founded in Edendale, California in 1912 as the Keystone Pictures Studio by Mack Sennett with backing from Adam Kessel and Charles O. Bauman, owners of the New York Motion Picture Company...
, offering Chaplin a higher salary and his own production unit. Chaplin made 14 short comedies for Essanay in 1915, at both the Chicago and Niles studios, plus a cameo appearance in one of the Broncho Billy westerns. Chaplin's Essanays are more disciplined than the chaotic roughhouse of Chaplin's Keystones, with better story values and character development. The landmark film of the Chaplin series is The Tramp (1915), in which Chaplin's vagabond character finds work on a farm and is smitten with the farmer's daughter. Chaplin injected moments of drama and pathos unheard of in slapstick comedies (the tramp is felled by a gunshot wound, and then disappointed in romance). The film ends with the famous shot of the lonely tramp with his back to the camera, walking down the road dejectedly, and then squaring his shoulders optimistically and heading for his next adventure. Audiences responded to the humanity of Chaplin's character, and Chaplin continued to explore serious or sentimental themes within comic situations.
Chaplin's stock company at Essanay included Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin was a cross-eyed American comedian and actor, best remembered for his work in silent films.-Personal life:...
, who disliked working with the meticulous Chaplin and only appeared with him in a couple of films; ingenue Edna Purviance
Edna Purviance
Edna Purviance was an American actress during the silent movie era. She was the leading lady in many Charlie Chaplin movies. In a span of eight years, she appeared in over thirty films with Chaplin.-Early life:...
, who became his off-screen sweetheart as well; Leo White
Leo White
Leo White was a stage performer and appeared as a character actor in many Charlie Chaplin films. He started his film career in 1911 and in 1913 moved to the Essanay Studios. In 1915, he began appearing in Chaplin's comedies and continued through Chaplin's Mutual Film comedies...
, almost always playing a fussy continental villain; and all-purpose authority figures Bud Jamison
Bud Jamison
Bud Jamison was an American film actor. He appeared in 450 films between 1915 and 1944.-Career:...
and John Rand
John Rand (actor)
John Rand was an American actor who started his film career in the 1910s, and most notably supported Charles Chaplin in over 20 of his subjects.-Selected filmography:*The Pawnshop *Easy Street *Pay Day...
.
Chaplin disliked Essanay, and left after only one year for more money and more creative control elsewhere. His departure caused a rift between founders Spoor and Anderson. Chaplin was the studio's biggest moneymaker, and Essanay resorted to creating "new" Chaplin comedies from file footage and out-takes. Finally, with Chaplin off the Essanay scene for good, Essanay signed French comedian Max Linder
Max Linder
Max Linder was an influential French pioneer of silent film.-Birth and early career:Born Gabriel-Maximilien Leuvielle in Saint-Loubès, Gironde, France to a Catholic wine-growing family, he grew up with a passion for the theatre and as a young man joined a theatre troupe touring the country...
, whose clever pantomime was often compared to Chaplin's. Linder failed to match Chaplin's popularity in America. In a last-ditch effort to save the studio, Essanay joined in a four-way merger orchestrated by Chicago distributor George Kleine in 1918. Kleine's new combine, V-L-S-E, was an amalgam of the Vitagraph, Lubin
Lubin Studios
The Lubin Manufacturing Company, was an American motion picture production company that produced silent films from 1902 to 1916. Lubin films were distributed with a Liberty Bell trademark.-History:...
, Selig, and Essanay companies. Only the Vitagraph brand name continued into the 1920s, and was absorbed by Warner Brothers in 1925.
Final years
George K. Spoor continued to work in the motion picture industry, introducing an unsuccessful 3-D3-D film
A 3-D film or S3D film is a motion picture that enhances the illusion of depth perception...
system in 1923, and Spoor-Berggren Natural Vision, a 65 mm widescreen
Widescreen
Widescreen images are a variety of aspect ratios used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than the standard 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio provided by 35mm film....
format, in 1930. He died in Chicago in 1953. G. M. Anderson became an independent producer, sponsoring Stan Laurel
Stan Laurel
Arthur Stanley "Stan" Jefferson , better known as Stan Laurel, was an English comic actor, writer and film director, famous as the first half of the comedy team Laurel and Hardy. His film acting career stretched between 1917 and 1951 and included a starring role in the Academy Award winning film...
in a series of silent comedies. Anderson died in Los Angeles in 1971.
The Essanay building in Chicago was later taken over by independent producer Norman Wilding, who made industrial films. Wilding's tenancy was actually much longer than Essanay's. In the early 70s a portion of the studio was offered to Columbia College (Chicago) for a dollar but the offer lapsed without action. Then it was given to a non-profit television corporation which sold it. One tenant was the midwest office of Technicolor. Today the Essanay lot is the home of St. Augustine's College
St. Augustine College (Chicago)
St. Augustine College is the first bilingual institution of higher education in Illinois. In was founded on 7 October 1980, under the auspices of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago. The founding of a college was the culmination of ten years of work by Spanish Episcopal Services and Father Carlos A....
, and its main meeting hall has been named the Charlie Chaplin Auditorium.
See also
:Category:Essanay Studios films- Niles Essanay Silent Film MuseumNiles Essanay Silent Film MuseumThe Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum is a film museum located in Niles, California on the former site of the Niles Essanay Studios where Broncho Billy and Charlie Chaplin made films in the 1910s. It is dedicated to preserving and showing silent films and their history...
- Chicago film industryChicago film industryThe Chicago film industry is a central hub for motion picture production and exhibition that was established before Hollywood became the undisputed capital of film making. In the early 1900s, Chicago boasted the greatest number of production companies and filmmakers. Essanay Studios founded by...
Further reading
- David Kiehn, Broncho Billy and the Essanay Film Company, Farwell Books, 2003. ISBN 978-0972922654.
External links
- Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum Fremont, CA
- Story of Essanay Studios in Niles
- History TV - An Animated History With Detailed History of Essanay Studios, and Extensive Filmography
- "Reel Chicago," Robert Loerzel, Chicago Magazine, May 2007.