Mascot Pictures Corporation was a minor film company of the 1920s and 1930s best known for producing film serials and
B-westernsThe Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
. Mascot's serial
The King of the KongoThe King of the Kongo is a 1929 Mascot film serial. It was the first serial to have sound, although only partial sound rather than the later "All-Talking" productions with complete sound. The soundtrack is now considered to be lost, although recently 7 original sound discs, 5 of them cracked,...
(
1929-Events:The days of the silent film are numbered. A mad scramble to provide synchronized sound is on.*January 20 - The movie In Old Arizona is released. The film is the first full-length talking film to be filmed outdoors....
) was the first serial to include
soundA sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before sound motion pictures were made commercially...
, beating
Universal StudiosUniversal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
by several months.
Mascot was formed in 1927 by
film producerA film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...
Nat LevineNat Levine , was an American film producer. He produced 105 films between 1921 and 1946. He was personal secretary to Marcus Loew, formed Mascot Pictures in 1927, and merged Mascot with Herbert Yates's Republic Pictures in 1935.He was born in New York, New York and died in Los Angeles,...
. In 1935 it merged with several other companies to form
Republic PicturesRepublic Pictures was an independent film production-distribution corporation with studio facilities, operating from 1934 through 1959, and was best known for specializing in westerns, movie serials and B films emphasizing mystery and action....
.
The company's logo featured a roaring
tigerThe tiger is the largest cat species, reaching a total body length of up to and weighing up to . Their most recognizable feature is a pattern of dark vertical stripes on reddish-orange fur with lighter underparts...
resting on top of a model of the planet
EarthEarth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
.
Mascot was created by
Nat LevineNat Levine , was an American film producer. He produced 105 films between 1921 and 1946. He was personal secretary to Marcus Loew, formed Mascot Pictures in 1927, and merged Mascot with Herbert Yates's Republic Pictures in 1935.He was born in New York, New York and died in Los Angeles,...
, a former personal secretary to
Marcus LoewMarcus Loew was an American business magnate and a pioneer of the motion picture industry who formed Loews Theatres and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer .-Biography:...
, in 1927 after the success of his independent serial
The Silent FlyerThe Silent Flyer is a 1926 adventure film serial directed by William James Craft. The film is considered to be lost.-Cast:* Silver Streak - Silver Streak, a dog* Malcolm McGregor - Lloyd Darrell * Louise Lorraine - Helen Corliss...
(
1926-Events:*August - Warner Brothers debuts the first Vitaphone film, Don Juan. The Vitaphone system used multiple 33⅓ rpm disc records developed by Bell Telephone Laboratories and Western Electric to play back audio synchronized with film....
).
In the beginning the company operated out of the upstairs offices of a contractor's business on Santa Monica Boulevard.
