All Topics  
Keystone Studios

 
Keystone Studios

 
   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link
 

 

Keystone Studios
 
 
  Topics Keystone Studios Topic Home

Keystone Studios was an early movie studio
Movie studio

A movie studio is, in the established sense of the term, a film distributor. Literally, however, the term denotes a controlled environment for the making of a film....
 founded in Edendale, California
Edendale, Los Angeles, California

Edendale is a historical name for a district in Los Angeles, California, northwest of downtown, in what is known today as Echo Park, Los Angeles, California and the eastern edge of Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California....
 in 1912 as the Keystone Pictures Studio by Mack Sennett
Mack Sennett

Mack Sennett was a Canadian -born Academy Award-winning 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."...
 with backing from Adam Kessel and Charles O. Bauman, owners of the New York Motion Picture Company. The company filmed in and around Glendale and Silver Lake
Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California

Silver Lake is a district east of Hollywood, Los Angeles, California in the city of Los Angeles, California. Silver Lake is inhabited by a wide variety of ethnicities and socioeconomic groups, but it is best known as an eclectic gathering of hipster , the creative class and a noticeable presence of LGBT people....
 for several years, and was owned by the Mutual Film Corporation between 1912 and 1915.

The studio is perhaps best remembered for the era under Mack Sennett when he created the slapstick
Slapstick

Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated extreme physical violence or activities which exceed the boundaries of common sense, such as a character being hit in the face with a heavy frying pan or running into a brick wall....
 antics of the Keystone Cops and for the "Sennett Bathing Beauties." Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin

Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin, Jr. Order of the British Empire , better known as Charlie Chaplin, was an Academy Award-winning England comedy film actor and filmmaker....
 got his start at Keystone when Sennett hired him fresh from his vaudeville
Vaudeville

Vaudeville was a genre of a variety show prevalent on the theatre in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. It developed from many sources, including the concert saloon, minstrel show, freak shows, dime museums, and literary burlesque....
 career to make silent film
Silent film

A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially spoken dialogue. The idea of combining motion pictures with recorded sound is nearly as old as film itself, but because of the technical challenges involved, synchronized dialogue was only made possible in the late 1920s with the introduction of the Vitaphone system....
s.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Keystone Studios'
Start a new discussion about 'Keystone Studios'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


Keystone Studios was an early movie studio
Movie studio

A movie studio is, in the established sense of the term, a film distributor. Literally, however, the term denotes a controlled environment for the making of a film....
 founded in Edendale, California
Edendale, Los Angeles, California

Edendale is a historical name for a district in Los Angeles, California, northwest of downtown, in what is known today as Echo Park, Los Angeles, California and the eastern edge of Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California....
 in 1912 as the Keystone Pictures Studio by Mack Sennett
Mack Sennett

Mack Sennett was a Canadian -born Academy Award-winning 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."...
 with backing from Adam Kessel and Charles O. Bauman, owners of the New York Motion Picture Company. The company filmed in and around Glendale and Silver Lake
Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California

Silver Lake is a district east of Hollywood, Los Angeles, California in the city of Los Angeles, California. Silver Lake is inhabited by a wide variety of ethnicities and socioeconomic groups, but it is best known as an eclectic gathering of hipster , the creative class and a noticeable presence of LGBT people....
 for several years, and was owned by the Mutual Film Corporation between 1912 and 1915.

The studio is perhaps best remembered for the era under Mack Sennett when he created the slapstick
Slapstick

Slapstick is a type of comedy involving exaggerated extreme physical violence or activities which exceed the boundaries of common sense, such as a character being hit in the face with a heavy frying pan or running into a brick wall....
 antics of the Keystone Cops and for the "Sennett Bathing Beauties." Charlie Chaplin
Charlie Chaplin

Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin, Jr. Order of the British Empire , better known as Charlie Chaplin, was an Academy Award-winning England comedy film actor and filmmaker....
 got his start at Keystone when Sennett hired him fresh from his vaudeville
Vaudeville

Vaudeville was a genre of a variety show prevalent on the theatre in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. It developed from many sources, including the concert saloon, minstrel show, freak shows, dime museums, and literary burlesque....
 career to make silent film
Silent film

A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially spoken dialogue. The idea of combining motion pictures with recorded sound is nearly as old as film itself, but because of the technical challenges involved, synchronized dialogue was only made possible in the late 1920s with the introduction of the Vitaphone system....
s. Charlie Chaplin at Keystone Studios is a 1993 compilation of some of the most notable films Chaplin made at Keystone, documenting his transition from vaudeville
Vaudeville

Vaudeville was a genre of a variety show prevalent on the theatre in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. It developed from many sources, including the concert saloon, minstrel show, freak shows, dime museums, and literary burlesque....
 player to true comic film actor to director. In 1915 Keystone Studios became an autonomous production unit of the Triangle Film Corporation
Triangle Film Corporation

'Triangle Film Corporation' was a major United States motion-picture studio, founded in the summer of 1915 in Culver City, California, and envisioned as a prestige studio based on the producing abilities of filmmakers D....
 with D. W. Griffith
D. W. Griffith

David Llewelyn Wark "D. W." Griffith was a premier pioneering Academy Award-winning American film director. He is best known as the director of the groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance ....
 and Thomas Ince. In 1917 Sennett gave up the Keystone trademark and organized his own company.
Macksennetbathingbeauties
Many other important actors also began their careers at Keystone, including Harold Lloyd
Harold Lloyd

Harold Clayton Lloyd, Sr. was an United States film actor and film producer, most famous for his silent film comedies.Harold Lloyd ranks alongside Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton as one of the most popular and influential film comedians of the silent film era....
, Gloria Swanson
Gloria Swanson

Gloria Swanson was an Academy Award-nominated, Golden Globe-winning United States actress. She was prolific during the silent film era as both an actress and a fashion icon, especially under the direction of Cecil B....
, Louise Fazenda
Louise Fazenda

Louise Fazenda was an United States film actor, appearing chiefly in silent film comedy films....
, Raymond Griffith
Raymond Griffith

Raymond Griffith was one of the great silent movie comedians.Griffith was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He lost his voice at an early age, causing him to speak for the rest of his life in a hoarse whisper....
, Ford Sterling
Ford Sterling

Ford Sterling was an United states comedian and actor best known for his work with Keystone Studios. One of the 'Big 4' he was the original chief of the Keystone Cops....
, Fatty Arbuckle
Fatty Arbuckle

Roscoe Conkling "Fatty" Arbuckle was an United States silent film comedian, director, and screenwriter. Starting at Paramount he eventually moved to Keystone Studios where he worked with Mabel Normand, Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, and Harold Lloyd....
, Marie Dressler
Marie Dressler

Marie Dressler was an Academy Awards-winning Canada actress....
, Mabel Normand
Mabel Normand

Mabel Normand was an United States silent film comedienne and actress. She was extremely popular during the 1910s, becoming one of the Big Four at Keystone Studios, which was founded by Mack Sennett with whom she shared a turbulent romantic relationship....
, Ben Turpin
Ben Turpin

Ben Turpin was a cross-eyed comedian, best remembered for his work in silent films....
, Harry Langdon
Harry Langdon

Harry L. Langdon was an United States comedian who appeared in vaudeville, silent films , and talkies....
 and Chester Conklin
Chester Conklin

Chester Cooper Conklin was an United States comedian and actor. He appeared in over 280 films, about half of them in the silent film era....
.

Sennett, by then a celebrity, departed the studio in 1917 to produce his own independent films (eventually distributed through Paramount
Paramount Pictures

Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American motion picture production company and distribution company, located on Melrose Avenue in Hollywood, California....
). The business of Keystone Studios decreased after his departure, and was finally dissolved after bankruptcy in 1935.

Much of the lighting & studio equipment from Keystone was bought by Reymond King - who started the "Award Cinema Equipment" company in Venice, California in November, 1935.

The name "Keystone Studios" was used later as a production label for Cineville and was named as the fictional studio in the Cineville production "Swimming With Sharks" starring Kevin Spacey. A new legal corporate entity named Keystone Studios began again during 2005. The two owners are Carl Colpaert and Lee Caplin. Keystone obtained its new trademark in 2006.

In July 2007 Independent film company Cineville and DVD distributor Westlake Entertainment are merging into an indie studio called Keystone. Joining the team are Westlake Entertainment principals Larry Cohen and Luke Stefanko .

Enternal links