Chesterfield Motion Picture Corporation, generally shortened to Chesterfield Pictures, was an American

film production Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion picture is produced. Filmmaking involves a number of complex and discrete stages, starting with an initial story, idea, or commission. It then continues through screenwriting, casti ...

company of the 1920s and 1930s. The company head was George R. Batcheller, and the company worked in tandem with its sister studio,

Invincible Invincible may refer to: Film and television * ''Invincible'' (2001 drama film), a drama by Werner Herzog about Jewish cabaret during the rise of Nazism * ''Invincible'' (2001 TV film), a fantasy / martial arts TV movie starring Billy Zane ...

, which was led by

Maury Cohen Maury Cohen (ca. 1913 - March 15, 1979), also known as Maury M. Cohen, was an American film producer most active during the 1930s. He owned one of the Poverty Row studios, Invincible films, which specialized in making low-budget feature films. Af ...

. The production company never owned its own studio and rented space at other studios, primarily

Universal Pictures Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Ameri ...

and

RKO RKO Radio Pictures Inc., commonly known as RKO Pictures or simply RKO, was an American film production and distribution company, one of the "Big Five" film studios of Hollywood's Golden Age. The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheu ...

. Batcheller's target market was neighborhood theaters that weren't part of the big studios' theater chains. These smaller houses usually showed second- or third-run movies, and couldn't afford to show the newest, expensive feature films. Batcheller serviced these smaller theaters with smaller movies: low-budget productions that cost theater owners much less than big-studio attractions, and could play first-run. This was an ambitious policy in the days before double features and "B" pictures, when individual movies were featured as the main attraction in movie theaters. Given Chesterfield's budget constraints, Batcheller could not afford to pay the high salaries commanded by major-studio performers, and relied on less expensive "name" talent (former stars of the silent screen, or currently established featured players). He also relied on a small staff of busy directors:

Frank R. Strayer Frank Raymond Strayer (September 21, 1891 – February 3, 1964) was an actor, film writer, director and producer. He was active from the mid-1920s until the early 1950s. He directed a series of 14 '' Blondie!'' (1938) movies as well. Biography ...

Richard Thorpe Richard Thorpe (born Rollo Smolt Thorpe; February 24, 1896 – May 1, 1991) was an American film director best known for his long career at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Biography Born Rollo Smolt Thorpe in Hutchinson, Kansas, Richard Thorpe began his en ...

Phil Rosen Philip E. Rosen (May 8, 1888 – October 22, 1951) was an American film director and cinematographer. He directed more than 140 films between 1915 and 1949. He was born in Marienburg, German Empire (now, Malbork, Poland), grew up in Ma ...

, and

Charles Lamont Charles Lamont (May 5, 1895 – September 11, 1993) was a prolific filmmaker, directing over 200 titles and producing and writing many others. He directed several Abbott and Costello comedies and many Ma and Pa Kettle films. Biography A Calif ...

. Chesterfield was one of a number of

Poverty Row Poverty Row is a slang term used to refer to Hollywood films produced from the 1920s to the 1950s by small (and mostly short-lived) B movie studios. Although many of them were based on (or near) today's Gower Street in Hollywood, the term did n ...

studios taken over by

Herbert Yates Herbert John Yates (August 24, 1880 – February 3, 1966) was the founder and president of Republic Pictures, who had western stars John Wayne, Gene Autry, and Roy Rogers under contract. Between the years 1935 and 1959, Republic, under Yates' l ...

in 1935 and merged into his newly formed

Republic Pictures Republic Pictures Corporation (currently held under Melange Pictures, LLC) was an American motion picture production-distribution corporation in operation from 1935 to 1967, that was based in Los Angeles. It had studio facilities in Studio City an ...

, in an attempt to create a studio with enough strength and appeal to compete with the

major studios Major film studios are production and distribution companies that release a substantial number of films annually and consistently command a significant share of box office revenue in a given market. In the American and international markets, the ...

.Balio p.322 Republic achieved this goal and lasted more than 20 years. George Batcheller died in 1938. In 1941 his son, George R. Batcheller, Jr., became head of the

PRC China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

studio and used his father's Chesterfield strategy there.

References

Bibliography

* Balio Tino. ''Grand Design: Hollywood as a Modern Business Entertprise 1930-1939''. University of California Press, 1995. * Pitts, Michael R. ''Poverty Row Studios, 1929–1940: An Illustrated History of 55 Independent Film Companies, with a Filmography for Each''. McFarland & Company, 2005. American film studios Film production companies of the United States {{US-film-company-stub

See also

References

Bibliography