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Harry Cohn
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==Life and career== Cohn was born to a working-class [[Jewish]] family in New York City.<ref>[http://www.germanhollywood.com/abc_index1.html Actors Directors from Germany, Austria, Switzerland β German-Hollywood Connection<!-- Bot generated title -->] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070720225543/http://www.germanhollywood.com/abc_index1.html |date=July 20, 2007 }}</ref> His father, Joseph Cohn, was a tailor from Germany, and his mother, Bella Joseph, was from the [[Pale of Settlement]], [[Russian Empire]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YalWxsoWEIkC&q=Harry+Cohn+Bella&pg=PA76|title=Supermob: How Sidney Korshak and His Criminal Associates Became America's Hidden Power Brokers|last=Russo|first=Gus|date=December 12, 2008|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing USA |isbn=9781596918986|access-date=August 13, 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rg3Q5OcfeSEC&q=Harry+Cohn+Bella&pg=PA18|title=The Merchant Prince of Poverty Row: Harry Cohn of Columbia Pictures|last=Dick|first=Bernard F.|year=1993 |publisher=University Press of Kentucky |isbn=0813133548|access-date=August 13, 2017}}</ref> He left school early and had a variety of jobs, including chorus boy, fur salesman, [[pool hustler]], shipping clerk, streetcar conductor and [[song plugger]] for a [[sheet music]] printer.<ref>{{cite book |last=Thomas |first=Bob |title=King Cohn - The Life and Times of Harry Cohn |url=https://archive.org/details/kingcohnlifetime00thom|url-access=registration |year=1967 |publisher=G. P. Putnam's Sons |isbn=978-1893224070 |page=[https://archive.org/details/kingcohnlifetime00thom/page/96 96]}}</ref><ref name=katz/> He also appeared in a [[vaudeville]] act with [[Harry Ruby]].<ref name=katz/> He entered the film industry when he got a job with [[Independent Moving Pictures]] (which had recently merged to become part of [[Universal Pictures|Universal Film Manufacturing Company]]), where his elder brother, [[Jack Cohn]], was already employed. The brothers made their first film there, ''[[Traffic in Souls]]''.<ref name=jackobit/> Cohn became personal secretary to Universal president, [[Carl Laemmle]].<ref name=katz>{{cite book |last=Katz |first=Ephraim |author-link=Ephraim Katz |author2=Fred Klein |author3=Ronald Dean Nolan |title=The International Film Encyclopedia |edition=3rd |year=1998 |publisher=Harper Collins |location=New York |isbn=0-333-74037-8 |pages=273 }}</ref> In 1919, Cohn joined his brother and fellow IMP employee [[Joe Brandt]], to found [[CBC Film Sales Corporation]].<ref name=jackobit>{{cite news|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|date=December 10, 1956|page=31|title=Jack Cohn Dead; Film Pioneer, 67|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1956/12/10/archives/jack-cohn-dead-film-pioneer-67-cofounder-of-columbia-with-brother.html|access-date=January 10, 2021}}</ref> The initials officially stood for Cohn, Brandt, and Cohn, but Hollywood wags noted the company's low-budget, low-class efforts and nicknamed CBC "Corned Beef and Cabbage." Harry Cohn managed the company's film production in Hollywood, while his brother managed its finances from New York. The relationship between the two brothers was not always good, and Brandt, finding the partnership stressful, eventually sold his third of the company to Harry, who took over as president, by which time the firm had been renamed Columbia Pictures Corporation. [[File:Movie Industry pledges cooperation with the government. Washington, D.C., June 25. At a conference with President Roosevelt today, a group of motion picture company executives, led by Will LCCN2016877943.jpg|thumb|alt=At the White House, Front row, left to right: Barney Balaban, Paramount; Harry Cohn, Columbia Pictures; Nicholas M. Schenck, Loew's; Will H. Hays, and Leo Spitz, RKO. Back row, left to right: Sidney Kent, 20th Century Fox; N.J. Blumberg, Universal; and Albert Warner, Warner Bros., in 1938|At the White House, front row, left to right: [[Barney Balaban]], Paramount; Harry Cohn, Columbia Pictures; [[Nicholas Schenck|Nicholas M. Schenck]], Loew's; [[Will H. Hays]]; [[Leo Spitz]], RKO. Back row, left to right: Sidney Kent, 20th Century Fox; N.J. Blumberg, Universal; [[Albert Warner]], Warner Bros., in 1938]] Most of Columbia's early work was action fare starring rock-jawed leading man [[Jack Holt (actor)|Jack Holt]]. Columbia was unable to shake off its stigma as a [[Poverty Row]] studio until 1934, when director [[Frank Capra]]'s Columbia comedy ''[[It Happened One Night]]'' swept the [[Academy Awards]]. Exhibitors who formerly wouldn't touch Columbia products became steady customers. As a [[horizontal integration|horizontally integrated]] company that only controlled production and distribution, Columbia had been at the mercy of theater owners. Columbia expanded its scope to offer moviegoers a regular program of economically made features, short subjects, serials, travelogues, sports reels, and cartoons. Columbia released a few "class" productions each year (''[[Lost Horizon (1937 film)|Lost Horizon]]'', ''[[Holiday (1938 film)|Holiday]]'', ''[[Mr. Smith Goes to Washington]]'', ''[[The Jolson Story]]'', ''[[Gilda (film)|Gilda]]'', ''[[All the King's Men (1949 film)|All the King's Men]]'', etc.), but depended on its popular "budget" productions to keep the company solvent. During Cohn's tenure, the studio always turned a profit. Cohn did not build a stable of movie stars like other studios. Instead, he generally signed actors who usually worked for more expensive studios ([[Wheeler & Woolsey]], [[Cary Grant]], [[Katharine Hepburn]], [[Mae West]], [[Humphrey Bogart]], [[Dorothy Lamour]], [[Mickey Rooney]], [[Chester Morris]], [[Warren William]], [[Warner Baxter]], [[Sabu Dastagir|Sabu]], [[Gloria Jean]], [[Margaret O'Brien]], etc.) to attract a pre-sold audience. Columbia's own stars generally rose from the ranks of small-part actors and featured players ([[Jean Arthur]], [[Rita Hayworth]], [[Larry Parks]], [[Julie Bishop (actress)|Julie Bishop]], [[Lloyd Bridges]], [[Bruce Bennett]], [[Jock Mahoney]], etc.). Some of Columbia's producers and directors also graduated from lesser positions as actors, writers, musicians, and assistant directors. Cohn was known for his autocratic and intimidating management style. When he took over as Columbia's president, he remained production chief as well, thus concentrating enormous power in his hands. He respected talent above any personal attribute, but he made sure his employees knew who was boss. Writer [[Ben Hecht]] referred to him as "[[White Fang]]". An employee of Columbia called him "as absolute a monarch as Hollywood ever knew." It was said "he had listening devices on all sound stages and could tune in any conversation on the set, then boom in over a loudspeaker if he heard anything that displeased him." Throughout his tenure, his most popular moniker was "King Cohn." [[Moe Howard]] of [[the Three Stooges]] recalled that Cohn was "a real [[Jekyll-and-Hyde]]-type guy... socially, he could be very charming." Cohn was known to scream and curse at actors and directors in his office all afternoon, and greet them cordially at a dinner party that evening. There is some suggestion that Cohn deliberately cultivated his reputation as a tyrant, either to motivate his employees or simply because it increased his control of the studio. Cohn is said to have kept a signed photograph of [[Benito Mussolini]], whom he met in Italy in 1933, on his desk until the beginning of World War II. (Columbia produced the documentary ''[[Mussolini Speaks]]'' in 1933, narrated by [[Lowell Thomas]].) Cohn also had a number of ties to [[National Crime Syndicate|organized crime]]. He had a long-standing friendship with Chicago mobster [[John Roselli]], and New Jersey mob boss [[Abner Zwillman]] was the source of the loan that allowed Cohn to buy out his partner Brandt. Cohn's brash, loud, intimidating style has become Hollywood legend and was reportedly portrayed in various movies. The characters played by Broderick Crawford in ''[[All the King's Men (1949 film)|All the King's Men]]'' (1949) and ''[[Born Yesterday (1950 film)|Born Yesterday]]'' (1950), both Columbia pictures, are allegedly based on Cohn, as is Jack Woltz, a movie mogul who appears in ''[[The Godfather]]'' (1972) as well as [[Rod Steiger]] in ''[[The Big Knife]]''. In his own way, Harry Cohn was sentimental about certain professional matters. During his early years as a producer he had signed comedian [[Billy West (silent film actor)|Billy West]] for a series of comedies, but failed to fulfill West's contract; 12 years later, when West was a struggling bit player, Cohn not only kept him working as an actor but made him an assistant director, and then allowed Mr. and Mrs. West to operate the Columbia Grill, a restaurant concession on the studio premises.<ref>''Boxoffice'', Aug. 4, 1975, p. 12.</ref> Cohn remembered the valuable contributions of Jack Holt during Columbia's struggling years, and kept him under contract until 1941. Cohn hired the Three Stooges in 1934 and, according to Stooge [[Larry Fine]], "he thought we brought him luck." Cohn kept the Stooges on his payroll until the end of 1957. Cohn was fond of what he termed "those lousy little 'B' pictures", and kept making them, along with [[short subject|two-reel comedies]] and [[Serial film|serials]], after other studios had abandoned them. Cohn could also hold grudges. He was responsible for the abrupt end to [[Hazel Scott]]'s film career after Scott protested the degrading costumes black women were scripted to wear on Mae West's 1943 film ''[[The Heat's On]]''. Cohn eventually relented, but made good on his vow that Hazel Scott would never set foot on a Hollywood studio as long as he lived.<ref>{{Citation |title=What Ever Happened to Hazel Scott? | date=December 22, 2016 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_WJ4PpxWaE |language=en |access-date=2022-05-07}}</ref> After [[David Niven]] playfully sent Cohn a lawyer's letter claiming Cohn's yacht as salvage, Cohn failed to see the joke and barred Niven from the Columbia lot; Niven would be hired by Columbia only after Harry Cohn's death.<ref>''King Cohn'', p. 272.</ref> Cohn also resented [[Loretta Young]] having a dress redesigned expensively, which he regarded as overcharging him for her wardrobe, and wouldn't speak to her for many years until she apologized to him in person.<ref>''King Cohn'', p. 270.</ref>
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