Julius Hagen

Julius Hagen
Born	Julius Jacob Kleimenhagen 1884 Hamburg, German Empire
Died	31 January 1940 London, England
Years active	1913–37
Spouse(s)	Hilda Hagen

Julius Hagen (1884–1940) was a German-born British film producer who produced more than a hundred films in Britain.

Hagen originally worked as a salesman for Ruffels Pictures. He then worked in his way up to become a production manager in the British silent film industry before becoming an independent producer in 1927. From 1928 he took control of Twickenham Studios and became one of the most profolific and successful producers of Quota quickies. He later switched to making more prestigious films, but in 1937 he was forced into bankcruptcy and lost control of Twickenham.

Hagen also directed a film, the 1928 adaptation of an Agatha Christie novel The Passing of Mr. Quinn.

Hagen was born in Hamburg but emigrated to Britain when he was still a child. He began his entertainment career as a stage actor, but in 1913 moved into the film industry and worked for several years as a film salesman. By 1917 he was a partner in a film distribution company, but this went bankrupt in 1919.

For the next few years, Hagen returned to selling films around the country and built up a reputation as an effective salesmen, enjoying success with unpopular films that were considered difficult to sell. He was then given a job as production manager with Stoll Pictures, one of the leading British Studios, whose main studio was based in Cricklewood. Following the Slump of 1924, the number of films produced rapidly declined, and in 1926 Hagen lost his job. He then moved to the rival company Astra-National where he co-produced The Flag Lieutenant, one of the biggest hits of 1926, starring Henry Edwards.

In 1927 Hagen and Edwards formed a separate production company, and created a sequel The Further Adventures of the Flag Lieutenant, which also proved popular with British audiences. The film was made at Twickenham Studios in Middlesex, and Hagen used it as his primary base of operations thereafter. Hagen followed this with The Fake (1927). He tried to secure financial backing for further films from the City of London, but after a brief boom in the late 1920s it was increasingly difficult to secure backing there for film production.

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