Twickenham Film Distributors Ltd
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| limited company | |
| Industry | Film |
| Founded | 1913 |
| Headquarters | Twickenham, United Kingdom |
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Key people
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Maria Walker (Chief Operating Officer) |
| Website | www.twickenhamstudios.com |
Twickenham Studios (formerly known as Twickenham Film Studios) is a film studio in St Margarets, London, United Kingdom used by various motion picture and television companies. It was established in 1913 by Dr. Ralph Jupp on the site of a former ice-rink. At the time of its original construction, it was the largest film studio in the United Kingdom.
In February 2012, it was announced that due to the studio going into administration, it would close before June, just a year before its centenary. The studio was subsequently saved from closure, with a new owner acquiring the studio in August 2012.
During the 1930s, the studio was run by Julius Hagen. Hagen built up his business making Quota quickies for major American studios who were required by law to produce a certain number of British films each year in order to be allowed to release their pictures into the lucrative British market. Hagen became very efficient at producing large numbers of these quickies of varying quality. He often filmed all day, and then brought in different crews and actors to work through the night.
Following the success of Alexander Korda's The Private Life of Henry VIII (1933), Hagen became interested in producing films which could be released in America. Twickenham took on more quality work such as the Gracie Fields vehicle This Week of Grace. This ultimately led Hagen to stop making quickies entirely and focus entirely on quality productions. He began to make more expensive films such as Seymour Hicks's Scrooge (1935) and Spy of Napoleon for which he hoped to gain an international market. Hagen spent £100,000 rebuilding Twickenham Studios and acquired studios in other parts of London. He also broke with his established distributors and attempted to distribute his own films. This proved a mistake, the major American studios blocked his entry into their market, while his films failed to gain access in the British market. In 1937 Hagen's company went bankrupt as part of a wider slump in British filmmaking that year bringing an end to his reign at Twickenham.
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Wikipedia