John
Maxwell had acquired a cinema chain which had grown to over 120 cinemas.
He also owned British International
Pictures, Welwyn Studios, and with other acquisitions, so Maxwell decided
to reorganize his empire in 1933. He changed the name of the studios to
Associated-British Picture Corporation (ABPC) and made Walter Mycroft head
of production.
In 1936, when Gaumont-British,
Maxwell's major rival, had major financial problems, Maxwell went to negotiate
a take-over of Gaumont-British. While Maxwell negotiated with the board,
Isidore Ostrer was negotiating a secret deal with 20th Century Fox which
would bail out Gaumont-British and eventually turn them over to the Rank
Organization.
Angry and disappointed, Maxwell sued but lost in his
attempt. Instead he purchased another chain of 130 cinemas. Maxwell also
initiated a new building program to develop new movie palaces going under
names of Regal, Savoy and Ritz.
Shortly afterward, the disasterous fire next door
at the Imperial Studio left British and Dominions in desperate need of help.
Unfortunately, Maxwell had just spent his investment money acquiring the
new theater chain and British
and Dominions was also acquired by the Rank Organization.
In 1939, Amalgamated Studios in Elstree also became
debt-ridden. While Maxwell negotiated, Rank AGAIN purchased Amalgamated
just to keep Maxwell from acquiring it.
With the outbreak of the war, the studios at Elstree
were requisitioned by the Royal Army Ordnance Corps and ABPC's production
was moved to Welwyn Studios which they had acquired in 1930.
Unfortunately, John Maxwell passed away in 1940 ending
a brilliant rise to power through hard work and drive.
After Maxwell's death, his long-serving lieutenant
Eric Lightfoot took control of the studio. Maxwell's widow, Catherine, inherited
4,050,000 shares of stock. Warner
Brothers made a generous offer to buy 2 million shares of her stock
for £900,000 which still left her with controlling interest, with
the insistance that Max Milder from Warner Brothers be installed as co-director
alongside of Lightfoot.
Warner eventually took control of ABPC in August
1945 with the acquisition of a further million ordinary shares from the
Maxwell estate for £1,125,000, giving it 37.5% of the issued share
capital. Now that it had control, Warner Brothers immediately fired Lightfoot.
WB had secured its own productions a guaranteed outlet in the British exhibition
market, and taken over the massive Elstree studio complex.
With post-war building restrictions meaning that no
new cinemas were being constructed, William Glen’s office was free
to prepare plans for the studios’ return to film use, after their
war years under requisition by the Royal Army Ordnance Corps. The studios
were completely renovated and modernized.
In 1949, Robert Clark became head of production and
increased the budgets to produce better films and distribution to the US.
Clark was a firm believer in cost controls and sold off Welwyn Studios to
concentrate more on the production at ABPC.
In 1955, it had become clear that television was a
growing concern, so ABPC entered into by being awarded a contract for Midlands
and Northern programs for Saturday and Sunday.
While Clark was in control, ABPC continually made
a profit, however, he was not liked by his peers and he fought against any
control from Warner Brothers, so in 1958 he was removed as head of production.
C. J. Latte took control of the studios and formed
a joint distribution Associated British-Pathe and Warner Brothers which
became Warner Pathe Distributors. This new distribution company was suppose
to handle WB films from the US, ABPC films and Allied Artists films.
In the 1960s, things went well, with US actors filming
and television production at an all time high. As the industry started going
through a change from musicals and comedy, Hammer Films set up a production
office at ABPC and started shooting horror films there.
With this change in the industry, also came a change
at ABPC. EMI started buying out WB stock which ended in a complete takeover
by 1969. ABPC was eliminated and the name changed to EMI-Elstree.
Here are the films we have in our archive
on ABPC
Go back to British
Distributors
