adolph zukor and marcus loew. 1924
My Cousin Adolph Zukor
A friend sent me The Hollywood Reporter’s Feb 29 article on Paramount Studios (you can see it in the links at the bottom of the page.) It inspired me to tell the stories of my connections to Paramount, Loew’s Theaters and Sony Pictures,
When I was growing up, my grandmother Julia would say that Adolph Zukor, the founder of Paramount Studios was her cousin. I was a big film buff and was impressed but skeptical. My cousin Ervin Foldi and I began researching our family tree and confirmed that Zukor is indeed my 1st cousin, three times removed. There is an enormous family tree on geni dot com with the extended family, huge mostly through marriages. But I am proud to share DNA with him via my 2nd great-grandmother who was Zukor’s father’s sister. We trace our Hungarian Zukor roots to 3rd great grandparents Nuchem and Nuchemne Zukor born around 1810.
Adolph Zukor was born in Ricse Hungary in 1873. He went to live with an uncle who was a rabbi after becoming an orphan at age 7. Rabbi Lieberman saw promise in young Adolph and wanted him to be a rabbi, but Adolph had other passions. He emigrated to the U.S. at age 16 and went into the fur trade in Chicago. In 1900 he and a partner entered the nickelodeon business in New York City. Nickelodeon theaters usually charged a nickel (5 cents) and played short films to piano accompaniment.
What’s a Nickelodeon?
Zukor partnered with Marcus Loew to open a string of nickelodeon theaters but soon realized that the key to their success was making their own films. Zukor and partners created The Famous Players Film Company in 1912 which launched him into film production.
Famous Players-Lasky (with partner Jesse Lasky) eventually morphed into Paramount Pictures with Zukor as president. The detailed history is fascinating as a study of the early film business.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Marcus Loew founded Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1924 to provide films for his theaters. Sadly, he died in 1927.
MGM and Paramount would continue to be rival studios during Hollywood’s Golden Age (1930s and 1940s) along with RKO, 20th Century Fox, Warner Brothers. Universal, the home of classic horror and monster films and United Artists and Columbia.
Adolph and My Family
Back to the personal story: Adolph Zukor was the first of his family to “make it big” in the U.S. and offered to pay for Hungarian relatives to move to emigrate. I have heard stories of several who did and at least one who did not and regretted it, as conditions in Europe deteriorated for Jews.
Family stories say that Adolph honored my great grandmother Mali as the matriarch of her family and would send his limo to bring her to his estate in upstate New York. She was a shy, simple woman so this seems unlikely, but one cousin said he heard it from his grandparents.
Zukor Leaves Birthplace as Charity Applicants Swamp Him
(Jewish Telegraphic Agency) Budapest, May 9
Besieged by 1,400 applicants from neighboring Hungarian and Czechoslovakian villages who demanded money aid or economic assistance, Adolph Zukor, American movie magnate has been compelled to leave hurriedly his native town of Riccse [Risce] which he has been revisiting.When he left he had a trunkful of applications for aid. Not even the police who were called out could establish order among the crowd that sought his assistance.
He had previously generously assisted some 400 poor people and gave large sums to religious organizations of all sects. He also established an endowment as dowries for poor Jewish brides and a free school for children in his birthplace.
jewish daily bulletin. May 11. 1930.
Message from my cousin András Földi about Zukor
Of course also we are very proud to have a relationship to Adolph Zukor who was a closest cousin of one of my great grandmothers. Adolph Zukor sent approx in 1930 the sum of 200 USD (or even more) and in addition an affidavit also to my grandmother (i.e. to my father’s mother) so that she can emigrate with her family to the US like many of our relatíves did it indeed in that time (even before) just thank to the similar help by A.Z.
My grandfather, however, insisted to remain in Hungary. Later, namely in the time of the Shoah and also thereafter my grandma blamed my grandpa often and bitterly for his reluctance.
Fortunately they could still survive the tragical time among other places in the ghetto of Budapest with their two sons as well as with my great grandmother Fani Lowinger (1873-1960) who was not only 1st cousin of A.Z. but also she was born almost at the same time (in April 1873 in Tiszakarád). Unfortunately a number of my relatives declining the generous invitation by A.Z. were deported and killed with their complete families in Auschwitz in 1944.
My Consulting at Sony Pictures
In 1989, I began working on a consulting project with two friends helping the executives of Columbia-Tristar which had recently been purchased by the Sony Corporation. Cultural and business issues were beyond challenging as Sony had little experience outside the technology industry. The U.S. Sony executives all felt they were celebrities in their own right, likely because they helped the careers of so many stars. Their egos were huge as you can imagine but my two partners were skilled in keeping everyone focused on the planning objectives. I remember meeting with a client and the phone rang and he had a ten-minute chat with Barbra Streisand. Her former boyfriend Jon Peters ran Sony Pictures with his friend Peter Guber for a few years.
Loew’s and Columbia Pictures
Now closing the loop on Marcus Loew: My other project was working with the president of the remaining Loew’s theater chain which Sony inherited when it bought Columbia-Tristar. I do not remember his name, but he had been in the movie theater business since he was a teenager. He was an elegant gentleman, full of amazing stories.
Since he was using the old offices of Columbia Pictures in New York, the display cases were filled with Oscars from some of my favorite films.
Although a smaller studio in the Golden Age, Columbia has more best picture Oscars than any other studio including:
- Lost Horizon (1937)
- All The King’s Men (1949)
- From Here To Eternity (1953)
- Lawrence Of Arabia (1962)
- A Man For All Seasons (1966)
It was great to read more about my great-grandfather’s first cousin. My name is Daniel Zucker, I live in Teaneck NJ, and would love to connect with you to discuss further. I have some interesting stories to tell, relatibg to Adolph and the family, and even Bob Hope.
Nice to hear from you David. My math genealogy skills are not great today we are definitely cousins! I look forwward to connecting. I am in a health recovery now but I will call in a couple weeks.
Hello distant cousins! My name is Meryle Nan Breier Mishkin Tank. My second middle name is after my grandmother, Hermine Breier, who was a cousin of Adolph Zukor through her mother, Zali Neumann nee Czukor. I for my whole life heard that we were related to the Zukors, but the stories got muddled and my grandmother died just before I was born. I live in San Francisco and would love to connect.