THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Mogul Jack Warner Was Hollywood Pioneer
By HERBERT G. LUFT
(Copyright"1978, JTA, Inc.)
HOLLYWOOD—Jack L.
Warner has beenreported-
dead twice within 2 . 0 years;
first on Aug. 5, 1958 when
his sports car speeding on a
Riviera road near Cannes
flipped over and exploded,
seemingly leaving him a
corpse on the dark highway;
and now when he actually
died at Cedars-Sinai Medi-
cal Center in Los Angeles
Sept. 9 at the age of 86.
The first time, he sur-
vived by a sheer miracle
when someone found him
unconscious and took him to
a hospital in southern
France where he spent long,
agonizing weeks, plus a
subsequent convalescent
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Upon recovery almost a
year later, he remarked
dryly that few people had
the privilege to read their
own obituary.
The last of the founders of
Hollywood, Warner twice
spearheaded the fight
against German aggre8-
sion, in 1917 when he pro-
duced Ambassador James
Gerard's "My Four Years in
Germany," and in 1939
when he presented the film
expose of "Confessions of a
Nazi Spy" which resulted in
the blacklisting of all
Warner Bros. pictures
throughout the Third Reich.
Jack answered Hitler and
Goebbels with "Sergeant
York," "Edge of Darkness,"
"Casablanca" and "Watch
on the Rhine." He also pro-
duced scores of training
films to assist the U.S.
Armed Forces.
His Polish-born father
was a shoemaker in his
native village. A former
neighbor who had im-
migrated to America
lured him to Baltimore
where the streets were
paved with gold. "I was
lucky that the nitwit
lied," Warner corn-
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mented sarcastically at
the height of his success.
"If he had told the truth,
there would have been no
Warner Bros. and you
would have had to put up
with other pictures not
quite as good."
Ben Warner, long before
the turn of the century,
went in steerage from
Hamburg to Baltimore to be
joined later by his wife and
the oldest two children; he
settled in Lynchburg, Va.;
peddled kitchenware, often
trading his surplus with
furs in Canada. -
On one of his father's reg-
ular trips across the border,
Jack was born in London,
Ont., Aug. 2, 1892. It was
less than two years before
Thomas A. Edison gave his
first demonstration of-a new
invention- called the
Kinetoscope, a device to
make pictures come to life.
As a boy, Jack was earn-
ing his money selling pap-
ers, shining shoes and run-
ning errands to advance to a
pre-teenaged singing
barker. He broke into show
business when, by chance,
he was offered the job to
chant illustrated songs be-
tween reels in a nickelodeon
in Youngstown, Ohio with
his. sister Rose accompany-
ing him at the piano.
After a vaudeville stint,
he went into the movie
business with three of his
older brothers, Sam,
Harry and Albert, pre- .
senting Edwin S. Porter's
"The Great Train Rob-
bery." The time was 1906;
Jack was but 17 years
old.
The Warner brothers
opened a motion picture
theater in a remodeled
store. By 1912 they had ac-
quired five theaters and
opened film exchanges in
Baltimore and Pittsburgh.
Running out of acceptable
pictures, they decided to
turn to production and
opened their first studio in
Brooklyn.
Around 1917, they moved"
their operation to Califor-
nia. By chance, Jack read a
newspaper ad for the
serialization of Gerard's
"My Four Years in Ger-
many," an intimate account
of the abortive dealings of
the U.S. ambassador with
Emperor Wilhelm II, espe-
cially his vainefforts to stop
submarine warfare. The
picture was distributed by
First National which later
merged with Warner Bros.
In 1925, Maj. Nathan
Levinson, who had joined
the company as a techni-
cal expert, heard that
Western Electric was ex-
perimenting, with sound.
Together with Sam
Warner, Levinson tried to
perfect the method of
sound recording and
synchronflation. In 1926,
Warner Bros. were the
first to present 'a fully
scored picture, "Don
Juan" starring John
Barrymore. A year later,
a talking picture, Al Jol-
son's "The Jazz Singer,"
followed.
It was Jack Warner who
accelerated the career of
Paul Muni when in 1932 he
signed him to portray the
title role in "I am a Fugitive
from a Chain Gang," di-
rected by Mervyn LeRoy
who had previously directed
Warner's "Little Caesar"
with Edward G. Robinson.
Jack won the Oscar for
best production with "The
Life of Emile Zola" in 1937,
with Muni in the title role
who also starred in
Warner's "Story of Louis
Pasteur."
Warner inspired the
careers of James Cagney,
Humphrey Bogart, Pat O'B-
rien and Bette Davis, who
won the 1938 Academy
Award for "Jezebel," which
involved the producer in a
dispute with David 0.
Selznick.
I met. Warner first in
1962 when he- chaired the
awards banquet for the
Golden Globes at the Be-
verly Hilton and had read
my name as one of the of-
ficials of the Hollywood
Foreign Press Assn. in
the program. Since he
had a running feud with
the husband of the late
Judy Garland, he was ir-
ritated with my name and
remarked that Sid Luft
must have made a com-
eback under the name of
Herbert Luft.
- He dared to purchase "My
Fair Lady" for a record price
in excess of $5 million. He
dared to star Audrey Hep-
burn, a non-singer, and
made a mint plus winning
multiple Academy Awards.
When the Academy hon-
ored him during the golden
anniversary of talking pic-
tures earlier this year, he
was too ill to attend. In
1958, he was at hand to re-
ceive the much coveted Irv-
ing Thalberg Award,
Warner was active in
numerous Jewish organiza-
tions and at one time served
as chairman of the Los Ang-
les Jewish Welfare Drive.
— —
Friday, October 6, 1918 33
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