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October 1928
- The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chain and Joseph P. Kennedy's Film Booking Offices of America studio were brought together under the control of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in October 1928.
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The business was formed after the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chain and Joseph P. Kennedy's Film Booking Offices of America studio were brought together under the control of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in October 1928.
1921. British businessmen Rufus S. Cole and H.F. Robertson create a film distribution company and purchase 13.5 acres on the corner of Gower Street and Melrose Avenue to build a studio. 1922. Robertson-Cole takes the name Film Booking Offices of America (FBO).
The company was reorganized in 1922 as the Film Booking Offices of America (FBO), and functioned primarily as a distributor of European and independent American films, along with the company's own output of decidedly second-rate genre pictures.
May 27, 2023 · In 1928, the Keith-Albee-Orpheum and Radio Corporation of America distribution companies merged to form RKO Radio Pictures, Incorporated (RKO). This company would become one of the largest ...
- During its Golden Age, RKO Pictures had many performers and actresses, including Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, who starred in several well-liked...
- Financial issues and several ownership and management changes plagued RKO Pictures. The studio needed help adjusting to the changing film industry,...
- RKO Pictures is not a functioning company. RKO Pictures discontinued production in 1957 as a result of financial issues and several ownership and m...
- Disney was not owned by RKO. The Walt Disney Company and RKO Pictures were independent companies in the movie business. During the 1930s to the 195...
- RKO is an acronym for "Radio-Keith-Orpheum." The "R" stands for Radio Corporation of America (RCA), a preeminent electronics business that created...
- The Formation and Early Development of RKO
- Reworking The UA Model
- Wartime Recovery
- The Decline and Fall of RKO
- Further Reading
Legend has it that RKO was created in a 1928 meeting between RCA president David Sarnoff (1891–1971) and Boston financier Joseph Kennedy (father of JFK) in the Oyster Bar in New York's Grand Central Station. While the meeting itself may have been apocryphal, Sarnoff and Kennedy did in fact control the elements that would merge to create RKO. Most o...
The success of Disney's Snow White was a harbinger of major changes in RKO's production policies and market strategy, which coalesced after the arrival of George Schaefer (1888–1981) as RKO president in late 1938. Schaefer was a former top executive at United Artists who was hired to adapt the UA model—i.e., the financing and distribution of indepe...
Schaefer's departure in mid-1942 signaled the deepening financial concerns at RKO, which had not returned to consistent profitability despite the waning Depression, the banner year in 1939 (which resulted in net losses for the studio), and the emergence from receivership in January 1940. By early 1942 it was clear that the "war boom" would be as mo...
When the studio reopened, Hughes was supervising all aspects of administration and production, and the results were disastrous. RKO released a few notable films early in Hughes's regime—most of them initiated under Schary, including two noir classics, The Set-Up (1949), directed by Robert Wise, and They Live By Night (1948), directed by newcomer Ni...
Berg, A. Scott. Goldwyn: A Biography. New York: Knopf, 1989. Croce, Arlene, The Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers Book. New York: Outerbridge & Lazard, 1972. Deitrich, Noah, and Bob Thomas. Howard: The Amazing Mr. Hughes. Greenwich, CT: Fawcett, 1972. Haver, Ronald. David O. Selznick's Hollywood. New York: Knopf, 1980. Hirsch, Foster. The Dark Side of t...
RKO was formed in October 1928 as a holding company for Keith-Albee-Orpheum Corp., F. B. O. (Film Booking Office) Productions, Inc. and a half-dozen other subsidiaries engaged in vaudeville...
One of the major motion picture studios of Hollywood’s “Golden Age,” RKO (Radio-Keith-Orpheum) made numerous notable films in the 1930s and ’40s. The studio was created in 1928 by a merger of the Radio Corporation of America, the Keith-Albee-Orpheum theater chain, and the American Pathé production firm.
