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Creator
Warner Bros
Call number
*T-Vim 1992-001
Physical description
18 volumes of slides
Preferred Citation

Warner Bros. Production Slides, *T-VIM 1992-001, Billy Rose Theatre Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

Repository
Billy Rose Theatre Division
Access to materials
Request an in-person research appointment.Restrictions apply

Color slides from a variety of Warner Bros. motion pictures produced during the 1980s and early 1990s.

Biographical/historical information

Warner Brothers Pictures was incorporated in 1923 by the four Warner brothers, Harry, Albert, Sam and Jack. The company had begun its movie making career earlier however, when it produced its first film in 1918. In 1925 Warner Bros. acquired the Vitagraph Company, in Brooklyn, New York, expanding its holdings from the East to the West coast. Warner Bros. pioneered sound motion pictures with Don Juan (1926) and The Jazz Singer (1927). Additional purchases in the twenties included First National Pictures and Fox West Coast Theatres. During the thirties and forties, Warner Bros. entertained the American public with such classic films as The Public Enemy (1931), The Story of Louis Pasteur (1936), The Adventues of Robin Hood (1938), Dark Victory (1939), The Maltese Falcon (1941), Casablanca (1943), Mildred Pierce (1945), Johnny Belinda (1948) and White Heat (1949).

Warner Bros. entered the age of television in the fifties. Financial difficulties in the sixties, however, resulted in a takeover by Seven Arts Productions, Ltd. In 1969, the company was acquired by Kinney National Services, Inc. and the newly formed Warner Communications, Inc. became the entertainment arm of Kinney's corporation which produced financially successful films such as Gremlins, Lethal Weapon and Batman. In 1989 Warner Bros. was bought by Time, Inc. The new corporation is now known as Time-Warner.

Scope and arrangement

The Warner Brothers production slides consist of publicity and production color slides for motion pictures produced or distributed by Warner Brothers Studio from 1979 until 1991. Early years of the collection contain many gaps with the first film being a 1979 release followed next by a 1983 release. From 1987, however, the collection is relatively complete. Some productions contain many images and a full record of the picture while other productions only have one image. Some of the motion pictures with significant numbers of images include The Color Purple, Little Shop of Horrors, Empire of the Sun, Innerspace, Lethal Weapon, The Lost Boys, The Witches of Eastwick, Tequila Sunrise, Above the Law, The Accidental Tourist, Arthur 2, Beetlejuice, Clara's Heart, Clean and Sober, A Cry in the Dark, Dangerous Liaisons, Everybody's All-American, Feds, Batman, Bert Rigby, You're a Fool, Cookie, Her Alibi, Driving Miss Daisy, In Country, Lethal Weapon 2, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, See You in the Morning, Tango & Cash, Young Einstein, Men Don't Leave, Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead, New Jack City and Robin Hood : Prince of Thieves. Featured stars include Whoopi Goldberg, Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Kevin Costner, Steve Martin, Rick Moranis, Dennis Quaid, Martin Short, Meg Ryan, Jason Patric, Corey Haim, Kiefer Sutherland, Jack Nicholson, Cher, Susan Sarandon, Michelle Pfeiffer, Kurt Russell, William Hurt, Kathleen Turner, Geena Davis, Dudley Moore, Alec Baldwin, Michael Keaton, Winona Ryder, Meryl Streep, Sam Neill, Glenn Close, John Malkovich, Rebecca DeMornay, Kim Basinger, Anne Bancroft, Peter Falk, Dianne Wiest, Tom Selleck, Morgan Freeman, Jessica Tandy, Bruce Willis, Chevy Chase, Sylvester Stallone, Christina Applegate, Wesley Snipes, Chris Rock, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Christian Slater and Alan Rickman.

The Warner Bros. production slides [graphic] is arranged in ten series:

Administrative information

Custodial history

The Warner Bros. Production Slides were donated to the Billy Rose Theatre Division from the press office of Warner Bros. Materials arrived over a few years ending in 1992.

Processing information

Processed by Mary Ellen Rogan and Rosalie Spar.

Using the collection

Location

Billy Rose Theatre Division
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center
40 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-7498
Third Floor

Conditions Governing Use

For permission to publish, contact the Curator, Billy Rose Theatre Division.

Copyright permissions are needed from Time-Warner.

Access restrictions

Photocopying prohibited.