THE WARNER BROTHERS, the Jewish immigrants who created modern Hollywood

THE WARNER BROTHERS
CHRIS YOGERST
The University Press of Kentucky (Screen Classics series)
$34.95 hardcover, available now

Rating: 4* of five

The Publisher Says: One of the oldest and most recognizable studios in Hollywood, Warner Bros. is considered a juggernaut of the entertainment industry. Since its formation in the early twentieth century, the studio has been a constant presence in cinema history, responsible for the creation of acclaimed films, blockbuster brands, and iconic superstars.

These days, the studio is best known as a media conglomerate with a broad range of intellectual property, spanning movies, TV shows, and streaming content. Despite popular interest in the origins of this empire, the core of the Warner Bros. saga cannot be found in its commercial successes. It is the story of four brothers—Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack—whose vision for Hollywood helped shape the world of entertainment as we know it.

In The Warner Brothers, Chris Yogerst follows the siblings from their family's humble origins in Poland, through their young adulthood in the American Midwest, to the height of fame and fortune in Hollywood. With unwavering resolve, the brothers soldiered on against the backdrop of an America reeling from the aftereffects of domestic and global conflict. The Great Depression would not sink the brothers, who churned out competitive films that engaged audiences and kept their operations afloat—and even expanding. During World War II, they used their platform to push beyond the limits of the Production Code and create important films about real-world issues, openly criticizing radicalism and the evils of the Nazi regime. At every major cultural turning point in their lifetime, the Warners held a front-row seat.

Paying close attention to the brothers' identities as cultural and economic outsiders, Yogerst chronicles how the Warners built a global filmmaking powerhouse. Equal parts family history and cinematic journey, The Warner Brothers is an empowering story of the American dream and the legacy four brothers left behind for generations of filmmakers and film lovers to come.

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My Review: Four driven Jewish immigrants left Poland poor nobodies and became the architects of an entire multi-billion dollar empire...and multi-trillion dollar industry.

They didn't play nice all the time. They didn't hesitate to call out hypocrisy while practicing it. But they, for better or worse, made the modern celebrity/entertainment culture we all live in from their savviest business instincts and their unrelenting drive to be Safe in their new homeland. They were charitable with their money and made a big difference in many lives, for the better.

Their studio acquiesced to the Production Code, as they had to in order to stay in business, but produced subversively messaged anti-Nazi and anti-Klan movies. They innovated technologically (The Jazz Singer's sound was an invention of Sam Warner, who died before its premiere...one of the brothers' many personal tragedies). They created and massaged and changed advertising paradigms, distribution methods, audience metrics...and how to make a mess of your life. Jack Warner, a horrible man, comes out of this biographical book looking like Iago's mentor. He was awful to actresses, he was awful to his brothers, he was horrible to his son. No one that terrible should've made the amazing films he made.

Loads of black and white images make this a handy reference for studio publicity photo lovers, and enrich the general reader's experience of the story. It is told as a story, albeit not in the most exciting narrative voice. The author definitely wants you to know that he's done the research, thought through the implications of the Warner Brothers's effect on film as an art and an industry. He's not ignoring the personal details of their Shakespearan family saga. He just doesn't give it to you in punchy, quip-laden sentences.

Author Yogerst is telling us the story of an Institution, The Warner Brothers, a family of immigrant Jews in an anti-semitic world, who created the institution Warner Bros., whose thousands of films we've all watched our entire lives...pure Hollywood, that story. That will appeal to your film-buff giftee as well as your Jewish studies maven. The Warner Brothers are well-served by The Warner Brothers.