Back لويس بي. ماير Arabic Louis B. Mayer AST Луіс Барт Маер Byelorussian Луис Майер Bulgarian Louis B. Mayer Catalan Louis B. Mayer Czech Louis B. Mayer Danish Louis B. Mayer German Louis B. Mayer Spanish Louis B. Mayer Basque

Louis B. Mayer

Not to be confused with the jurist Louis B. Meyer.

Louis B. Mayer
Mayer in 1953
Born
Lazar Meir

July 12, 1884
Russian Empire
DiedOctober 29, 1957(1957-10-29) (aged 73)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Resting placeHome of Peace Cemetery (East Los Angeles)
NationalityRussian-Canadian-American[1]
Other names
  • Louis Burt Mayer
  • Ezemiel Mayer
  • Louis Burton Mayer
  • Lazar Mayer,
  • Lazar Meir
[2]
Occupations
  • Film producer
  • Studio executive
Years active1915–1951
Political partyRepublican
Board member ofMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Spouses
  • Margaret Shenberg
    ​
    ​
    (m. 1904; div. 1947)​
  • Lorena Layson
    ​
    (m. 1948)​
Children2, including Irene Mayer Selznick

Louis Burt Mayer (/ˈmeɪ.ər/; born Lazar Meir; July 12, 1884[3] – October 29, 1957) was a Canadian-American[1] film producer and co-founder of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios (MGM) in 1924. Under Mayer's management, MGM became the film industry's most prestigious movie studio, accumulating the largest concentration of leading writers, directors, and stars in Hollywood.

Mayer was born in the Russian Empire and grew up poor in Saint John, New Brunswick. He quit school at 12 to support his family and later moved to Boston and purchased and renovated a small vaudeville theatre in Haverhill, Massachusetts. He renovated and expanded several other theatres in the Boston area catering to audiences of higher social classes. After expanding and moving to Los Angeles, he teamed with film producer Irving Thalberg and they developed hundreds of films. Mayer handled the business of running the studio, such as setting budgets and approving new productions, while Thalberg, still in his twenties, supervised all MGM productions.

Mayer claimed to believe in "wholesome entertainment" and went to great lengths to discover new actors and develop them into major stars.[4] During his long reign at MGM, Mayer acquired many critics and supporters. Some stars did not appreciate his attempts to control their private lives, while others saw him as a concerned father figure. He was controversial for his treatment of the actors under his management, demanding compliance from female stars by threatening their livelihoods, such as in the case of Judy Garland, whom he forced to go on diets, take drugs, and work punishing schedules.[5]

Mayer was forced to resign as MGM's vice president in 1951, when the studio's parent company, Loew's, Inc., wanted to improve declining profits. A staunch conservative, Mayer at one time was the chairman of the California Republican Party.[6][7] In 1927, he was one of the founders of AMPAS, famous for its annual Academy Awards.[8]

  1. ^ a b "Louis B. Mayer | The Canadian Encyclopedia". www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca.
  2. ^ "Mayer, Louis B. (Louis Burt), 1885-1957". LC Linked Data Service: Authorities and Vocabularies. Library of Congress. Archived from the original on September 26, 2018. Retrieved September 26, 2018.
  3. ^ Mayer maintained that he was born in Minsk on July 4, 1885. According to Scott Eyman, the reasons may have been:
    • Mayer's father gave different dates for his birthplace at different times, so Mayer was not comfortable specifying a date;
    • It was part of Mayer's sense of showmanship and being born on July 4 seemed to stand for patriotism and had a certain ring to it;
    • "He needed to believe in a myth of self-creation which, in his case, was not far off the mark";
    • When Mayer was young, his family constantly moved around in the general area of Minsk, Vilnius and Kyiv;
    • As Jews, they felt insecure and therefore were reluctant to be specific.
  4. ^ McLean, Adrienne L. (ed.), Glamour in a Golden Age: Movie Stars of the Nineteen Hundred and Thirties. Rutgers University Press, 2011, p. 6.
  5. ^ Adams, Thelma (October 17, 2017). "Casting-Couch Tactics Plagued Hollywood Long Before Harvey Weinstein". Variety. Archived from the original on January 7, 2019. Retrieved August 12, 2022.
  6. ^ Hollitz, John (2016). Contending Voices, Volume II: Since 1865. Cengage. p. 147. ISBN 9781305888074. Archived from the original on December 5, 2020. Retrieved April 1, 2019.
  7. ^ Travers, Steven (2014). The Duke, the Longhorns, and Chairman Mao: John Wayne's Political Odyssey. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 103. ISBN 9781589798984. Archived from the original on December 5, 2020. Retrieved April 1, 2019.
  8. ^ Land of Ancestors: Louis Burt Mayer Archived December 2, 2013, at the Wayback Machine.

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