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Details are murky, and contemporary accounts don't help. So I throw
myself upon the group.
What was the last released by Fox Films before its permanently became 20th Century-Fox? I think it's IN OLD KENTUCKY (1935), but some sources list this as a 20th Century-Fox release.
Evidently the merged companies didn't start releasing under the new name until early October 1935, and even then a few strays like WAY DOWN EAST (the Fonda version) went out without the the 20th Century-Fox logo and fanfare.
Also confusing: Most sources state that METROPOLITAN (1935) was the first official 20th C-F release, but according to release dates, Jane Withers' THIS IS THE LIFE and CHARLIE CHAN IN SHANGHAI came first. (METROPOLITAN was the first 20th Century film released by Fox rather than UA).
Do I ask too much? Will you all start screaming "DO YOUR OWN STINKIN' RESEARCH"? I have, believe me. Just looking for some assisatnace.

Not sure exactly what you are looking for. The only way to know for sure the production and release information is by gaining access to the studio archives. If you are just interested in what logo was at the beginning of the picture, the only other reliable means is from original release domestic USA movie posters. The logos on the films themselves may have been changed over the years during re-releases.

The In Old Kentucky poster has "Fox Film" logo, as does Charlie Chan in Shanghai. Based upon release dates, In Old Kentucky is most likely the last Fox Film and Call Of The Wild was the last 20th Century Picture.

Metropolitan was definitely a 20th Century Fox production and release, although it was shot at the UA studio as were many previous 20th Century Pictures. This may be the source of your confusion. There was a lot of politics on the Fox lot that first year as Zanuck, coming from 20th Century, wrestled with Fox's Winfield Sheehan for head of production. Obviously, Zanuck won.

If you don't already have it, may I recommend The Films Of 20th Century Fox by Tony Thomas and Aubrey Solomon. Published in 1979, the authors had access and assistance of the studio's archive department. It also covers Fox Film and 20th Century Pictures, although not in as great detail as one would desire. You should also check out the Film Daily Yearbook Of Motion Pictures 1936, which contains all the major motion picture business events of 1935. Boxoffice Magazines from that year would also be invaluable.

I've got the 1979 FILMS OF... book, which confusingly lists both WAY DOWN EAST and IN OLD KENTUCKY as Fox, rather than 20th C-F releases , though they came out in late October and late November of 1935 respectively, by which time a few 20th C-F releases had taken place (the book also leaves out several pre-merger Fox titles like GEORGE WHITE'S 1935 SCANDALS).
The first big trade ad for the new merged company listed four November releases, beginning with METROPOLITAN (filmed by 20th Century before the merger, as were THE MAN WHO BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO, PROFESSIONAL SOLDIER and THANKS A MILLION) and WAY DOWN EAST. The posters for EAST and KENTUCKY list only "Fox", without the new logo, but the listings in Boxoffice indicate that they're 20th C-F releases.
Also, the 1979 book lists BLACK SHEEP as 20th C-F, though it was released on June 6, 1935, before the merger was official, and says "Fox" in the onscreen credits.
It's really kinda hazy. If we set a "cutoff" date of October 7, when Jane Withers' THIS IS THE LIFE (advertised everywhere as 20th CF) was released, then the last "real" Fox film was Nino Martini's HERE'S TO ROMANCE (October 4).
Further muddying the waters, some 20th CF films were released in New York as Fox Films, then distributed nationally under the 20th CF banner a few weeks or months later!
One source indicates that YOUR UNCLE DUDLEY (NY release 11.14.35) was the first film made at Fox studios after the merger. This then would be the first "official" production, though it came out after METROPOLITAN.
Grr. Grr. Pull hair,gnash teeth.

Hal Erickson wrote:I've got the 1979 FILMS OF... book, which confusingly lists both WAY DOWN EAST and IN OLD KENTUCKY as Fox, rather than 20th C-F releases , though they came out in late October and late November of 1935 respectively, by which time a few 20th C-F releases had taken place (the book also leaves out several pre-merger Fox titles like GEORGE WHITE'S 1935 SCANDALS).
The first big trade ad for the new merged company listed four November releases, beginning with METROPOLITAN (filmed by 20th Century before the merger, as were THE MAN WHO BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO, PROFESSIONAL SOLDIER and THANKS A MILLION) and WAY DOWN EAST. The posters for EAST and KENTUCKY list only "Fox", without the new logo, but the listings in Boxoffice indicate that they're 20th C-F releases.
Also, the 1979 book lists BLACK SHEEP as 20th C-F, though it was released on June 6, 1935, before the merger was official, and says "Fox" in the onscreen credits.
It's really kinda hazy. If we set a "cutoff" date of October 7, when Jane Withers' THIS IS THE LIFE (advertised everywhere as 20th CF) was released, then the last "real" Fox film was Nino Martini's HERE'S TO ROMANCE (October 4).
Further muddying the waters, some 20th CF films were released in New York as Fox Films, then distributed nationally under the 20th CF banner a few weeks or months later!
One source indicates that YOUR UNCLE DUDLEY (NY release 11.14.35) was the first film made at Fox studios after the merger. This then would be the first "official" production, though it came out after METROPOLITAN.
Grr. Grr. Pull hair,gnash teeth.

So why shouldn't this be hazy? These were two working companies that didnt stop producing films as they merged, so there's going to be Fox product and Twentieth Century product in varying stages of just-before merger production that ends up going out under 20C-F and who's going to be paying that much serious attention to changing title cards and splicing on new logos? I've seen prints of some of the late Will Rogers films that have 20th C-F logos, then say Fox Presents in the opening titles. Nobody was concerned about some picayune precise historian worrying about this seventy-five years later. I'll wager you'd gnash the same teeth trying to determine the last official First National Picture pre-Warner Brothers.

RICHARD M ROBERTS

Richard Roberts wrote:I've seen prints of some of the late Will Rogers films that have 20th C-F logos, then say Fox Presents in the opening titles.

You can't go by the film, the logo may have been changed over the years. You need to go by the original release movie poster. Every film released after the merger was a 20th Century Fox release. What logo and studio credit is a different matter.

Hal Erickson wrote:which confusingly lists both WAY DOWN EAST and IN OLD KENTUCKY as Fox, rather than 20th C-F releases

Can't speak for Way Down East, but the original release posters for In Old Kentucky have the FOX FILM logo. Again, every film released after the merger was a 20th Century Fox release, it is just a matter of which logo and studio credit was on the picture.

Oh, I'm NOT going by the logo. I NEVER go by that logo. The TV distributor stuck the 20th CF trademark on the front of SUNNY SIDE UP and ME AND MY GAL, released respectively in 1929 and 1935! And how about the "Buy War Bonds" slug at the end of the 1940s reissue of 1935's CALL OF THE WILD?
The confusion arises as to when the studio's films were FIRST regarded as official 20TH CF releases.
The merger was finalized in late August-early September, delayed a bit by a few nervous stockholders. The reconfigured logo and new corporate name was first advertised in the trades (notably BOXOFFICE) in mid-September, sometime between the 15th and the 18th. But no film was advertised as a 20th CF release in the trades or on screen until early October, with THIS IS THE LIFE leading the pack on October 7. METROPOLITAN was regarded as the first "official" release as far as I can determine, but IN OLD KENTUCKY was released several weeks after that film and variously advertised as a either a Fox film or a 20th C-F film.
(The same situation occurs after the formation of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and that studio's initial release, HE WHO GETS SLAPPED In 1924. For nearly two years all advertising referred to "Metro-Goldwyn", with Mayer unmentioned except in the film's credits).
I guess I can reveal that I've been working off-and-on for several years on a book about the Fox films from 1914 to 1935. If the actual status of WAY DOWN EAST and IN OLD KENTUCKY (the only two that are currently in doubt) remains muddied, I may have to put them in a special category--but then, I'd have to do that for the earliest Fox films of 1914-1915, which still being advertised as "Box Office Attractions" or "William Fox Vaudeville" releases!

"I'll wager you'd gnash the same teeth trying to determine the last official First National Picture pre-Warner Brothers." [RICHARD ROBERTS]

The FN-WB thing doesn't bother me too much (mainly because I'm not considering a book about that dichotomy). Because of some complicated tax issues, a certain number of films went out under the First National banner and a certain number as Warner Bros., annually from 1928 on. Only up until 1935 was there any pretense that this single studio operation was two separate entities, with certain films (like SIX DAY BIKE RIDER and I SELL ANYTHING) substituting the FN "World in a Chain" logo for the WB shield in the opening "zoom from clouds" sequence.
After that, the only film I ever saw that included the FN logo (within the WB shield) was 1938's FOUR DAUGHTERS. The studio was content to open with the WB shield and add "A First National Picture" after the cast credits. This however isn't quite the same as the 20th CF situation, where the confusion occurred only in the last months of 1935, and wasn't perpetrated over a period of seven years.
And then there's Chesterfield-Invincible...ah, I'm too tired....

Hal Erickson wrote:(The same situation occurs after the formation of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and that studio's initial release, HE WHO GETS SLAPPED In 1924. For nearly two years all advertising referred to "Metro-Goldwyn", with Mayer unmentioned except in the film's credits).

I've done some research on the Metro-Goldwyn-MGM situation, and while the corporate merger took place on 17 April 1924 there were a few titles that trickled out in the following weeks like True as Steel and The Recoil which were copyrighted only to Goldwyn Pictures. It's been a while since I looked at the Metro data but I think Sherlock Jr. was among their very last releases, and only "Metro" is ever visible in the opening or closing titles, never Metro-Goldwyn.

The earliest film that I count as a full-fledged Metro-Goldwyn title is Revelation, which starred Viola Dana and Monte Blue and premiered in NY in June. It seems to be the earliest film for which M-G was the copyright claimant, so that's good enough for me. 14 other titles were released by the new company before He Who Gets Slapped.

I think the easiest solution to your Fox dilemma is to include all Fox and TCF films through the end of 1935. That would let your readers get a good feel for the immediate pre- and post-merger output of the company and no one should be unhappy for an author erring on the side of inclusiveness.

-Harold

Harold Aherne wrote:

Hal Erickson wrote:(The same situation occurs after the formation of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and that studio's initial release, HE WHO GETS SLAPPED In 1924. For nearly two years all advertising referred to "Metro-Goldwyn", with Mayer unmentioned except in the film's credits).

I think the easiest solution to your Fox dilemma is to include all Fox and TCF films through the end of 1935. That would let your readers get a good feel for the immediate pre- and post-merger output of the company and no one should be unhappy for an author erring on the side of inclusiveness.

-Harold

Not a bad idea, though that would include films made after the merger. The 1935 films that are unquestionably 20th C-F releases are, in order of appearance: THIS IS THE LIFE, CHARLIE CHAN IN SHANGHAI,METROPOLITAN,the Spanish-language ROSE DE FRANCIA, BAD BOY, PADDY O'DAY, MUSIC IS MAGIC, THE MAN WHO BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO, THANKS A MILLION, MY MARRIAGE, NAVY WIFE (originally announced for Sept 17 '35 release but bumped to Nov. 29), SHOW THEM NO MERCY, YOUR UNCLE DUDLEY, WHISPERING SMITH SPEAKS (A Sol Lesser Production),THE LITTLEST REBEL and PROFESSIONAL SOLDIER (the last "20th Century" production, as indicated in the opening credits).

The trick would be, Hal, to find all those missing Fox titles up to 1935 but then that 1935 Call of the Wild is very incomplete on DVD and it was not a Fox title in the New Jersey fire of the mid-1930s, I presume or should not have been.

CALL OF THE WILD (actually a 20th Century-UA release) currently exists in the reissue version sent out by 20thCF in the 1940s--note the "Buy War Bonds" slug in the closing credits.
Even when it first came out, there were changes. Originally Jack Oakie's character was killed, but preview audiences reacted so negatively that a new scene was shot for the finale in which Oakie and Gable are reunited.
And of course, we all know about Loretta Young's bun in the oven once shooting wrapped.

Hal Erickson wrote: And of course, we all know about Loretta Young's bun in the oven once shooting wrapped.

So was the "bun" a 20th Century or a TCF production. Maybe it should be considered a Young/Gable independant production.