Paul Davidson (film producer)

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Paul Davidson

Paul Davidson (born March 30, 1867 in Lötzen , East Prussia, † July 18, 1927 in Ebenhausen , Upper Bavaria) was a German film producer .

Life

He began commercial training at the age of 16 and then worked in the clothing industry. While visiting a magical theater in Paris , he became aware of the novel cinematography. On April 7, 1904, he decided to get into the film business.

In 1905 he founded the Allgemeine Kinematographen-Theater Gesellschaft mbH in Frankfurt am Main with share capital of 20,000 Reichsmarks . On March 21, 1906, he opened his first movie theater, the Union Theater in Mannheim . In 1907 he became the owner of the Union Theater on Alexanderplatz in Berlin , which he opened on September 4, 1909. On August 21, 1910, the even more magnificent Union-Theater Unter den Linden followed . On October 3, 1913, Davidson opened the UT on Kurfürstendamm and meanwhile owned 56 cinemas in Germany, Belgium and Hungary.

In 1909/10 he transformed his Frankfurt company into Projektions-AG "Union" (PAGU), the first German film company. In 1910 he started distributing films and in 1912 film production in Berlin-Tempelhof .

In August 1915 he sold his cinema chain to the Danish company Nordisk Film . Davidson focused on film production, where Ernst Lubitsch rose to be his star. When in November 1917 with support from the Supreme Command , the Universum Film (UFA) was founded, a few months later went to Davidson also PAGU in it.

In 1916, Davidson, as General Director of PAGU, received the Officer's Cross of the Order of Alexander from Prince and Tsar Ferdinand of Bulgaria for the film Bogdan Stimoff .

Davidson became general director of Ufa together with Karl Bratz. In addition to Ernst Lubitsch, he discovered and promoted Emil Jannings , Pola Negri and Asta Nielsen . On April 7, 1921, he gave up his post at Ufa and became a co-founder of the European Film Alliance GmbH (EFA). After the failure of this project, he founded Paul-Davidson AG on September 17, 1924 under the umbrella of Ufa. At the beginning of 1927 he left Ufa completely and committed suicide a few months later.

Filmography

literature

Web links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Paul Davidson died. In: Film-Kurier. No. 168, July 19, 1927. imdb names July 1927 as the date of death and Berlin as the place of death , whereas Kay Less thinks : The film's great personal lexicon as the date of June 11, 1927 and Dresden as the place of death.
  2. ^ Gerhard Lamprecht : German silent films 1915-1916 . Deutsche Kinemathek eV, Berlin 1969, p. 339 .
personal data
SURNAME Davidson, Paul
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German film producer
DATE OF BIRTH March 30, 1867
PLACE OF BIRTH Lötzen , East Prussia
DATE OF DEATH July 18, 1927
Place of death Ebenhausen , Upper Bavaria