What happened to Hollywood’s ‘Big Five’ studios?
During what many people dub the ‘Golden Age of Hollywood‘, all-powerful movie studios ruled the industry with an iron fist.
While there were plenty of companies around, only a select few really made an impact at the very top of the pyramid, and these were the so-called ‘Big Five’.
If you wanted the biggest stars, the best special effects, the most engaging stories, then these guys were the ones to go to, and without them, Hollywood as we know it today simply wouldn’t exist, which raises the question of what happened to them after the ‘Golden Age’ bubble burst.
For that, you can look to poor financial decisions, changing trends, and many, many corporate mergers, following which the studios that were once untouchable now look very different, with one of them even disappearing entirely.
Obviously, each of these five studios has a long and complicated history that people could (and have) written entire books about, so think of this piece as an appetiser, a brief introduction to whet your curiosity, and if you want to learn more about this fascinating era of Hollywood on your own time, then be my guest.
What befell Hollywood’s ‘Big Five’ studios?
Paramount Pictures
Initially founded as the Famous Players Film Company in 1912, Paramount Pictures is one of the oldest film studios of any kind still operating.
Founder Adolph Zukor originally had 24 actors under contract, who are represented by the 24 stars that still adorn the company’s famous mountain logo. As they picked up momentum, stars were still their primary currency, with Marlene Dietrich, Mae West, Gary Cooper, the Marx brothers, and many more on the books. They made money hand over fist thanks to the fact that they also owned a large number of movie theatres, but unfortunately, the US government cottoned on to this in 1948, and the company was forced to split, which effectively brought an end to studio dominance in the trade.
Minor speed bumps to one side, Paramount continued to be a sign of excellence, responsible for both The Godfather and Titanic, which broke box office records at the time. In 2025, the company became part of the massive conglomerate, Paramount Skydance, which also owns Nickelodeon, CBS, MTV, and plenty of others. The company still has its headquarters in Hollywood, remaining the only one of the ‘Big Five’ still stationed in the heart of Tinseltown.
Warner Bros Pictures
Without Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack, the real-life ‘Warner brothers’ that give this studio its name, Hollywood’s Golden Age might have never happened. Warner Bros was the company that gave the world The Jazz Singer, the first movie to feature fully synchronised sound, and the next few years continued to yield hits, such as influential gangster flick Little Caesar and ‘Best Picture’ winner The Life of Emile Zola. Unfortunately, from a business perspective, the good times were not to last.
Warner Bros have spent the past several decades being kicked around from one buyer to another. In 1969, they were bought by Kinney National Company, an organisation best known for running funeral homes and parking services. They were famously bought out by AOL right before the dot-com bubble burst, resulting in one of the most disastrous mergers in history. They were eventually absorbed by Discovery Inc, but that merger also failed to set the world on fire.
As we speak, the company is the focus of a bidding war, attracting attention from the likes of Netflix and their old rivals, Paramount, a sad sight, seeing such an esteemed studio fall this far.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
In case you hadn’t already worked this out, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (or MGM for short) was born from a merger of three existing companies. Movie mogul Marcus Loew formed the super studio in 1924, and he quickly set about pursuing the biggest names in town.
The company’s slogan was “more stars than there are in heaven”, specialising in musicals like The Wizard of Oz, Meet Me in St Louis, and Singin’ in the Rain. The company’s famous lion logo roared loud and proud for most of the 20th century, but the kitty’s claws would eventually get trimmed.
By 2009, the company was in over $3billion worth of debt, and they filed for bankruptcy one year later, a troubling time they would eventually get themselves out of, but this period betrayed serious issues at the core of the company, which led to Amazon buying the studio in 2022, meaning we have to think about Jeff Bezos every time we sit down to watch a James Bond movie.
These days, as part of one of the biggest companies on the planet, MGM are doing very well for itself, even if they did have to sell their soul to get there.
RKO Pictures
RKO is easily the most interesting name on this list, birthed from the combination of two existing companies, one of which was owned by Joseph Kennedy, patriarch of the famous Kennedy dynasty.
It was home to many of the most important and influential names of the era, from the majesty of Katharine Hepburn to the musicality of Fred Astaire. Its output was absolutely stellar, exemplified by King Kong in 1933 and a little picture called Citizen Kane eight years later, but things started to go downhill when the studio was purchased by Howard Hughes in 1948.
As anyone who knows anything about Hughes will tell you, he was absolutely bonkers, and his erratic business practices and general behaviour led to a major downturn in fortunes. After less than a decade and many legal battles behind the scenes, it was sold to the General Tire and Rubber Company. This acquisition changed little, and by 1958, the studio in its original form was dead.
The RKO name still exists today through a company that handles remakes of old films, but it’s a crying shame that one of the most pivotal players in Hollywood history now lies in rack and ruin.
20th Century Studios
The youngest of the ‘Big Five’ by far, 20th Century Studios was formed in 1935, almost a decade after the ‘Golden Age’ began. Previous incarnation: 20th Century Pictures merged with the Fox Film Company (remember that name now) to form the new juggernaut. The studio flourished during the Second World War, quickly establishing itself as the place to go for edgier, more adult-oriented output, and in the 1950s, it started releasing all of its movies in CinemaScope, the first major studio to do so.
As we all know, 20th Century was eventually consumed by Rupert Murdoch and his News Corporation leviathan. After several decades in the clutches of the Aussie tyrant, it then became part of one of the biggest buyouts in Hollywood history, wherein the Disney Corporation paid over $71billion for most of the studio’s assets in 2019.
From a pop culture standpoint, the results were seismic as Marvel Studios now had access to characters like the X-Men and the Fantastic Four. TV titans like The Simpsons and Family Guy now have a home on Disney+, and dozens and dozens of recognisable franchises were welcomed under the Disney umbrella, as Mickey and co smiled all the way to the bank.
