Jack L. Warner

One of the original pantheon of moguls who shaped Hollywood into the global leader in filmed entertainment, Jack L. Warner was the co-founder of Warner Bros. Studios, and led the company over the course of a four-decade career that saw him earn a reputation as one of the industry's most successful - and despicable - figures. Warner entered the business with his brothers Harry, Sam and Albert, and collectively launched Warner Bros. in 1923. He quickly established himself as the dominant force among the family through a combination of shrewd negotiations and unbridled ruthlessness. Though he would oversee some of the most acclaimed films of the 20th century, including the first "talking picture," "The Jazz Singer" (1927), as well as "The Public Enemy" (1931), "The Maltese Falcon" (1941), "Casablanca" (1942) and "Giant" (1956), he dismissed anyone who displeased him, from top actors and screenwriters to his own brothers, whom he would ouster from their own company. When he was himself removed from Warner Bros. in 1969, Jack Warner was among the last of the great Hollywood movers and shakers, the men who helped to create the Hollywood dream, and who ruled it with an iron fist.