| Biography | The Gaumont-British Picture Corporation was a company which produced and distributed films and operated a cinema chain in the United Kingdom.
Gaumont-British was founded in 1898 as the British subsidiary of the French Gaumont Film Company. It became independent of its French parent in 1922 when Isidore Ostrer acquired control of Gaumont-British. In 1927 a leading silent film maker, the Ideal Film Company, merged with Gaumont.
The company's Lime Grove Studios was used for film productions including Alfred Hitchcock's adaptation of The 39 Steps (1935), while its Islington Studios made Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes (1938). In the 1930s, the company employed 16,000 people.
In the United States, Gaumont-British had its own distribution operation for its films until December 1938, when it outsourced distribution to 20th Century Fox. In 1941 the Rank Organisation bought Gaumont-British and its sister company Gainsborough Pictures. |