Paramount Studios – Hollywood, California

Producer Richard Zampella on the Lot at Paramount Pictures 9.29.15

Of the Big Six Movie Studios, Paramount is the only one still based in Hollywood, and Paramount and Fox are the only ones still located within the Los Angeles city limits.

True to its dramatic origins, Paramount has been of the most storied companies in American film history with Adolph Zukor and his successors amassing a dazzling stable of talent that upheld the most robust rosters of celebrities which included their biggest star – Gary Cooper.

Cooper singlehandedly lifted Paramount’s sagging Depression-era fortunes, playing “everyman” heroes, perfectly capturing the era, such as Longfellow Deeds in Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (1936); Long John Willoughby in Meet John Doe (1941) — both Frank Capra classics — and Alvin York in Sergeant York (1941). Cooper came to embody the essence of the American character, especially that unique combination of rugged individualism and magnanimous selflessness — in his case, nurtured by the West and his English immigrant parents, who inculcated in him the elegant manners of a “gentleman.”

Cooper played one of baseball's greats, Lou Gehrig, in The Pride of the Yankees (1942) and garnered another Best Actor Academy Award nomination. Appearing in a film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls, Cooper starred opposite Ingrid Bergman in a drama set during the Spanish Civil War. This role earned him a third Academy Award nomination.

Of the 100s of films that cooper starred in throughout his decades long career – Gary Cooper filmed the majority of those films on the lot at Paramount Studios.

About Richard Zampella:

Richard Zampella is the Producer of Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen which is a documentary film about the 20-year friendship between writer Ernest Hemingway and film actor Gary Cooper. Written and directed by John Mulholland, it is narrated by actor Sam Waterston with actor Len Cariou as the voice of writer Ernest Hemingway. The film was reviewed by The New York Times film critic Andy Webster on October 11, 2013 and was named an NY Times Critics’ Pic by Manohla Dargis, A. O. Scott and Stephen Holden.