The Rise and Fall of Cosmopolitan Productions: William Randolph Hearst's Cross-Promotional Strategies

This article seeks to reassess Hearst's place in American cinema history by focusing on Cosmopolitan Productions, Hearst's fiction film unit, and its dealings with major Hollywood studios. I use MGM/Cosmopolitan's Our Dancing Daughters (Harry Beaumont, 1928) as a case study to explore two forms of cross-promotional strategies of the late 1920s: serialized fictionalizations and news articles. While Hearst's involvement in Hollywood may be considered peripheral, he developed unique transmedial ways of promoting film interests nationwide.