Putting Penn to Paper: Warner Bros.’ Contract Governance and the Transition to New Hollywood

Abstract

This article examines the contracts at Warner Bros. for two productions by director Arthur Penn as a case study to consider how these agreements shaped production cultures during the emergence of New Hollywood. Through the 1950s, the studio employed production-distribution agreements that used strict controls and regulations to mimic its in-house procedures. But in the 1960s, it preferred short-form joint venture agreements that allowed more direct control in shaping the film’s production while turning the producers into self-regulators. As the contracts reveal, Warner Bros. reshaped their business to grant production culture control to producers while also ensuring the studios’ corporate role in the New Hollywood landscape.