Universal Monsters - Beginnings

Beginnings

Universal started out by the name Independent Moving Pictures Company (IMP). IMP had only one horror film, Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (1913).

Universal's earliest success in the horror genre was the historical drama The Hunchback of Notre Dame in 1923. It starred Lon Chaney in the title role. The lavish production sets rebuilt 15th-century Paris on an epic scale, even re-creating the famed Notre Dame de Paris cathedral.

A runaway success at the box office, Hunchback of Notre Dame inspired Universal to produce their first true horror film, The Phantom of the Opera, based on the mystery novel by Gaston Leroux. The film was released in 1925. Chaney designed and endured torturous make-up that even exceeded the demands of his previous role as the Hunchback. And as with the film Hunchback, the sets played an important part in the film. The interior of the Opéra Garnier was recreated to scale, and remains one of the longest-standing film sets to this day. It was used for the 1943 remake with Claude Rains, as well as numerous other pictures.

Chaney, who was a freelance player at the time of Phantom of the Opera's production, signed a contract at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and could no longer produce character roles for Universal. His death in 1930 ended any possibility of his leaving MGM for another studio, and Universal turned their attentions to other actors such as German character actor Conrad Veidt, who had been a star in the 1920 German expressionist horror masterpiece, Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari (The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari), and in 1928's The Man Who Laughs.

• The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923)
• The Phantom of the Opera (1925)
• The Cat and the Canary (1927)
• The Man Who Laughs (1928)
• The Last Warning (1929)
• The Last Performance (1929)