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Table of contents What's This?
  • Conditions Governing Access
  • Restrictions on Use and Reproduction
  • Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements
  • Provenance/Source of Acquisition
  • UCLA Catalog Record ID
  • Preferred Citation
  • Processing Information
  • Expanded Biographical Narrative
  • Scope and Content
  • Organization and Arrangement
  • Online Items Available
  • Items Removed from the Collection

  • Contributing Institution: UCLA Library Special Collections
    Title: Stanley Chase papers
    Creator: Chase, Stanley
    Identifier/Call Number: LSC.1090
    Physical Description: 157.2 linear feet (105 boxes, 12 oversize boxes, and 27 map folders)
    Date (inclusive): circa 1925-2001
    Date (bulk): 1955-1989
    Abstract: Stanley Chase (1928-) was a theater, film, and television producer. The collection consists of production and business files, original production drawings, posters, press clippings, sound recordings, and scripts from his major projects.
    Physical Location: Stored off-site. All requests to access special collections material must be made in advance using the request button located on this page.
    Language of Material: Materials are in English.

    Conditions Governing Access

    Open for research. All requests to access special collections materials must be made in advance using the request button located on this page.

    Restrictions on Use and Reproduction

    Property rights to the physical objects belong to UCLA Library Special Collections. All other rights, including copyright, are retained by the creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue the copyright owner or his or her heir for permission to publish where The UC Regents do not hold the copyright.

    Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements

    CONTAINS AUDIOVISUAL MATERIALS: This collection contains both processed and unprocessed audiovisual materials. For information about the access status of the material that you are looking for, refer to the Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements note at the series and file levels. All requests to access processed audiovisual materials must be made in advance using the request button located on this page.

    Provenance/Source of Acquisition

    Gift of Stanley Chase, 1967-1968 and 2002.

    UCLA Catalog Record ID

    UCLA Catalog Record ID: 999642153606533 

    Preferred Citation

    [Identification of item], Stanley Chase Papers (Collection 1090). Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, UCLA.

    Processing Information

    The collection was originally brief-listed by Manuscripts Division staff in 1968. Following the second gift in 2002, the collection was partially rehoused by Joshua Amberg in the fall of 2004, then thoroughly rehoused and processed by Timothy Holland in the Center For Primary Research and Training (CFPRT), with assistance from Laurel McPhee, in the summer of 2005.
    Collections are processed to a variety of levels depending on the work necessary to make them usable, their perceived user interest and research value, availability of staff and resources, and competing priorities. Library Special Collections provides a standard level of preservation and access for all collections and, when time and resources permit, conducts more intensive processing. These materials have been arranged and described according to national and local standards and best practices.
    We are committed to providing ethical, inclusive, and anti-racist description of the materials we steward, and to remediating existing description of our materials that contains language that may be offensive or cause harm. We invite you to submit feedback about how our collections are described, and how they could be described more accurately, by filling out the form located on our website: Report Potentially Offensive Description in Library Special Collections. 

    Expanded Biographical Narrative

    Stanley Chase was born Stanley Cohen on May 3, 1928 in Brooklyn, New York. He graduated from New Utrecht High School in 1944, and enlisted in the Navy at age 17. He received his B.A. from New York University in 1949, and immediately pursued graduate study in drama at Columbia University. In 1950 Chase went to work for CBS Television and met Carmen Capalbo, with whom he eventually produced the record-breaking musical off-Broadway hit, The Threepenny Opera. Chase followed the success of that production with three more Broadway plays: The Potting Shed (1957), A Moon for the Misbegotten (1957), and The Cave Dwellers (1957). He also produced a European tour of Free and Easy, a Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer jazz musical featuring Quincy Jones.
    Chase went on to work for various film and television companies, including Metro-Goldwyn Mayer, 1962; the American Broadcasting Company, where he was director of network television program development from 1962-1963; United Artists, where he created and developed the ABC television pilot Inside Danny Baker with Mel Brooks in 1963; Columbia Pictures, where he was a television production head and executive producer from 1963-1964; and Universal Studios, where he was an executive and producer from 1965-1970. Major projects from this period include the Universal Studio television anthology series Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre for NBC, 1966-1967, and the Universal Studios films The Hell with Heroes (1968) and Colossus: The Forbin Project (1970). Chase founded Stanley Chase Productions, Inc. in 1976 as a motion picture, television production, and distribution company, and was president of that enterprise. Major motion picture projects included High Ballin' (1978), Fish Hawk (1982), and Mack the Knife (1990). Television projects included the made for television movies The Courage of Kavik, the Wolf Dog (1979) and An American Christmas Carol (1980).

    Scope and Content

    The collection consists of production and business files, original production drawings, posters, press clippings, sound recordings, and scripts documenting Stanley Chase's forty-year career as a producer in theater, film, and television. The production files contain contracts, correspondence, legal documents, memoranda, photographs, publicity materials and other miscellaneous papers. Of particular interest are the files pertaining to Chase's off-Broadway production of Kurt Weill and Berthold Brecht's The Threepenny Opera, and the Broadway plays A Moon for the Misbegotten, The Potting Shed, and The Cave Dwellers at the Bijou Theatre. Important materials from the film series include production files, original production design drawings, and photographs for The Hell with Heroes (1968) and Colossus: The Forbin Project (1970), both created while Chase was an executive producer at Universal Studios. The collection also contains voluminous files related to Stanley Chase Productions, Inc. projects and Chase's work in television, including screenplays, story pitches, and memoranda.

    Organization and Arrangement

    Arranged in the following series:
    1. Theater, 1946-1989 (34 boxes, 5 oversize boxes, 5 map folders), subseries A-E as follows:
      1. The Threepenny Opera, 1952-1961.
      2. Free and Easy, 1956-1960.
      3. Bijou Theatre files, 1946-1961.
      4. Miscellaneous, 1953-1989.
      5. Playbill programs, ca. 1950-1960.
    2. Film, 1955-2001 (38 boxes, 4 oversize boxes, 20 map folders), subseries A-F as follows:
      1. The Hell with Heroes, 1967-1968.
      2. Colossus: The Forbin Project, 1965-1970.
      3. High Ballin', 1976-1986.
      4. Mack the Knife, 1955-1990.
      5. Miscellaneous productions, ca. 1973-1981.
      6. Scripts, 1956-2001.
    3. Television, 1925-1994 (32 boxes, 1 oversize box, 1 map folder), subseries A-D as follows:
      1. An American Christmas Carol, 1979-1994.
      2. The Courage of Kavik, the Wolf Dog, 1977-1983.
      3. Miscellaneous productions, 1925-1994.
      4. Scripts, 1960-1984.
    4. Audiovisual materials, 1959-1989 (1 box, 2 oversize boxes).
    5. Miscellaneous, 1944 (1 folder, 1 map folder).

    Online Items Available

    Portions of this collection have been digitized and are available online: Stanley Chase Papers (1 item). 

    Items Removed from the Collection

    The following eleven reels of film and two videos found among the papers were transferred to the UCLA Film and Television Archive in September 2005 for processing.
    • ¾" videotape: Grace Kelly; The Courage of Kavik, the Wolf Dog; High Ballin'; Fish Hawk; High Ballin' screen tests; Fish Hawk trailers.
    • VHS videotape: Grace Kelly; An American Christmas Carol.
    • 16mm film: Dream Wife pilot; Inside Danny Baker pilot; Jigsaw pilot; Colossus: The Forbin Project.
    • 35mm film: Frontier Family Adventure (aka Fish Hawk), reel 1 only.

    Subjects and Indexing Terms

    Television producers and directors -- United States -- Archives.
    Motion picture producers and directors -- United States -- Archives.
    Film scripts.
    Television plays.
    Theatrical producers and directors -- United States -- Archives.
    Chase, Stanley, 1927-2005--Archives.
    Stanley Chase Productions.