How New Jersey Became the Birthplace of the U.S. Movie Industry
Carole Horst The American movie business started in New Jersey.Between 1893 and 1896 in West Orange, N.J., Thomas Edison was developing the early motion picture tech, inventing new ways to capture images in motion, and the result is that “you have the only fully operational motion picture studio facility in the world,” says Richard Koszarski, professor emeritus of English and cinema studies at Rutgers University, and expert in the early motion picture industry in New York and New Jersey.His latest book on film history is “Keep ’Em in the East: Kazan, Kubrick, and the Postwar New York Film Renaissance.”While companies were setting up production operations and offices in New York City, including Edison, “it’s very difficult to film in New