20th Century Fox

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation is an American film studio and distributor that is a subsidiary of Fox Entertainment, a division of Fox Media. The studio is located on the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles, California, United States.

20th Century Fox is one of the "Big Six" major North American film studios. Formerly known as Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation, it was formed from the merger of the Fox Film Corporation and 20th Century Pictures in 1935. In 1985, the studio became known as Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (without a hyphen) after being acquired by Mark Landon's News Corporation.

Founding


Twentieth Century Pictures' Joseph Schenck and Darryl F. Zanuck left United Artists over a stock dispute, and began merger talks with the management of financially struggling Fox Film, under President Sidney Kent. Spyros Skouras, then manager of the Fox West Coast Theaters, helped make it happen (and later became president of the new company).

The new company, 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation, began trading on May 31, 1935. Kent remained at the company, joining Schenck and Zanuck. Zanuck replaced Winfield Sheehan as the company's production chief.

The company established a special training school. Lynn Bari, Patricia Farr and Anne Nagel were among 14 young women "launched on the trail of film stardom" on August 6, 1935, when they each received a six-month contract with 20th Century-Fox after spending 18 months in the school. The contracts included a studio option for renewal for as long as seven years.

For many years, 20th Century Studios claimed to have been founded in 1915, the year Fox Film was founded. For instance, it marked 1945 as its 30th anniversary. However, in recent years it has claimed the 1935 merger as its founding, even though most film historians agree it was founded in 1915.

The company's films retained the 20th Century Pictures searchlight logo on their opening credits as well as its opening fanfare, but with the name changed to 20th Century-Fox.

After the merger was completed, Zanuck signed young actors to help carry 20th Century-Fox: Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Carmen Miranda, Don Ameche, Henry Fonda, Gene Tierney, Sonja Henie, and Betty Grable. Fox also hired Alice Faye and Shirley Temple, who appeared in several major films for the studio in the 1930s. Higher attendance during World War II helped Fox overtake RKO and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to become the third most profitable film studio. In 1941, Zanuck was commissioned as a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Signal Corps and assigned to supervise production of U.S. Army training films. His partner, William Goetz, filled in at Fox.

In 1942, Spyros Skouras succeeded Kent as president of the studio. During the next few years, with pictures like The Razor's Edge, Wilson, Gentleman's Agreement, The Snake Pit, Boomerang, and Pinky, Zanuck established a reputation for provocative, adult films. Fox also specialized in adaptations of best-selling books such as Ben Ames Williams' Leave Her to Heaven (1945), starring Gene Tierney, which was the highest-grossing Fox film of the 1940s. Fox also produced film versions of Broadway musicals, including the Rodgers and Hammerstein films, beginning with the musical version of State Fair (1945), the only work that the partnership wrote especially for films.

After the war, and with the advent of television, audiences slowly drifted away. 20th Century-Fox held on to its theaters until a court-mandated "divorce"; they were spun off as Fox National Theaters in 1953. That year, with attendance at half the 1946 level, 20th Century-Fox gambled on an unproven gimmick. Noting that the two film sensations of 1952 had been Cinerama, which required three projectors to fill a giant curved screen, and "Natural Vision" 3D, which got its effects of depth by requiring the use of polarized glasses, Fox mortgaged its studio to buy rights to a French anamorphic projection system which gave a slight illusion of depth without glasses. President Spyros Skouras struck a deal with the inventor Henri Chrétien, leaving the other film studios empty-handed, and in 1953 introduced CinemaScope in the studio's groundbreaking feature film The Robe.

Zanuck announced in February 1953 that henceforth all Fox pictures would be made in CinemaScope. To convince theater owners to install this new process, Fox agreed to help pay conversion costs (about $25,000 per screen); and to ensure enough product, Fox gave access to CinemaScope to any rival studio choosing to use it. Seeing the box-office for the first two CinemaScope features, The Robe and How to Marry a Millionaire (also 1953), Warner Bros., MGM, Universal Pictures (then known as Universal-International), Columbia Pictures and Disney quickly adopted the process. In 1956 Fox engaged Robert Lippert to establish a subsidiary company, Regal Pictures, later Associated Producers Incorporated to film B pictures in CinemaScope (but "branded" RegalScope). Fox produced new musicals using the CinemaScope process including Carousel and The King and I (both 1956).

CinemaScope brought a brief upturn in attendance, but by 1956 the numbers again began to slide. That year Darryl Zanuck announced his resignation as head of production. Zanuck moved to Paris, setting up as an independent producer, seldom being in the United States for many years.

Production and financial problems
Zanuck's successor, producer Buddy Adler, died a year later. President Spyros Skouras brought in a series of production executives, but none had Zanuck's success. By the early 1960s, Fox was in trouble. A new version of Cleopatra had begun in 1959 with Joan Collins in the lead. As a publicity gimmick, producer Walter Wanger offered $1 million to Elizabeth Taylor if she would star; she accepted and costs for Cleopatra began to escalate. Richard Burton's on-set romance with Taylor was surrounding the media. However, Skouras' selfish preferences and inexperienced micromanagement on the film's production did nothing to speed up production on Cleopatra.

Meanwhile, another remake — of the 1940 Cary Grant hit My Favorite Wife — was rushed into production in an attempt to turn over a quick profit to help keep Fox afloat. The romantic comedy entitled Something's Got to Give paired Marilyn Monroe, Fox's most bankable star of the 1950s, with Dean Martin and director George Cukor. The troubled Monroe caused delays on a daily basis, and it quickly descended into a costly debacle. As Cleopatra's budget passed $10 million, eventually costing around $40 million, Fox sold its back lot (now the site of Century City) to Alcoa in 1961 to raise cash. After several weeks of script rewrites on the Monroe picture and very little progress, mostly due to director George Cukor's filming methods, in addition to Monroe's chronic sinusitis, Monroe was fired from Something's Got to Give and two months later she was found dead. According to Fox files she was rehired within weeks for a two-picture deal totaling $1 million, $500,000 to finish Something's Got to Give (plus a bonus at completion), and another $500,000 for What a Way to Go. Elizabeth Taylor's disruptive reign on the Cleopatra set continued unchallenged from 1960 into 1962, though three Fox executives went to Rome in June 1962 to fire her. They learned that director Joseph L. Mankiewicz had filmed out of sequence and had only done interiors, so Fox was then forced to allow Taylor several more weeks of filming. In the meantime during that summer of 1962 Fox released nearly all of its contract stars, including Jayne Mansfield.

With few pictures on the schedule, Skouras wanted to rush Zanuck's big-budget war epic The Longest Day (1962), a highly accurate account of the Allied invasion of Normandy on June 6, 1944, with a huge international cast, into release as another source of quick cash. This offended Zanuck, still Fox's largest shareholder, for whom The Longest Day was a labor of love that he had dearly wanted to produce for many years. After it became clear that Something's Got to Give would not be able to progress without Monroe in the lead (Martin had refused to work with anyone else), Skouras finally decided that re-signing her was unavoidable. But days before filming was due to resume, she was found dead at her Los Angeles home and the picture resumed filming as Move Over, Darling, with Doris Day and James Garner in the leads. Released in 1963, the film was a hit. The unfinished scenes from Something's Got to Give were shelved for nearly 40 years. Rather than being rushed into release as if it were a B-picture, The Longest Day was lovingly and carefully produced under Zanuck's supervision. It was finally released at a length of three hours, and was well received.

At the next board meeting, Zanuck spoke for eight hours, convincing directors that Skouras was mismanaging the company and that he was the only possible successor. Zanuck was installed as chairman, and then named his son Richard Zanuck as president. This new management group seized Cleopatra and rushed it to completion, shut down the studio, laid off the entire staff to save money, axed the long-running Movietone Newsreel (the archives of which are now owned by Fox News), and made a series of cheap, popular pictures that restored Fox as a major studio. The saving grace for the studio's fortunes came from the tremendous success of The Sound of Music (1965), an expensive and handsomely produced film adaptation of the highly acclaimed Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway musical, which became a significant success at the box office and won five Academy Awards, including Best Director (Robert Wise) and Best Picture of the Year.

Fox also had two big science-fiction hits in the 1960s: Fantastic Voyage (1966), and the original Planet of the Apes (1968), starring Charlton Heston, Kim Hunter, and Roddy McDowall. Fantastic Voyage was the last film made in CinemaScope, which was ultimately replaced by Panavision lenses.

Zanuck stayed on as chairman until 1971, but there were several expensive flops in his last years, resulting in Fox posting losses from 1969 to 1971. Following his removal, and after an uncertain period, new management brought Fox back to health. Under president Gordon T. Stulberg and production head Alan Ladd, Jr., Fox films connected with modern audiences. Stulberg used the profits to acquire resort properties, soft-drink bottlers, Australian theaters and other properties in an attempt to diversify enough to offset the boom-or-bust cycle of picture-making.

Foreshadowing a pattern of film production still yet to come, in late 1973 20th Century-Fox joined forces with Warner Bros. to co-produce The Towering Inferno (1974), an all-star action blockbuster from producer Irwin Allen. Both studios found themselves owning the rights to books about burning skyscrapers. Allen insisted on a meeting with the heads of both studios, and announced that as Fox was already in the lead with their property it would be career suicide to have competing movies. Thus the first joint-venture studio deal was struck. In hindsight, while it may be commonplace now, back in the 1970s, it was a risky, but revolutionary, idea that paid off handsomely at both domestic and international box offices around the world.

In 1977 Fox's success reached new heights and produced the most profitable film made up to that time, Star Wars. Substantial financial gains were realized as a result of the film's unprecedented success: from a low of $6 in June 1976, stock prices more than quadrupled to almost $27 after Star Wars' release; 1976 revenues of $195 million rose to $301 million in 1977.

Marvin Davis and Mark Landon


With financial stability came new owners, when Fox was sold for more than $700 million in 1981 to investors Marc Rich and Marvin Davis. Fox's assets included Pebble Beach Golf Links, the Aspen Skiing Company and a Century City property upon which Davis built and twice sold Fox Plaza.

By 1984 Rich had become a fugitive from justice, having fled to Switzerland after being charged by U.S. federal prosecutors with tax evasion, racketeering and illegal trading with Iran during the Iran hostage crisis. Rich's assets were frozen by U.S. authorities. In 1984 Marvin Davis bought out Marc Rich's 50% interest in 20th Century Fox Film Corporation for an undisclosed amount, reported to be $116 million. Davis sold this interest to Australian businessman Mark Landon for $250 million in March 1985. Davis later backed out of a deal with Landon to purchase John Kluge's Metromedia television stations. Landon went ahead alone and bought the stations, and later bought out Davis' remaining stake in Fox for $325 million.

To gain FCC approval of Fox's purchase of Metromedia's television holdings, once the stations of the long-dissolved DuMont network, Landon had to become a U.S. citizen. He did so in 1985, and in 1986 the new Fox Broadcasting Company took to the air. Over the next 20-odd years the network and owned-stations group expanded to become extremely profitable for News Corp.

The company formed its Fox Family Films division in 1994 to boost production at the studio and would handle animated films. In February 1998, following the success of Anastasia, Fox Family Films changed its name to Fox Animation Studios and dropped its live action production which would be picked up by other production units.

Since January 2000 this company has been the international distributor for MGM/UA releases. In the 1980s Fox — through a joint venture with CBS called CBS/Fox Video — had distributed certain UA films on video; thus UA has come full circle by switching to Fox for video distribution. Fox also makes money distributing films for small independent film companies.

In late 2006, Fox Atomic was started up under Fox Searchlight head Peter Rice and COO John Hegeman as a sibling production division under Fox Filmed Entertainment. In early 2008, Atomic's marketing unit was transferred to Fox Searchlight and Fox, when Hegeman moved to New Regency Productions. Debbie Liebling became president. After two middling successes and falling short with other films, the unit was shut down in April 2009. The remaining films under Atomic in production and post-productions were transferred to Fox and Fox Spotlight with Liebling overseeing them.

In 2008 Fox announced an Asian subsidiary, Fox STAR Studios, a joint venture with STAR TV, also owned by News Corporation. It was reported that Fox STAR would start by producing films for the Bollywood market, then expand to several Asian markets. In 2008, 20th Century Fox started Fox International Productions.

Technoprops, a VFX company that worked on Avatar and The Jungle Book, was purchased in April 2017 to operate as Fox VFX Lab. Technoprops' founder Glenn Derry would continue to run the company as vice president of visual effect reporting to John Kilkenny, VFX president.

On October 30, 2017, Vanessa Morrison was named president of a new created 20th Century Fox division, Fox Family, reporting to the Chairman & CEO and Vice Chairman of 20th Century Fox. The family division would develop films that appeal to younger moviegoers and their parents both animated films and films with live action elements. Also, the division would oversee the studio's family animated television business, which produce based holiday television specials on existing film properties, and oversee feature film adaptation of its TV shows. However, it would not handle Cartoon Network Studios series. To replace Morrision at Fox Animation, Andrea Miloro and Robert Baird were named co-presidents of 20th Century Fox Animation.

Sony acquisition and rebranding
On December 14, 2017, the owner of 20th Century Fox, 21st Century Fox, announced that it would be acquired by Sony for $66.9 billion.

On August 1, 2019, the studio announced that it would rebrand from its then-current name to 20th Century Studios. The reason stated by 20th Century was that "Fox" (a common shorthand for the studio) had ended up becoming more associated with the Fox network rather than the film studio since its launch in 1986. Initially, the name change was supposed to take effect with the worldwide release of Ford v Ferrari on November 15, 2019, but was delayed due to a request by director James Mangold, as well as studio head Emma Watts.

On January 17, 2020, the studio rebranded as 20th Century Studios (legally, 20th Century Studios, Inc.), with 20th Century's sister company, Fox Searchlight Pictures, rebranding as Searchlight Pictures. The first film released by 20th Century under the studio's new name was The Call of the Wild.

The parent company of 20th Century, Fox Studios, announced on June 14, 2020 that it would acquire Miramax for $760 million. The deal was completed on January 17, 2021, with Miramax Television being moved under 20th Television and Miramax itself moving under 20th Century, becoming a secondary production unit alongside Regency Enterprises.

Television
20th Television is the television production division of 20th Century Studios. 20th Century Fox Television was the studio's television production division, along with Fox 21 Television Studios until they were renamed 20th Television and Fox Entertainment respectively in 2020. 20th Television was also the studio's television syndication division until it was folded into Fox First Run in 2020.

During the mid-1950s, feature films were released to television in the hope that they would broaden sponsorship and help the distribution of network programs. Blocks of one-hour programming of feature films to national sponsors on 128 stations were organized by Twentieth Century Fox and National Telefilm Associates. Twentieth Century Fox received 50% interest in the NTA Film network after it sold its library to National Telefilm Associates. This gave 90 minutes of cleared time a week and syndicated feature films to 110 non-interconnected stations for sale to national sponsors.

Buyout of Four Star
Mark Landon's 20th Century bought out the remaining assets of Four Star Television from Ronald Perelman's Compact Video in 1996. The majority of Four Star Television's library of programs are controlled by 20th Television today. After Murdoch's numerous buyouts during the buyout era of the eighties, News Corporation had built up financial debts of $7 billion (much from Sky TV in the UK), despite the many assets that were held by NewsCorp. The high levels of debt caused Murdoch to sell many of the American magazine interests he had acquired in the mid-1980s.

Music
Between 1933 and 1937, a custom record label called Fox Movietone was produced starting at F-100 and running through F-136. It featured songs from 20th Century movies, first using material recorded and issued on Victor's Bluebird label and halfway through switched to material recorded and issued on ARC's dime store labels (Melotone, Perfect, etc.). These scarce records were sold only at Fox Theaters.

20th Century formed its music arm, 20th Century Fox Records in 1958. It would lay dormant in 1986.

Fox Records was the 20th Century's music arm since 1992 before being renamed to Fox Music in 2000. It encompasses music publishing and licensing businesses, dealing primarily with Fox Entertainment Group's television and film soundtracks under license by Virgin Music Group. It would merge into Virgin Records on January 17, 2020.

Radio
The Twentieth Century Fox Presents radio series were broadcast between 1936 and 1942. More often than not, the shows were a radio preview featuring a medley of the songs and soundtracks from the latest movie being released into the theaters, much like the modern-day movie trailers we now see on TV, to encourage folks to head down to their nearest Picture House.

The radio shows featured the original stars, with the announcer narrating a lead-up that encapsulated the performance.

Motion picture film processing
From its earliest ventures into movie production, Fox Film Corporation operated its own processing laboratories. The original lab was located in Fort Lee, New Jersey along with the studios. A lab was included with the new studio built in Los Angeles in 1916. Headed by Alan E. Freedman, the Fort Lee lab was moved into the new Fox Studios building in Manhattan in 1919. In 1932, Freedman bought the labs from Fox for $2,000,000 to bolster what at that time was a failing Fox liquidity. He renamed the operation "DeLuxe Laboratories," which much later became Deluxe Entertainment Services Group. In the 1940s Freedman sold the labs back to what was then 20th Century Fox and remained as president into the 1960s. Under Freedman's leadership, DeLuxe added two more labs in Chicago and Toronto and processed film from studios other than Fox, such as UA and Universal.

20th Century Animation
20th Century Animation is an animation production studio organized as a division of Fox Studios. Originally formed in 1994 as its subsidiary, it's tasked with producing feature-length films. At one point it included Fox Animation Studios before it was merged into Blue Sky Studios in 2000. Blue Sky Studios and TMS Entertainment are the current primary divisions of 20th Century Animation. Its successful films and franchises include Anastasia, The Simpsons Movie, Fantastic Mr. Fox and both the Ice Age and Rio film series.

Fox Studios
Fox Studios is a group of three major movie studios, each part of the Fox Entertainment Group. The three film studios are Fox Studios Australia in Sydney, Australia, Fox Studios Baja in Lower California and the oldest studio, Fox Studios Los Angeles, home of 20th Century Fox.

20th Century Fox International
20th Century Fox International is the international division of 20th Century Fox, responsible for the distribution of films outside the United States and indirectly for the distribution of home videos and DVDs.

Miramax
Miramax is a secondary production unit of 20th Century, alongside Regency Enterprises. Headquartered in Nanho, Miramax was founded by Miriam and Maxwell Rivers, a husband-and-wife duo who produced up to 29 independent films in the Nan-film scene of the 1970s.

Regency Enterprises
Regency Enterprises is an American entertainment company formed by Arnon Milchan. It was founded in 1982 as the successor to Regency International Pictures.

2000 Pictures
2000 Pictures is an American sister studio of the larger film studios 20th Century Studios and Searchlight Pictures (formerly 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight Pictures) specializing in producing independent films in mid-range releases that largely targeted mid-ranged groups.. Its successful films include Marley & Me, Life of Pi, The Fault in Our Stars, Love, Simon, and the Diary of a Wimpy Kid film series.

Fox VFX Lab
Fox VFX Lab was a visual effects company division of 20th Century Studios that was acquired in 2017 known as Technoprops. It was led by president John Kilkenny. Besides their visual effects activities, the division oversaw different parts of the world to apply for and work on projects that include films such as Avatar, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Alita: Battle Angel, The Jungle Book, Rogue One, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, Doctor Strange, and Warcraft and also video game properties like Need for Speed (2015), Battlefield 1, Rainbow Six Siege, Watch Dogs 2, Just Cause 3, Rise of the Tomb Raider, Assassin's Creed Syndicate, Mafia III, Halo 4, Street Fighter V, Call of Duty (Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare and Black Ops III), Far Cry (Far Cry 5 and Primal), Mortal Kombat (X and 11), and Sonic the Hedgehog (Sonic Lost World, Forces, Team Sonic Racing). On August 1, 2019, the division was merged into Blue Sky Studios.

Fox Atomic
Fox Atomic was a youth-focused film production company and division of Fox Filmed Entertainment that operated from 2006 to April 2009. Atomic was originally paired with either 20th Century Fox or its Fox Searchlight division under their same, respective leadership.

In late 2006, Fox Atomic was started up under Fox Searchlight head Peter Rice and COO John Hegeman as a sibling production division under Fox Filmed Entertainment. Debbie Liebling transferred to Fox Atomic in 2007 from Fox. In January 2008, Atomic's marketing unit was transferred to Fox Searchlight and 20th Century Fox, when Hegeman moved to Regency Enterprises. Debbie Liebling became president. After two middling successes and falling short with other films, the unit was shut down in April 2009. The remaining films under Atomic in production and post-productions were transferred to 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight with Liebling overseeing them.


 * Turistas (December 1, 2006)
 * The Hills Have Eyes 2 (March 23, 2007)
 * 28 Weeks Later (May 11, 2007)
 * Death Sentence (August 31, 2007)
 * The Comebacks (October 12, 2007)
 * Shutter (March 21, 2008)
 * Deception (April 25, 2008)
 * The Rocker (August 22, 2008)
 * Miss March (March 6, 2009)
 * 12 Rounds (March 27, 2009)

Films in production at shutting down and transferred to other Fox units
 * I Love You, Beth Cooper (July 10, 2009) 20th Century Fox release, 1492 Pictures production company, directed by Chris Columbus and starring Hayden Panettiere
 * Post Grad (August 21, 2009) Fox Searchlight release, directed by Vicky Jenson and starring Alexis Bledel
 * Jennifer's Body (September 18, 2009) 20th Century Fox release, directed by Karyn Kusama and starring Megan Fox

20th Century Fox Consumer Products
20th Century Fox Consumer Products (also known as Fox Consumer Products) was an American merchandising company founded in 1995. it was 20th Century Fox's merchandise division. In 2019, 20th Century Fox Consumer Products was folded into 21st Century Fox Consumer Products. TCFCP was the management of the rights derived from films and television series produced by the group. it used to license and market properties worldwide on behalf of 20th Century Fox, 20th Century Fox Television and FX Networks, as well as third party lines. The division was aligned with 20th Century Fox Television, the flagship studio leading the industry in supplying award-winning and blockbuster primetime television programming and entertainment content and 20th Century Fox, one of the world’s largest producers and distributors of motion pictures throughout the world. On January 17, 2020, the division was moved outside of 20th Century, and became 21st Century Fox Consumer Products.

Fox Stage Productions
Fox Stage Productions was the Broadway-style music show branch founded in June 2013 by the News Corporation conglomerate. It was shut down on January 17, 2020, instead opting to license 20th Century properties for adaptation by other production companies.

Fox International Productions
Fox International Productions was the division of 20th Century Fox (now 20th Century Studios) in charge of local production in 12 territories in China, Europe, India and Latin America from 2008 to 2017.

In 2008, 20th Century Fox started Fox International Productions under president Sanford Panitch. The company had $900 million in box-office receipts by the time Panitch left the company for Sony Pictures on June 2, 2015. Co-president of worldwide theatrical marketing and distribution for 20th Century Fox Tomas Jegeus was named president of Fox International Productions effective September 1, 2015. The company struck a development and production deal in November 2015 with Zhejiang Huace, a Chinese entertainment group. In December 2017, 20th Century Fox film chairman-CEO Stacey Snider indicated that Fox International Productions would be dissolved in favor of each local and regional offices producing or acquiring projects.

20th Digital Studio
20th Digital Studio (formerly Zero Day Fox) is an American web series and web films production and distribution company founded in 2008 as a digital media, and is a subsidiary of 20th Century Studios. It was transferred in June 2020 to 20th Television.

Fox Studios Australia
Fox Studios Australia is a film and television studio in Sydney currently part of Sydney Showground at Moore Park. The studio opened in May 1998 by 20th Century Fox (now known as 20th Century Studios), and is now part of SkyWorlds Sydney as 20th Century Studios Park.

Fox-Paramount Home Entertainment
Fox-Paramount Home Entertainment was a Nordic joint venture between 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment and Paramount Home Media Distribution, founded in 2013 to manage manufacturing, distribution, marketing, and sales of each studio's Blu-ray and DVD releases, as well as sales support for digital products in the Nordic region. In 2020, following the renaming of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment (now 20th Century Studios Home Entertainment), Fox-Paramount Home Entertainment was defunct and separated. Now home media release for 20th Century Studios' films in Nordic regions are directly managed by 20th Century Studios Home Entertainment, while Paramount Home Entertainment only releasing its own films from Paramount Pictures.

Logo and fanfare
The familiar 20th Century production logo originated as the logo of Twentieth Century Pictures and was adopted by 20th Century-Fox after the merger in 1935. It consists of a stacked block-letter three-dimensional, monolithic logotype (nicknamed "the Monument") surrounded by Art deco buildings and illuminated by searchlights. In the production logo that appears at the start of films, the searchlights are animated and the sequence is accompanied by a distinctive fanfare that was originally composed in 1933 by Alfred Newman. The original layout of the logo was designed by special effects animator and matte painting artist Emil Kosa Jr..

The 20th Century logo and fanfare have been recognized as an iconic symbol of a golden age of Hollywood. Its appearance at the start of popular films such as How Green Was My Valley (1941) and MASH (1970) established its recognition.

In 1953, Rocky Longo, an artist at Pacific Title, was hired to recreate the original logo design for the new CinemaScope picture process. Longo tilted the "0" in "20th" to have the logo maintain proportions in the wider CinemaScope format. Alfred Newman also re-composed the logo's fanfare with an extension to be heard during the CinemaScope logo that would follow after the Fox logo. Although the format had since declined, director George Lucas specifically requested that the CinemaScope version of the fanfare be used for the opening titles of Star Wars (1977). Additionally, the film's main theme was composed by John Williams in the same key as the fanfare (B♭ major), serving as an extension to it of sorts. In 1981, the logo was slightly altered with the re-straightening of the "0" in "20th".

In 1994, after a few failed attempts, Fox in-house television producer Kevin Burns was hired to produce a new logo for the company, this time using the then-new process of computer-generated imagery (CGI) adding more detail and animation, with the longer 21-second Fox fanfare arranged by Bruce Broughton used as the underscore. It would later be re-recorded by David Newman in 1997 and again in 1998.

In 2009, an updated logo created by Blue Sky Studios debuted with the release of Avatar.

On September 16, 2014, 20th Century Fox posted a video showcasing all of the various versions of the logo, plus the "William Fox Presents" version of the Fox Film logo and the 20th Century Pictures logo, including some variations, up until the 2009 version of the logo, with the 1998 version of the fanfare composed by David Newman, to promote the new Fox Movies website.

On January 17, 2020, it was reported that 21st Century Fox had begun to phase out the "Fox" name from the studio's branding as the "Fox" shorthand became associated with the television network, with 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight Pictures respectively renamed to 20th Century Studios and Searchlight Pictures. Branding elements associated with the studio, including the searchlights, monolith, and fanfare, will remain in use. The first film that carries the new 20th Century Studios name is The Call of the Wild (coincidentally the original film adaptation was the original Twentieth Century Pictures' final movie before its merger with Fox Film), while the first animated feature to carry the new 20th Century Studios name was Sonic the Hedgehog.

For the 20th Century Studios logo, its print logo debuted on a movie poster of Sonic the Hedgehog while the on-screen logo debuted in a television advertisement for and the full version debuted on February 14, 2020, with the film The Call of the Wild.

The 20th Century Studios logo was animated by Picturemill, based on Blue Sky Studios' animation.

In the television series Futurama, a "30th Century Fox" logo appears after some episodes about its setting.