New York native Harold B. Franklin entered show business as a booking
agent for vaudeville acts in 1910, becoming a theater manager four
years later. He joined Famous Players-Lasky as director of its theater
operations, but left several years later to head Fox-West Coast
Theaters. He worked for various companies in movie theater operations
until 1933, when he and playwright Edgar Selwyn joined in a venture to
produce stage plays. Two years later he went to work for Columbia
Pictures as a production executive. Although he did produce two films,
his main focus was in the exhibition end of the business. While on a
business trip to Mexico to survey their theaters, he died suddenly in
Mexico City.
