60 free Paramount Pictures trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Paramount Pictures trivia quiz covers more than a century of the studio with the mountain logo. It starts with the basics any movie fan should know: the year it was founded, the franchises it owns, the famous Melrose Avenue lot and the Best Picture winners in its library. From there it digs into the founding story, from Adolph Zukor's Famous Players and Jesse Lasky's rented horse barn to W. W. Hodkinson sketching a Utah peak on a napkin. The harder questions are for film-history buffs: block booking and the 1948 Supreme Court case that ended the studio system, the Fleischer cartoons, the Gulf+Western years under Charles Bluhdorn and Robert Evans, Barry Diller's team of future moguls, the Desilu purchase that brought Star Trek in the door, the Viacom bidding war, DreamWorks, and the 2025 Skydance merger. There is also a run of questions on the logo itself, whose star count and mountain have changed more than most people realise. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries for the studio, its founders and its landmark films, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. If you enjoy this one, try our Hollywood, Star Trek and Best Picture quizzes next.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which year does Paramount Pictures date its founding?
1912
That makes it the second-oldest surviving studio in the United States, behind Universal.
Q 02Which studio is the only American film studio older than Paramount?
Universal Pictures
Globally, Gaumont, Pathe, Titanus and Nordisk Film are all older still.
Q 03Which Hungarian-born producer founded the Famous Players Film Company that grew into Paramount?
Adolph Zukor
He had been an early investor in nickelodeons and later served as chairman emeritus.
Q 04What slogan did Zukor adopt for his first film company, which put stage stars on screen?
Famous Players in Famous Plays
The idea was to attract middle-class audiences by putting leading stage actors on film.
Q 05Which legendary French actress starred in Famous Players' first film?
Sarah Bernhardt
The film was Les Amours de la reine Elisabeth, and by mid-1913 the company had completed five films.
Q 06Which brother-in-law lent Jesse L. Lasky the money to start his Feature Play Company?
Samuel Goldwyn
He was still known as Samuel Goldfish at the time.
Q 07Which director, the Lasky company's first employee, set up in a rented Hollywood horse barn?
Cecil B. DeMille
He had virtually no film experience; the site became known as the Lasky-DeMille Barn.
Q 08What was the title of the Lasky company's first feature film, released in 1914?
The Squaw Man
It was shot at the barn between Vine Street, Selma Avenue, Argyle Avenue and Sunset Boulevard.
Q 09Which Utah theatre owner founded the original Paramount Pictures Corporation as a distributor in 1914?
W. W. Hodkinson
He is also credited with drawing the mountain logo from memory on a napkin.
Q 10What was Paramount's original distribution company called before taking the Paramount name in 1914?
Progressive Pictures
It was the first successful nationwide film distributor at a time when films were sold state by state.
Q 11What was the name of the corporation Zukor formed through a three-way merger in 1916?
Famous Players-Lasky
Valued at $12.5 million, it was the largest film company of its day.
Q 12What was the practice that forced exhibitors to buy a year of Paramount films to get one star's pictures?
Block booking
It gave Paramount a leading position but drew antitrust pursuit for more than twenty years.
Q 13Which studio facility did Lasky buy in 1926 that remains part of Paramount's headquarters?
Robert Brunton Studios
The 26-acre site at 5451 Marathon Street cost $1 million.
Q 21The 1948 Supreme Court case United States v. Paramount Pictures ruled that studios could not do what?
Own movie theater chains
The decision split off United Paramount Theaters and effectively ended the classic studio system.
Q 22Which television network did the spun-off United Paramount Theaters acquire in 1953?
ABC
Leonard Goldenson led ABC to first place in the Nielsen ratings by the mid-1970s.
Q 23Paramount's experimental 1939 Los Angeles TV station became which first commercial station on the West Coast?
KTLA
It was sold to Gene Autry in 1964 for a then-phenomenal $12.5 million.
Q 14On which Hollywood street is Paramount's headquarters, at number 5555?
Melrose Avenue
It is the last major studio still located in Hollywood proper.
Q 15Which animation studio, home of Betty Boop and Popeye, made cartoons for Paramount from 1927?
Fleischer Studios
A 1935 poll showed Popeye was even more popular than Mickey Mouse.
Q 16What did Paramount rename the New York cartoon studio behind Popeye after acquiring it?
Famous Studios
That incarnation kept producing cartoons until 1967 but never matched the Fleischers' artistic acclaim.
Q 17Paramount was an early investor in radio, buying a 50% interest in which network in 1928?
CBS
It sold within a few years, but decades later Viacom would own both Paramount and that network.
Q 18Which Chicago theatre chain did Zukor acquire in 1926?
Balaban & Katz
Balaban became Paramount president in 1936 and led its relaunch after bankruptcy.
Q 19Which taxi and rental-car magnate did Zukor hire in 1931 to fix Paramount's finances?
John D. Hertz
His measures failed and the company went into receivership in January 1933.
Q 20Whose suggestive 1933 films She Done Him Wrong and I'm No Angel helped trigger Production Code enforcement?
Mae West
The Catholic Legion of Decency threatened a boycott if the Code was not enforced.
Q 24Which 1956 DeMille remake of his own 1923 film gave the struggling studio some relief?
The Ten Commandments
DeMille had been associated with Paramount since 1913 and died in 1959.
Q 25How many of its pre-1950 films did Paramount sell to MCA in February 1958?
764
The library included the Marx Brothers films, most of the Road pictures and Double Indemnity.
Q 26Which industrial conglomerate bought Paramount in 1966?
Gulf and Western
Its boss Charles Bluhdorn immediately put his stamp on the studio by installing a virtually unknown producer as head of production.
Q 27Which production chief restored Paramount's fortunes with Rosemary's Baby, Love Story and The Godfather?
Robert Evans
He held the job for eight years despite some rough times.
Q 28From whom did Paramount's parent buy the neighboring Desilu studio in 1967?
Lucille Ball
The Desilu lot had once belonged to RKO Pictures.
Q 29Which studio joined Paramount's Cinema International Corporation as a third partner in 1973?
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Both Paramount and CIC later entered the video market, with Paramount Home Video and CIC Video.
Q 30Which executive led the 1970s Paramount team nicknamed the "Killer-Dillers"?
Barry Diller
His associates Eisner, Katzenberg, Dawn Steel and Don Simpson all went on to run studios of their own.