As general manager of
Hal Roach Studios from 1931 to 1936, Ginsberg acquired an unsavory reputation as a hatchet man. His ruthless cost-cutting, penchant for intrigue, and insistence that the Roach comedies could always be produced faster and cheaper, made him a feared and hated figure in the otherwise genial atmosphere of Roach's "Lot of Fun". Ginsberg particularly did not get along with comedian
Stan Laurel, who nicknamed him "The Expediter". One of the many Roach employees he fired was a budding young director named
George Stevens. Ironically, a quarter-century later Ginsberg would co-produce Stevens' epic feature "Giant" (1956) and get an Oscar nomination for it.