Case studies of directors and producers in the Golden Age studio system

[Victoria97]

I'm teaching a film history course this semester, and while covering the Golden Age of Hollywood, I want to move beyond the iconic stars and glamour to critically examine the studio system's impact on filmmaking as an art and business. I'm looking for specific case studies of directors or producers who managed to create artistically significant work within, or in spite of, that rigid factory-like structure. For scholars and enthusiasts, which films from that era best illustrate the tension between commercial formula and directorial vision, and are there any under-appreciated figures from the period whose contributions to cinematography, editing, or narrative are overshadowed by the more famous names?