This article is about the animation/television/feature film production company owned by Sony. For the New York company, see EUE/Screen Gems. For the album by Elkie Brooks, see Screen Gems (album).
Screen Gems
Product type
Animation (1921–49) Television (1948–74) Film (1998–present)
1921;103years ago(1921)(animation division) November 1948;76 years ago(November 1948)(television division) December 8, 1998;26 years ago(December 8, 1998)(film division)
Discontinued
1949;75years ago(1949)(animation division) May6, 1974;50 years ago(1974-05-06)(television division)
Screen Gems is an American film production company owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of Japanese multinational conglomerate, Sony Group Corporation.[1] The Screen Gems brand has served several different purposes for its parent companies over the decades since its incorporation, initially as a cartoon studio, then a television studio, and later on as a film studio. The label currently serves as a film production that specializes in genre films, mainly horror.[2]
When producer Pat Sullivan came to Harry Warner to sign a contract with him on his and Otto Messmer's series Felix the Cat, he declined and instead told his soon-to-be former secretary Margaret J. Winkler that she should form her own company and take control of the distribution of the series. Winkler formed M.J. Winkler Productions and soon also took control of Max and Dave Fleischer's series Out of the Inkwell. By 1923 she and Sullivan were arguing, and that same year the Fleischer Brothers formed their own distribution company named Red Seal. Winkler saw an unreleased short called Alice's Wonderland, a cartoon produced and directed by Walt Disney, and became impressed with the short. The two agreed to make a series about the cartoon. In 1924, Charles Mintz married Winkler, and the latter's career began to decline. Mintz quickly assumed Winkler's role in the company, later rebranding it Winkler Pictures.
In 1925 Winkler's renewal contract for the Felix shorts was written, yet Winkler declined to renew due to her dispute with Sullivan. The following year the Alice Comedies stopped being distributed by Winkler. After Mintz become involved with the progress it was clear that Disney was unhappy with the production costs on cartoons, and he asked Disney and Ub Iwerks to develop a new character. The result was Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, the first animated character for Universal Pictures.[4] In February 1928, when the character proved more successful than expected, Disney sought to meet with Mintz over the budget, wanting to spend more on the cartoons. Mintz refused, and hired away all of Walt Disney Studios's animators except Iwerks, Les Clark, and Johnny Cannon, who all refused to leave Disney. He moved the production of the Oswald cartoons to Winkler Pictures, along with Margaret Winkler's brother, George. After losing the Oswald contract to Walter Lantz, Mintz focused on the Krazy Kat series, which was the output of a Winkler-distributed property.
M.J. Winkler Productions became known as Winkler Pictures after Mintz took over in 1926 and partnered with Columbia Pictures for distribution in 1929. In 1931, when the studio moved from New York to California, it was renamed The Charles Mintz Studio.[5]
Becoming Screen Gems (1933–41)
The Charles Mintz studio became known as Screen Gems in 1933. The name was originally used in 1933, when Columbia Pictures acquired a stake in Charles Mintz's animation studio.[6] The name was derived from an early Columbia Pictures slogan, "Gems of the Screen"; itself a takeoff on the song "Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean".[7] In 1939, a short while before his death, after becoming indebted to Columbia, Mintz relinquished ownership of his studio and the Screen Gems name to Columbia to settle longstanding financial problems.[8] Mintz was nominated for two Academy Awards for Best Short Subject. His first nomination was in 1935 for Holiday Land, and he was nominated again in 1938 for The Little Match Girl. For about a decade, Charles Mintz produced Krazy Kat, Scrappy, and the Color Rhapsody animated film shorts through Columbia Pictures. He would later pass way in December 30, 1939, from a heart attack.
Columbia would oversee management of the studio following ownership. The studio's production manager became the studio head but was shortly replaced by Mintz's brother-in-law, George Winkler. Columbia later decided to hire Frank Tashlin, then a writer for Walt Disney Productions, as lead producer.[9] There he would hire many displaced animators from the 1941 Disney animators' strike, as well as making the decision of firing the bulk of their initial in-house staff (included Arthur Davis, Manny Gould, Lou Lilly, Ben Harrison and Winkler). Tashlin would also direct the 1941 short The Fox and the Grapes. Based on the Aesop's Fable of the same name, the short would inadvertently spawn Columbia's most successful characters with The Fox and the Crow, a comic duo of a refined Fox and a street-wise Crow. He was later replaced by Ben Schwalb as producer, but continued to work there as a creative supervisor.
Decline and Closure (1942-1949)
Tashlin's stay at Screen Gems would be short-lived, as he would later leave the studio, following an argument with Columbia higher-ups.[10] When interviewed by Michael Barrier, he said that the management "can't stay happy long when things are going well, so we ended up in another fracas and I left."[9] He was replaced by Dave Fleischer (who produced the 1942 WWII short Song of Victory under Tashlin's supervision), previously the co-founder and head supervisor of Fleischer Studios. John Hubley described Fleischer as being very detached from his employees, calling him "one of the world's intellectual lightweights". He was, however, also known for editing completed cartoons in a way that broke continuity.[11] Fleischer was later fired and succeeded by a revolving door of producers, including musician Paul Worth, Three Stooges producer Hugh McCollum and ex-Schlesinger assistants Ray Katz and Henry Binder. The studio would also create several more recurring characters around this time, including Tito and His Burrito, Flippy, Flop the Cat, Igor Puzzlewitz, Willoughby Wren, and an adaptation of Al Capp's comic series Li'l Abner, with varying levels of success.
Animation historians agree that the studios output declined following Frank Tashin's departure, as the cartoons that came after were described as "misguided" or "imitation Warner Bros." Hubley also said to have disliked his work at the studio, and that Columbia "hated" the cartoons they were making.[11] The decline in quality could be attributed to several key factors; Tashlin's departure from the studio, the inability to obtain experienced directors and storyman, and Columbia's mismanagement behind the scenes. Other staff members during this period included people such as Bob Wickersham, Paul Sommer, Alec Geiss, Sid Marcus, Howard Swift and Alex Lovy. Bob Clampett was also brought in as a gag writer before setting up his own brief animation studio for Republic Pictures.[12][13]
Screen Gems was, in an attempt to keep costs low, the last American animation studio to stop producing black and white cartoons. The final black-and-white Screen Gems shorts appeared in 1946, over three years after the second-longest holdouts (Famous Studios and Leon Schlesinger Productions). During that same year, Columbia decided to shut its doors for good, while releasing a back catalog up until 1949.[14] It later merged with the television version of Screen Gems (previously Pioneer Telefilms).
In 1999, Columbia TriStar International Television produced Totally Tooned In- a syndicated TV package showcasing Columbia's classic cartoon library. With the aid of animation historian Jerry Beck, Columbia restored and remastered the majority of the color Screen Gems cartoons (as well as all the UPA cartoons) from their original 35mm elements. The show aired in several international markets before making its American television debut on Antenna TV on January 8, 2011. They would later be aired on Toon In With Me on the MeTV Network in November 2021.[15] Despite these restoration efforts, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment has no current plans to release these shorts on DVD or Blu-ray. Since CPE Holdings, Inc. became dormant on May 9, 2024, Sony Pictures Releasing now owns the theatrical distribution on behalf of Columbia Pictures, while Sony Pictures Television owns the television distribution on behalf of CPT Holdings, Inc. to the majority of the color Screen Gems cartoons (as well as all the UPA cartoons) library.
Theatrical short film series
All series were distributed by Columbia unless otherwise noted.[16]
Ralph Cohn, the son of Columbia co-founder Jack Cohn and nephew of Columbia head Harry Cohn, founded Pioneer Telefilms, a television commercial production company, in 1947. Ralph later wrote a 50-page memo arguing that Columbia should be the first major film studio to move into television. Although Harry wasn't convinced by the suggestion, Columbia invested $50,000 acquiring Pioneer and reorganized it as Screen Gems.[18] The studio started its new business in New York on April 15, 1949.[19]
By 1951, Screen Gems became a full-fledged television studio by producing and syndicating several popular shows (see below). Within a few months, Ralph Cohn had sold a half-hour dramatic anthology concept to the Ford Motor Company which became Ford Theatre, which was one of the first times a major Hollywood movie studio had produced content for television. They also produced seven episodes of the first season of Cavalcade of America.[20][21]
The name "Screen Gems," at the time, was used to hide the fact that the film studio was entering television production and distribution. Many film studios saw television as a threat to their business, thus it was expected that they would shun the medium. However, Columbia was one of a few studios who branched out to television under a pseudonym to conceal the true ownership of the television arm. That is until 1955, when Columbia decided to use the woman from its logo under the Screen Gems banner, officially billing itself as a part of "the Hollywood studios of Columbia Pictures", as spoken in announcements at the end of some Screen Gems series.
By 1952, the studio had produced a series of about 100 film-record coordinated releases for television under the brand "TV Disk Jockey Toons" in which the films "synchronize perfectly with the records".[22]
On July 1, 1956, studio veteran Irving Briskin stepped down as stage manager of Columbia Pictures and formed his own production company Briskin Productions, Inc. to release series through Screen Gems and supervise all of its productions.[23] On December 10, 1956, Screen Gems expanded into television syndication by acquiring Hygo Television Films (a.k.a. Serials Inc.) and its affiliated company United Television Films, Inc. Hygo Television Films was founded in 1951 by Jerome Hyams, who also acquired United Television Films in 1955 that was founded by Archie Mayers.[24]
During that year, the studio began syndicating Columbia Pictures' theatrical film library to television, including the series of two-reel short subjects starring The Three Stooges in 1957. Earlier on August 2, 1957, they also acquired syndication rights to "Shock Theater", a package of Universal Pictures horror films (later shifted to MCA TV), which was enormously successful in reviving that genre.[25]
In the late 1950s, Screen Gems also entered into ownership and operation of television stations. Stations owned by Screen Gems over the years included KCPX (Salt Lake City; now KTVX, owned by Nexstar Media Group), WVUE-DT (New Orleans; now owned by Gray Television), WAPA-TV (San Juan; now owned by the Hemisphere Media Group), WNJU (Linden, NJ; now Telemundo/NBCUniversal O&O), and several radio stations as well, including 50,000-watt clear channel WWVA (Wheeling, WV; now owned by iHeartMedia). As a result, in funding its acquisitions, 18% of Screen Gems' shares was spun off from Columbia and it became a publicly-traded company on the NYSE until 1968. Screen Gems also provided technical assistance and partial control of a private television station in Venezuela, Canal 11 Televisión, which existed from 1966 to 1968.[27][28]
In 1963, William Dozier, who was one of the top Screen Gems employees, and senior vice president of production left to start out Greenway Productions, with a non-exclusive agreement with the studio for joint distribution of its TV productions.[29] Even though none of Greenway's shows went to SG, Greenway immediately struck out a deal with rival television producer 20th Century-Fox Television in 1964.[30]
In 1963, Screen Gens entered music publishing with the purchase of Don Kirshner's Aldon Music with Kirshner named head of the Columbia-Screen-Gems music division. Four years later, he departed Screen Gems after coming into conflict with The Monkees over their desire to play on their records. Lester Sill replaced Kirshner, and remained head of music publishing until 1985. Screen Gems-Columbia Music was sold to EMI for $23.5 million in 1976.
From 1964 to 1969, former child star Jackie Cooper was Vice President of Program Development. He was responsible for packaging series (such as Bewitched) and other projects and selling them to the networks.
For the 1965–1966 season, Screen Gems announced that they would sign three big creative programmers to develop new series, which was announced in June 1964. Among them was writer Sidney Sheldon, director Hy Averback, and writer David Swift.[31]
In 1965, Columbia Pictures acquired a fifty per cent interest in the New York-based commercial production company EUE, which was incorporated into Screen Gems and renamed EUE/Screen Gems. The studios were sold in 1982 to longtime Columbia Pictures executive George Cooney shortly after Columbia Pictures was sold to The Coca-Cola Company.
Merger with Columbia Pictures and reincorporation as Columbia Pictures Television (1968–74)
On December 23, 1968, Screen Gems merged with its parent company Columbia Pictures Corporation and became part of the newly formed Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. for $24.5 million.[32]
In the following year, former ABC vice president of programming Leonard Goldberg joined Screen Gems, displacing Jackie Cooper as vice president of program development.[33] Goldberg failed to receive the same level of success as Cooper. His shows all tanked after one season, with the exception of The Partridge Family, and he abruptly left after three years, with the most notable other production of Goldberg's tenure at Screen Gems being the 1971 television movie Brian's Song. He then formed a production company with producer Aaron Spelling.[34]
In 1971, Douglas S. Cramer, former executive VP in charge of production at Paramount Television, set up a SG-affiliated production firm, The Douglas S. Cramer Company, to produce projects for feature films and TV projects via Columbia Pictures.[35] In 1972, David Gerber, who had left 20th Century Fox Television, set up a SG-affiliated production company to produce his own projects with that company. The most notable of these productions was Police Story, an NBC police crime drama.[34] In 1973, Allan Blye and Chris Bearde via Blye-Bearde Productions signed an independent production agreement with Screen Gems to develop their own projects.[36] Also that year, Harry Ackerman, who was vice president of production left the studio to start his own production company to be affiliated with Paramount Television.[37]
On May 6, 1974, Screen Gems was renamed to Columbia Pictures Television as suggested by then-studio president David Gerber, who succeeded Art Frankel as his studio president.[38] The final notable production from this incarnation of Screen Gems before the name change was the 1974 miniseriesQB VII. Columbia was, technically, the last major studio to enter television by name.
Later years and aftermath
Changes in corporate ownership of Columbia came in 1982, when Coca-Cola bought the company, although continuing to trade under the CPT name. In the mid-1980s, Coca-Cola reorganized its television holdings to create Coca-Cola Television, merging CPT with the television unit of Embassy Communications as Columbia/Embassy Television, although both companies continued to use separate identities until January 2, 1988, when it and Tri-Star Television were merged under the CPT name.[39] Columbia also ran Colex Enterprises, a joint venture with LBS Communications to distribute most of the Screen Gems library, which ended in 1987.[40] In 1985, the name was brought back by Columbia Pictures Television to distribute classic television series from its vaults to first-run syndication.[41]
On December 18, 1987, Coca-Cola spun off its entertainment holdings and sold it to Tri-Star Pictures, Inc. for $3.1 billion. It was renamed as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc., also creating Columbia/Tri-Star by merging Columbia and Tri-Star. Both studios continued to produce and distribute films under their separate names.[42] In 1989, Sony Corporation of Japan purchased Columbia Pictures Entertainment. On August 11, 1991, Columbia Pictures Entertainment was renamed as Sony Pictures Entertainment as a film production-distribution subsidiary and subsequently combined CPT with a revived TriStar Television on February 21, 1994 to form Columbia TriStar Television. The name "Screen Gems" was also utilized for a syndicated hour-long program for classic television called Screen Gems Network that first aired in 1999 and ran until 2002.[43]
Days of Our Lives (produced by Corday Productions 1965–1974; produced thereafter by Columbia Pictures Television, Columbia TriStar Television and Sony Pictures Television)
As of 2023, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2016) is Screen Gems' highest-grossing film with over $300 million dollars worldwide in box office earnings.
United Productions of America, better known as UPA, was an American animation studio and later distribution company founded in 1941 as Industrial Film and Poster Service by former Walt Disney Productions employees. Beginning with industrial and World War II training films, UPA eventually produced theatrical shorts for Columbia Pictures such as the Mr. Magoo series. In 1956, UPA produced a television series for CBS, The Boing-Boing Show, hosted by Gerald McBoing Boing. In the 1960s, UPA produced syndicated Mr. Magoo and Dick Tracy television series and other series and specials, including Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol. UPA also produced two animated features, 1001 Arabian Nights and Gay Purr-ee, and distributed Japanese films from Toho Studios in the 1970s and 1980s.
The golden age of American animation was a period that began with the popularization of sound synchronized cartoons in 1928 and gradually ended in the 1960s when theatrical animated shorts started to lose popularity to the newer medium of television. Animated media from after the golden age, especially on television, were produced on cheaper budgets and with more limited techniques between the late 1950s and 1980s.
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., commonly known as Columbia Pictures, is an American film production and distribution company that is the flagship unit of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Entertainment's Sony Pictures, which is one of the "Big Five" film studios and a subsidiary of the multinational conglomerate Sony Group Corporation.
Walter Lantz Productions was an American animation studio that was active from 1928 to 1949 and then from 1950 to 1972. It was the principal supplier of animation for Universal Pictures.
Lorimar Productions, Inc., later known as Lorimar Television and Lorimar Distribution, was an American production company that was later a subsidiary of Warner Bros., active from 1969 until 1993, when it was folded into Warner Bros. Television. It was founded by Irwin Molasky, Merv Adelson, and Lee Rich. The company's name was a portmanteau of the name of Adelson's then wife, Lori, and Palomar Airport.
Margaret J. Winkler Mintz was a key figure in silent animation history, having a crucial role to play in the histories of Max and Dave Fleischer, Pat Sullivan, Otto Messmer, and Walt Disney. She was the first woman to produce and distribute animated films. Winkler was the subject of the feature film Walt Before Mickey.
TriStar Pictures, Inc. is an American film studio and production company that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, part of the multinational conglomerate Sony Group Corporation. It is a corporate sibling of fellow Sony studio, Columbia Pictures.
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. is an American diversified multinational mass media and entertainment studio conglomerate that produces, acquires, and distributes filmed entertainment through multiple platforms. Through an intermediate holding company called Sony Film Holding Inc., it is operated as a subsidiary of Sony Entertainment Inc., which is itself a subsidiary of the Japanese multinational technology and media conglomerate Sony Group Corporation.
Columbia TriStar Television, Inc. was an American television production and distribution company active from 1994 to 2002 as the third iteration of what had originated as Columbia Pictures's television studio, Screen Gems.
Columbia Pictures Television, Inc. was launched on May 6, 1974, by Columbia Pictures as an American television production and distribution company. It is the second name of the Columbia Pictures' television division Screen Gems (SG) and the third name of Pioneer Telefilms. The company was active from 1974 until New Year's Day 2001, when it was folded into Columbia TriStar Television, a merger between Columbia Pictures Television and TriStar Television. A separate entity of CPT continues to exist on paper as an intellectual property holder, and under the moniker "CPT Holdings" to hold the copyright for the TV show The Young and the Restless, as well as old incarnations from the company's television library such as What's Happening!!
Charles Bear Mintz was an American film producer and distributor who assumed control over Margaret J. Winkler's Winkler Pictures after marrying her in 1924. The couple had two children, Katherine and William. Between 1925 and 1939, Mintz produced over 370 cartoon shorts.
The Screen Gems Network (SGN) was an American afternoon television program which ran in syndication from September 20, 1999, to September 9, 2002, launched by Columbia TriStar Television Distribution and produced by Evolution Media. The concept for the program was announced on January 11, 1999 and it began airing on September 20, 1999; for the block's first season, only half-hour sitcoms were part of the block, with the second season expanding to include hour-long drama shows.
ELP Communications was an American television production company that originally began in 1974.
Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Inc. is the home entertainment distribution division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony.
The Fox and the Crow are a pair of anthropomorphic cartoon characters created by Frank Tashlin for the Screen Gems studio.
Coca-Cola Telecommunications, Inc. (CCT) was a first-run syndication unit of Columbia Pictures Television created on November 4, 1986, that was a merger between CPT's first-run syndication division and The Television Program Source, Inc.. The Television Program Source was a joint-venture between Alan Bennett, former King World president Robert King, and CPT that was founded on October 15, 1984.
Spelling-Goldberg Productions was an American television production company established on May 1, 1972 by Aaron Spelling and Screen Gems' top TV executive Leonard Goldberg. They produced series during the 1970s including Family, Starsky & Hutch, T. J. Hooker, S.W.A.T., Charlie's Angels, Fantasy Island, and Hart to Hart. Spelling's other companies, Aaron Spelling Productions and Thomas-Spelling Productions, co-existed at the same time period and produced other well-known shows. A majority of the series produced by Spelling-Goldberg originally aired on ABC.
The Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group is a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment to manage its motion picture operations. It was launched in 1998 by integrating the businesses of Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. and TriStar Pictures, Inc.
Raymond Patterson was an American animator, producer, and director. He was born in Hollywood, California, and was the younger brother of animator Don Patterson.
Emmanuel Gould was an American animated cartoonist from the 1920s to the 1970s, best known for his contributions as a director, writer and animator for Screen Gems, and solely an animator for Warner Bros. Cartoons and DePatie–Freleng Enterprises.
↑ "Table of Contents". Dick Nitelinger's The Hosts of Horror. June 10, 2004. Archived from the original on June 10, 2004. Retrieved September 17, 2020.
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