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157-435: Screen Gems was a television production company that was owned by Columbia Pictures from 1948 to May 6, 1974, best known for shows like Bewitched , The Partridge Family and I Dream of Jeannie . It was one of the largest television producers in history, and it was around that time, one of the few TV subsidiaries of a major movie studio that didn't carry the film studio's name. It was highly profitable until 1974, when it

314-517: A Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album also in 2011, Joan Osborne's Bring it on Home which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Blues Album in 2013, and The Beatles' "First Recordings: 50th Anniversary Edition" which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Album Notes in the same year. Saguaro Roads Records though, was excluded from the deal when RDA had to sell Time Life to Mosaic Media Investment Partners in 2013, but has remained dormant ever since. The following list shows many of

471-659: A Grammy Award for Best Traditional Gospel Album complemented with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award for their Live in New Orleans video registration, Patti LuPone 's Gypsy : The 2008 Broadway Cast Recording which was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album that year, Hank Williams: The Complete Mother's Best Recordings which was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Historical Album in 2011, Patty Loveless's Mountain Soul II which won

628-552: A 2001 US$ 20 million net operating profit into a net operating loss of US$ 50 million in 2003. Direct Holdings sold music and video products under the Time Life brand, and was also the holding company of the StarVista LIVE L.L.C. experience entertainment property, thereby becoming responsible for Time Life's entry into that industry in the 2003-13 time period. In March 2007, Ripplewood led a group that acquired and privatized

785-525: A deal at the studio. Also in 1978, Larry White was then promoted to president of the studio. From 1978 to 1986, CPT co-produced series with Spelling-Goldberg including Fantasy Island , Hart to Hart , and T. J. Hooker . On February 19, 1979, CPT acquired TOY Productions, whose output included What's Happening!! and Carter Country . In 1981, Richard Dawson has signed a joint development contract with Rastar Television and Columbia Pictures Television to produce TV shows. On August 13, 1981, CPT acquired

942-439: A deal with the studio. On February 2, 1989, Columbia Pictures Television formed a joint-venture with Norman Lear's Act III Communications called Act III Television to produce television series instead of managing. On November 8, 1989, Sony bought Columbia Pictures Entertainment for $ 3.4 billion and the next day, Sony acquired The Guber-Peters Entertainment Company (formerly game show production company Barris Industries with

1099-534: A deal with the studio. Also that same year that producer Roy Huggins struck a deal with the studio. Also that year, Columbia Pictures Television entered into an agreement with producer Centerpoint to co-produce two miniseries Sadat and The Last Days of Pompeii . On January 30, 1984, CPT joined forces with Lexington Broadcast Services Company by creating a joint venture between the two companies called Colex Enterprises to distribute library shows such as Father Knows Best and The Monkees , while throughout

1256-534: A definitive end. While the vast majority of published book series were conceived, initiated and produced by Time Life itself, which included the Australian branch initiated Australian at War series, the company also (re)issued on occasion series in similar vein they were either especially commissioned for by outside parties, or as licensee of series that were originally conceived, produced and/or released by third-party publishers elsewhere, typically for release on

1413-576: A financial stake in Columbia Pictures Industries and Alan Hirschfield was appointed CEO, succeeding Leo Jaffe who became chairman. Stanley Schneider, son of Abe Schneider (who became honorary chairman before leaving the board in 1975) was replaced as head of the Columbia Pictures studio by David Begelman , who reported to Hirschfield. Some years later Begelman was involved in a check-forging scandal that badly hurt

1570-413: A healthier balance-sheet (due in large part to box office hits like Kramer vs. Kramer , Stir Crazy , The Blue Lagoon , and Stripes ) Columbia was bought by beverage company The Coca-Cola Company on June 22, 1982, for $ 750 million. Studio head Frank Price mixed big hits like Tootsie , Gandhi , The Karate Kid , The Big Chill , and Ghostbusters with many costly flops. To share

1727-538: A live-action feature. Columbia was the last major studio to employ the expensive color process. Columbia's first Technicolor feature was the western The Desperadoes , starring Randolph Scott and Glenn Ford . Cohn quickly used Technicolor again for Cover Girl , a Hayworth vehicle that instantly was a smash hit, released in 1944, and for the fanciful biography of Frédéric Chopin , A Song to Remember , with Cornel Wilde , released in 1945. Another biopic, 1946's The Jolson Story with Larry Parks and Evelyn Keyes ,

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1884-615: A local branch and not by the American mother company; the 1986–89 book series Australians at War was initiated by the local Australasian subsidiary, "Time-Life Books (Australia) Pty Ltd." – located at 15 Blue Street, North Sydney, N.S.W. 2060, Australia at the time, according to the volume colophons of the series – and therefore relatively rare on American/European soil. Prior to Time-Life, Inc.'s decision to relocate its headquarters from Chicago to Fairfax, Virginia in late 1986, it had long before that already decided to split off

2041-469: A major reorganization shook up at Columbia/Embassy Television, whereas Embassy employee Glenn Patrick resigned to start his own film and television production company, and Barbara Corday was appointed president at the organized studio. The Columbia name would now be used for dramatic shows, while the Embassy name would be used for comedic output. Owing to the association with Castle Rock Entertainment with

2198-458: A mass-market mail order book club/retailer of which there were several in the era, most conspicuously that of contemporary competitor Reader's Digest . On the first volume in the 1966–70 Library of Art series (the eighth one Time-Life took in production at the time) for example, American artist Rockwell Kent commented, "It would be hard for me to overstate my delight in "The World of Michelangelo" – not merely for its superb reproductions of

2355-520: A new management team was brought in. In 1972, Columbia and Warner Bros. formed a partnership called The Burbank Studios, in which both companies shared the Warner studio lot in Burbank . In 1971, Columbia Pictures established sheet music publisher Columbia Pictures Publications, with vice president and general manager Frank J. Hackinson , who later became the president. In 1973, Allen & Co took

2512-519: A nigh next-door neighbor eventually of its mother company after 1986, and where it stayed until it was vacated in 2004. Contemporary reporters though, had a tough time keeping both premises apart, as they kept confusing one for the other. Time-Life Books' DTC business model started to slump around 1991. Then-Deputy Editor Harris Andrews recalled how distraught he got when his 1991 Echoes of Glory mini-series project did not do well in DTC sales. However, once

2669-489: A notorious failure both critically and financially. CPT Holdings then became a stand-alone division from CPT. In January 1988, Columbia/Embassy Television and Tri-Star Television were formed to create the new Columbia Pictures Television and Embassy Communications was reduced as in-name-only and was renamed as ELP Communications as the copyright holder for the shows by Embassy. Meanwhile, Coca-Cola Telecommunications and Embassy Communications (the distributor arm) were merged into

2826-426: A particular year (in this case, 1955 through 1964—the early, pre-Beatles years of rock music), a stylistic trend or particular artist influential in rock music. Each volume had 22 tracks, and was said to contain the original hit recording by the original artist (although this wasn't always true on early pressings of the early albums in the series). The songs themselves represented the most important and popular songs from

2983-494: A proper release). On May 21, 1986, Joe Indelli was resigned as president of Columbia Pictures Television Distribution, in order to launch a new company that was owned by MTM Enterprises to syndicate its own programs and Robert King, who was partner of The Television Program Source, would replace it as CPTD's president of the studio. Also in 1986, the former Lear units (Embassy Television, Embassy Telecommunications, and Tandem Productions) were merged to become Embassy Communications;

3140-685: A reorganization of the various Columbia Pictures legacy labels (Colpix, Colgems , and Bell), Davis introduced Columbia Pictures' new record division, Arista Records , in November 1974, with Davis himself owning 20% of the new venture. Columbia maintained control of the label until 1979, when it was sold to Ariola Records . In addition, Columbia sold its music publishing business (Columbia-Screen Gems) to EMI in August 1976 for $ 15 million. Both would later be reunited with Columbia Pictures under Sony ownership. In December 1976, Columbia Pictures acquired

3297-426: A scrolling list of other titles), a commercial spokesman (usually a performer or legendary disc jockey relevant to a given series, such as Rick Dees for a 1970s-intensive collection and Ralph Emery for a country music series) and testimonials from customers attesting to the quality and value of the albums, to pitch a given series. Key selling points of these collections are that each track was digitally transferred to

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3454-730: A small investment in originally, and notably distributed the 1985–1986 nighttime syndicated version of The Price Is Right and was slated to distribute a new version of Match Game for syndication in 1987). It was headed by Gary Rosenthal, who was leading Embassy Telecommunications, and also inserted was a new subsidiary Coca-Cola Television Operations. On September 9, 1986, Columbia Pictures Television's European division expanded its branch, producing programming for ITV franchisee holders, such as HTV , and added new co-productions from other ITV franchisees such as Anglia Television and Yorkshire Television . Coca-Cola Telecommunications also took some programs that were or slated to be distributed under

3611-1177: A toll-free number for assistance and the Time-Life infomercial channel has been pulled from all cable services, before it went permanently dark altogether. In 2008, Reader's Digest Association (RDA) launched Saguaro Roads Records, Inc. as an in-house music recording label, and resorted it under Time Life due to its 2007 subordination under RDA by their then-owner Ripplewood. Under the combined "Time Life/Saguaro Roads Records" label, albums have been released with Adam Hood , Blind Boys of Alabama , Bo Bice , Brandy and Ray J , Collin Raye , Dion , Edwin McCain , Hank Williams (estate), Jim Brickman , Joan Osborne , Lonestar , Marc Cohn , Mark Chesnutt , Patty Loveless , Rebecca Lynn Howard , Tanya Tucker , The Grascals , Angie Stone , Waylon Jennings and Don McLean . Since its launch Saguaro Roads Records has had garnered seven Grammy nominations for its releases. These included two 2009 releases from The Blind Boys of Alabama whose Down in New Orleans album won

3768-522: A total of 34 years, one of the longest tenures of any studio chief ( Warner Bros. ' Jack L. Warner was head of production or CEO longer but did not become CEO until 1956). Even in an industry rife with nepotism, Columbia was particularly notorious for having a number of Harry and Jack's relatives in high positions. Humorist Robert Benchley called it the Pine Tree Studio, "because it has so many Cohns". Brandt eventually tired of dealing with

3925-516: A variety of reasons. The Dutch language versions of History of the World (as "Time Life Wereld Geschiedenis"), The Epic of Flight (as "De Geschiedenis van de Luchtvaart"), The Enchanted World (as "Het Rijk der Fabelen"), and Mysteries of the Unknown (no Dutch series title) series, for example, were shy of four, seven, eight, and a whopping twenty-five volumes in translation respectively. Likewise,

4082-502: 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 . On June 19, 1918, brothers Jack and Harry Cohn and their business partner Joe Brandt founded

4239-608: Is the sitcom That's My Mama and was originally slated to be a Screen Gems production. Other new productions that were slated to be Screen Gems productions were Nakia , Born Free and Police Woman . On May 27, 1974, Columbia Pictures Television planned to syndicate as early as 1975, ten one-hour musical specials that was set to be taped in Las Vegas nightclubs, and the programs will be simulcast on FM Radio to be set up by Yuri Zabran. In September 1974, Columbia had signed Abby Mann to develop long-form television projects, and

4396-785: The Hallroom Boys (the vaudeville duo of Edward Flanagan and Neely Edwards ), and the Charlie Chaplin -imitator Billy West . The start-up CBC leased space in a Poverty Row studio on Hollywood's famously low-rent Gower Street . Among Hollywood's elite, the studio's small-time reputation led some to joke that "CBC" stood for "Corned Beef and Cabbage". CBC was reorganized as Columbia Pictures Corporation by brothers Harry and Jack Cohn and best friend Joe Brandt on January 10, 1924. Harry Cohn became president in 1932 and remained head of production as well, thus concentrating enormous power in his hands. He would run Columbia for

4553-798: The Mickey Mouse cartoon series from 1929 to 1932. The studio is presently headquartered at the Irving Thalberg Building on the former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (currently known as the Sony Pictures Studios ) lot in Culver City, California since 1990. Columbia Pictures is a member of the Motion Picture Association (MPA), under Sony Pictures Entertainment, and is currently one of six live-action labels of Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group,

4710-526: The Barry & Enright Productions game show library. In 1992, CPT has the potential by possibly going off-net syndication rights to a company backed by a joint venture between RHI Entertainment and Trilogy Entertainment Group. Later that year, director Jonathan Lynn had signed a deal with the studio to develop their own television projects, including an NBC series commitment. On May 10, 1993, CPT and MCA TV formed their barter divisions. CPT's barter division

4867-583: The Matt Helm series with Dean Martin . Columbia also produced a James Bond spoof, Casino Royale (1967), in conjunction with Charles K. Feldman , which held the adaptation rights for that novel . By 1966, the studio was suffering from box-office failures, and takeover rumors began surfacing. Columbia was surviving solely on the profits made from Screen Gems, whose holdings also included radio and television stations. On December 23, 1968, Screen Gems merged with Columbia Pictures Corporation and became part of

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5024-941: The Reader's Digest Association (RDA) in the process agreeing to make Direct Holdings, and thus Time-Life, a subsidiary of RDA. In addition to the company's film and music core activities, it was also the holding company of television and radio combo stations. Stations the company owned were KLZ-TV - AM - FM in Denver , WFBM-TV - AM - FM in Indianapolis , WOOD-TV - AM in Grand Rapids, Michigan , KERO-TV in Bakersfield, California , and KOGO-TV - AM - FM in San Diego , many of which were sold to McGraw-Hill in 1972; however, Time Life kept WOOD-TV, which became WOTV after

5181-650: The Time and Life pictorial archives nearby), before it relocated back east again to 8280 Willow Oaks Corporate Drive, Fairfax, VA 22031 in 1986 where it remained until its ultimate demise in 2023. Starting in 1967, Time Life combined its book offerings with music collections (two to five records) and packaged them as a sturdy box set. After Walter Wanger 's death in 1968, its Time Life Films subsidiary also acquired his production company Walter Wanger Productions and many of its films. When record labels were no longer producing vinyl albums in 1990, Time Life transitioned to CD. In

5338-532: The Time Frame aka History of the World and Lost Civilizations series), the addition of more book series for children, while at the same time substantially stepping up their editorial focus on easier – and thus cheaper – to produce DIY-themed book series, they had already introduced in 1968 with their long-running 1968-77 Foods of the World cookbook series. The books though, regardless of their perceived quality, are easy to find at low prices on

5495-583: The United States Department of Justice filed an antitrust suit against Kerkorian to block him from holding a stake in Columbia while controlling MGM. On February 19, 1979, Columbia Pictures Television acquired TOY Productions; the production company founded by Bud Yorkin and writers Saul Turteltaub and Bernie Orenstein in 1976. In May, Kerkorian acquired an additional 214,000 shares in Columbia, raising his stake to 25%. On August 2,

5652-484: The 1930s, Columbia signed Jean Arthur to a long-term contract, and after The Whole Town's Talking (1935), Arthur became a major comedy star. Ann Sothern 's career was launched when Columbia signed her to a contract in 1936. Cary Grant signed a contract in 1937 and soon after it was altered to a non-exclusive contract shared with RKO . Many theaters relied on westerns to attract big weekend audiences, and Columbia always recognized this market. Its first cowboy star

5809-487: The 1934 Oscars, put Columbia on the map. Until then, Columbia's business had depended on theater owners willing to take its films, since it did not have a theater network of its own. Other Capra-directed hits followed, including the original version of Lost Horizon (1937), with Ronald Colman , and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), which made James Stewart a major star. In 1933, Columbia hired Robert Kalloch to be its chief fashion and women's costume designer. He

5966-463: The 1960s and 1970s, the collections released by Time–Life Records catered to an adult audience, with genres including classical , jazz , swing and orchestral music; and the music of operas and Broadway theatre . On occasion, Time Life offered popular music (generally pre-1955 music, as opposed to pop and rock music airing on contemporary hit radio stations in the United States at

6123-883: The 1980s and 1990s, other shows such as Bewitched , I Dream of Jeannie , and The Partridge Family were licensed to The Program Exchange . The same year, CPT acquired distribution rights to Benson . In late 1984, Barbara Corday took over as president of the studio. Another high-profile deal at CPT arrived in August 1984 when two of the high-profile independent producers North Ave. Productions (backed by Michael S. Baser and Kim Weiskopf ) signed with CPT after leaving 20th Century Fox Television (now 20th Television ), while George Schenck and Frank Cardea through Schenck/Cardea Productions reupped its contract with CPT. On June 18, 1985, Norman Lear and Jerry Perenchio sold their company, Embassy Communications, Inc. ( Embassy Pictures , Embassy Television , Tandem Productions , and Embassy Home Entertainment) to Coca-Cola. The company gained

6280-596: The CPT logo and begin putting the CTT logo in its place, and also in January 1997, changed monikers from Sony Television Entertainment to Columbia TriStar Television Group. On July 1, 2000, Barry Thurston stepped down as president of Columbia TriStar Television Distribution after 17 years and was succeeded by then-current president, Steve Mosko. On January 1, 2001, Columbia Pictures Television officially dropped its separate logo and it

6437-575: The Civil War followup project. This however, did not apply to latter-day non-proprietary book series Time-Life was licensed to market, such as the 1999-2000 The Civil War: A Narrative – 40th Anniversary Edition commemorative series edition, or the European series licensed from Andromeda Oxford, Ltd. (see below ) Time-Life ceased to publish books when it made its Time-Life Books, Inc. division defunct in January 2001, with any remaining vestiges of

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6594-564: The Civil War" ( OCLC   1044896 ) book titles as spin-offs of their two flagship magazines. It was Time, Inc. itself however, that did initiate the publication of DTC book series in 1960 with their long running 1960-67 LIFE World Library series, before it was two years later placed into the care of its newly established subsidiary. After having tested the waters with the tentative 1960–61 trade paperback Time Capsule budget-priced book series publishing trial run (which actually evolved into their 1962-1966 Time Reading Program series,

6751-539: The Cohn brothers, and in 1932 sold his one-third stake to Jack and Harry Cohn, who took over from him as president. Columbia's product line consisted mostly of moderately budgeted features and short subjects including comedies, sports films, various serials, and cartoons. Columbia gradually moved into the production of higher-budget fare, eventually joining the second tier of Hollywood studios along with United Artists and Universal . Like United Artists and Universal, Columbia

6908-591: The Columbia Pictures Television banner including What's Happening Now!! , The Real Ghostbusters , Dinosaucers , and Punky Brewster as well as taking the US distribution rights of Hardcastle and McCormick from Colex. Columbia acquired the rights to Punky , a former NBC in-house production, because Financial Interest and Syndication Rules prevented the network from producing more episodes for syndication after they cancelled it. During

7065-569: The Fairfax premises open as the non-print Time-Life seat until the altogether shuttering of the company in 2023. The from 2004 onward unrelated Time [& Life], Inc./Time Warner however, continued until the late-2010s to publish similar print material for the home market through New York City-based Time Home Entertainment, Inc. (founded in the early 1990s), but as publisher of retail single-title books only instead of (direct marketed) book series, which they themselves had already scrubbed entirely in

7222-640: The Family and The Jeffersons , for $ 485 million. On November 16, 1985, CBS dropped out of the Tri-Star venture. Time Life Time Life, Inc. (also habitually represented with a hyphen as Time-Life, Inc. , even by the company itself) was an American multi-media conglomerate company formerly known as a prolific production/publishing company and direct marketeer seller of books, music, video/DVD, and other multimedia products. After all home market book publication activities had been shuttered in 2003,

7379-730: The German-language version of The Old West (as "Der Wilde Westen," and, even though American specific, translated nonetheless due to the continued and unabated popularity of the Western genre in Germany), disseminated through the Amsterdam branch as Time-Life Bücher, was shy of seven volumes just like the French-language Le Far West edition was. Of at least one series is known that it had been initiated by

7536-595: The Magician (1939), The Shadow (1940), Terry and the Pirates (1940), Captain Midnight (1942), The Phantom (1943), Batman (1943), and the especially successful Superman (1948), among many others. Columbia also produced musical shorts, sports reels (usually narrated by sportscaster Bill Stern ), and travelogues. Its " Screen Snapshots " series, showing behind-the-scenes footage of Hollywood stars,

7693-487: The President of Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1959, until his death a year later. Columbia could not afford to keep a huge roster of contract stars, so Jack Cohn usually borrowed them from other studios. At Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer , the industry's most prestigious studio, Columbia was nicknamed "Siberia", as Louis B. Mayer would use the loan-out to Columbia as a way to punish his less-obedient signings. In

7850-515: The Stooges, Keaton, Charley Chase , Shemp Howard , Joe Besser , and Joe DeRita subjects have been released to home video. Columbia incorporated animation into its studio in 1929, distributing Krazy Kat cartoons, taking over from Paramount . The following year, Columbia took over distribution of the Mickey Mouse series from Celebrity Productions until 1932. In 1933, The Mintz studio

8007-537: The Tandem unit ceased production to be used after the cancellation of Diff'rent Strokes but remained in-name-only, while the Columbia and Embassy units continued to exist separately. Also on the same year on August 28, CPT acquired Danny Arnold's Four D Productions, Inc. for $ 50 million. On November 24, 1986, Coca-Cola regrouped CPT, Embassy Communications, and Merv Griffin Enterprises into Coca-Cola Television, which

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8164-782: The UPA deal was terminated, Columbia distributed the Hanna-Barbera cartoons, including Loopy De Loop from 1959 to 1965, which was Columbia's final theatrical cartoon series. In 1967, the Hanna-Barbera deal expired and was not renewed. According to Bob Thomas' book King Cohn , studio chief Harry Cohn always placed a high priority on serials. Beginning in 1937, Columbia entered the lucrative serial market and kept making these weekly episodic adventures until 1956, after other studios had discontinued them. The most famous Columbia serials are based on comic-strip or radio characters: Mandrake

8321-562: The US and Canada alone with very limited retail distribution overseas, ceasing all together in 2023. Time-Life, Inc. was founded in 1961 as the book marketing subsidiary of the New York City-based Time Inc. , the later, around 1966, coined Time & Life, Inc. (note use of different connecting characters between "Time" and "Life") and took its name from Time Inc.'s two then-flagship magazines, Time and Life . It remained independent from both however, even though

8478-513: The US home market, usually, but not always, under its own imprint. English-language versions of British Commonwealth-pedigree series were published by a variety of publishers for the various English-speaking territories in the world, with the regional Time-Life Books B.V. Amsterdam subsidiary commonly designated for Europe and the British Isles, as mentioned in the colophons of the individual volumes. The Amsterdam subsidiary also took care of

8635-574: The World series, the UK variant of the home market Time Frame series where it had been a common volume. Nor was this phenomenon restricted to the English-language volume releases alone; of the "Gemstones" volume of the Planet Earth series, which had been a common one for the source release, is known that its "Edelgesteenten" Dutch-language counterpart ( ISBN   906182494X ) had been

8792-551: The arcade game company D. Gottlieb & Co. for $ 50 million. In 1978, Begelman was suspended for having embezzled money from Columbia. Hirschfield was forced out for his refusal to reinstate him. Begelman later resigned and was replaced by Daniel Melnick in June 1978. Fay Vincent was hired to replace Hirschfield. Frank Price became president of production in 1978. In March 1979, he would become president of Columbia Pictures, succeeding Melnick. During Price's tenure he

8949-457: The book business, it had the already near-empty Alexandria office premises vacated in 2004 after its acquisition of Time Life, laying off what was left of the former Time-Life Books, Inc. staff, outsourcing remaining operations like customer service, order processing and distribution to third-party companies in Iowa, Pennsylvania and Kentucky instead. It did keep the Fairfax premises open however, as

9106-518: The book colophons. Time Life added music in 1967, selling box sets and collections through Time–Life Records as a division subordinated under Time-Life Books, Inc. The division changed its name to Time Life Music after music cassette tapes were added to its array of releases, with its European iterations, including the German Time Life Musik label, subordinated under the Amsterdam "Time-Life Books BV" subsidiary branch. During

9263-540: The book division immediately terminated for good upon the 31 December 2003 acquisition by Ripplewood/Direct Holdings L.L.C. The European "Time Life Books B.V." Amsterdam subsidiary branch and its three satellite offices elsewhere in Europe though, held out for a few years longer before they too were all closed down simultaneously in late August 2009, after which all remaining book publishing activities were suspended indefinitely. Despite Ripplewood's stated intent to return to

9420-415: The book division onto its own entity in 1964, as above stated, in order to better differentiate between their book and the non-print media activities. Time-Life Books, Inc. had in the meantime moved out its New York City premises (where it was left behind by its mother company when they moved to Chicago in 1969) a decade earlier in early 1977 to the nearby 2000 Duke St. Alexandria, VA 22314 premises, to become

9577-399: The brand logo of their former book subsidiary on their own single-title book publications again after 2013, it (the brand, not the subsidiary) had quietly bought back from Mosaic Media Investment Partners in January 2014. Having been renamed "Time Inc. Books" in 2015, the publisher shared its mother company's fate when it went ultimately defunct in 2018, bringing the era of Time-Life Books to

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9734-423: The budgets of his films, and the studio got the maximum use out of costly sets, costumes, and props by reusing them in other films. Many of Columbia's low-budget "B" pictures and short subjects have an expensive look, thanks to Columbia's efficient recycling policy. Cohn was reluctant to spend lavish sums on even his most important pictures, and it was not until 1943 that he agreed to use three-strip Technicolor in

9891-510: The collections the company has released, but is by no means exhaustive. Time Life's video business has been growing quickly since 2000. Starting out at the dawn of the VHS era in 1978, the division began with (re-)issuing such documentary series as The World at War (1973–74), The Trials of Life (1990), The Civil War (1990), The Wild West (1993), The Nazis: A Warning from History (1997), and Growing Up Wild (2012). As evidenced by

10048-494: The company and its only official online retailer were permanently shut down by its last owner, though the one remaining official website only went dark in May 2024. As Time-Life Books, Inc. – which was not formally incorporated as an official subsidiary until 1964 – the company gained fame as a seller of book series that were directly mailed to households in (bi-)monthly installments, operating as book sales clubs , which

10205-550: The company as an office boy out of high school and become a director in 1929, rising through the financial side of the business. In 1963, Columbia acquired music publisher Aldon Music . By the late 1960s, Columbia had an ambiguous identity, offering old-fashioned fare such as A Man for All Seasons and Oliver! along with the more contemporary Easy Rider and The Monkees . After turning down releasing Albert R. Broccoli 's Eon Productions James Bond films, Columbia hired Broccoli's former partner Irving Allen to produce

10362-519: The company could in the beginning draw on the editorial services of both for their early 1960s book series, particularly where pictorial content was concerned. The subsidiary moved out of the New York City premises to its own headquarters in Chicago, USA after that building had finished construction in 1969 (though it had left the book division at New York for the editorial convenience of having

10519-514: The company distributed programming made by the CapCities/ABC-Brillstein-Grey joint venture Brillstein-Grey Communications until MCA purchased an investment made by the parent company. On February 21, 1994, after takeover by Sony Pictures Entertainment , Columbia Pictures Television and TriStar Television merged under the leadership of Jon Feltheimer and the two combined studios became Columbia TriStar Television . After

10676-770: The company's shows until 1967, when Hanna-Barbera was sold to Taft Broadcasting . In 1960, the animation studio became a publicly traded company under the name Screen Gems, Inc., when Columbia spun off an 18% stake. By 1950, Columbia had discontinued most of its popular series films ( Boston Blackie , Blondie , The Lone Wolf , The Crime Doctor , Rusty , etc.) Only Jungle Jim , launched by producer Sam Katzman in 1949, kept going through 1955. Katzman contributed greatly to Columbia's success by producing dozens of topical feature films, including crime dramas , science-fiction stories, and rock'n'roll musicals. Columbia kept making serials until 1956 and two-reel comedies until 1957, after other studios had abandoned these mediums. As

10833-669: The desired format using the original master recordings, as opposed to being "re-records"; and that the most popular and requested songs by customers could be found in a single collection (as opposed to a customer having to purchase many albums to obtain just a few desired tracks). Customers were given a choice of which format they wanted their box set: either vinyl albums (through 1990), 8-track or cassette tape , or compact disc ; today's box sets are offered only as compact discs. While most of Time Life's box-sets and releases were critically hailed, there were also some minor faults pointed out by critics. For instance, several early pressings of

10990-426: The early 1980s, Columbia and Tri-Star Pictures set up a film partnership with Delphi Film Associates and acquired an interest in various film releases. In 1984, Delphi Film Associates III acquired an interest in the Tri-Star and Columbia film slate of 1984, which would make a $ 60 million offering in the financing of film production. Also that year, Columbia Pictures had bought out the rights to Hardbodies , which

11147-690: The early volumes in "The Rock'n'Roll Era" series contained stereo re-recordings of the original hits (something that would be corrected on later pressings, either with the correct original recording or a replacement track). Sometimes, the most popular songs of a given time period were omitted, frequently due to licensing issues. Examples included The Beatles and The Rolling Stones for the Classic Rock and "Super Hits"/"AM Gold" series;, Garth Brooks and Shania Twain on various country music series;, and Prince , Madonna , Whitney Houston , Guns N' Roses , Bon Jovi , Janet Jackson and Michael Jackson on

11304-557: The early-1980s and located at the time at Ottho Heldringstraat 5, 1066 AZ Amsterdam , Netherlands ) as headquarters for mainland Europe and the British isles, which maintained administrative satellite offices in Paris ( France ), London ( UK ), and Munich ( Germany ), not by coincidence all located in the countries where Time-Life Books took on the publisher role itself. However, not rarely were these translated versions truncated for

11461-491: The fall of 1986, the sitcom Designing Women began a successful seven-year run on CBS. The same year, Tri-Star Pictures formed Tri-Star Television and produced the short-lived series Downtown . Tri-Star produced more series in 1987, Take Five , Nothing in Common , My Two Dads , Werewolf , and Buck James . Also that same year, Clyde Phillips joined the studio as an independent television producer. In 1987,

11618-491: The first project to came out of the deal was Medical Story . In 1975, Carl Reiner joined Columbia Pictures Television to serve as executive producer and host of the show Good Heavens , which was for the ABC television network. Also, on July 1, 1975, former NBC vice president Larry White had set up his own production company Larry White Productions with a deal at Columbia Pictures Television. On May 10, 1976, White then joined

11775-472: The first years of its existence after Time & Life had shortly before relocated from its previous premises in Rockefeller Center in 1960. In 2014 it relocated again to smaller premises elsewhere in the city. As a brand, Time-Life actually outlived its sire by five years, as the remnants of Time & Life went defunct in early 2018 after a steady three-decades long decline (mirroring in effect

11932-677: The focus of the group shifted towards music, video, and entertainment experiences – such as the StarVista cruises – exclusively. Its products have once been sold worldwide throughout the Americas, Europe, Australasia, and Asia via television, print, retail, the Internet, telemarketing, and direct sales. Activities were largely restricted to the North American home market afterwards, and operations were until recently focused on

12089-429: The format of their choice); customers and had the option of keeping just the volumes they wanted. In time, each volume was also offered for individual sale. Several of the series – especially the pop, rock, country and rhythm and blues series – had retail versions for sale, released after the entire series was issued. Typically, these were sold at discount stores, often grouped in three-CD sets of 12 tracks each and having

12246-420: The fourteen-volume "40th Anniversary Edition" The Civil War: A Narrative and the eighteen-volume Voices of the Civil War series, where the volumes "Petersburg Siege to Bentonville" ( ISBN   0783501129 ) and "Shenandoah 1864" ( ISBN   078354717X ) were the rarer ones respectively. The same applied for "The Rise of Cities" volume ( ISBN   0705409910 ) from the twenty five-volume History of

12403-483: The increasing cost of film production, Coke brought in two outside investors whose earlier efforts in Hollywood had come to nothing. In 1982, Columbia, Time Inc. 's HBO and CBS announced, as a joint venture, "Nova Pictures"; this enterprise was to be renamed Tri-Star Pictures . In 1983, Price left Columbia Pictures after a dispute with Coca-Cola and went back to Universal. He was replaced by Guy McElwaine . In

12560-446: The larger studios declined in the 1950s, Columbia's position improved. This was largely because it did not suffer from the massive loss of income that the other major studios suffered from the loss of their theaters (well over 90 percent, in some cases). Columbia continued to produce 40-plus pictures a year, offering productions that often broke ground and kept audiences coming to theaters. Some of its significant films from this era include

12717-541: The largest studios. The studio soon replaced RKO on the list of the "Big Five" studios. In 1946, Columbia dropped the Screen Gems brand from its cartoon line, but retained the Screen Gems name for various ancillary activities, including a 16 mm film-rental agency and a TV-commercial production company. On November 8, 1948, Columbia adopted the Screen Gems name for its television production subsidiary when

12874-423: The late 1920s, spurred by a successful association with director Frank Capra . With Capra and others such as the most successful two reel comedy series, The Three Stooges , Columbia became one of the primary homes of the screwball comedy . In the 1930s, Columbia's major contract stars were Jean Arthur and Cary Grant . In the 1940s, Rita Hayworth became the studio's premier star and propelled their fortunes into

13031-456: The late 1950s. Rosalind Russell , Glenn Ford and William Holden also became major stars at the studio. It is one of the leading film studios in the world, and was one of the so-called " Little Three " among the eight major film studios of Hollywood 's Golden Age . Today, it has become the world's third largest major film studio. The company was also primarily responsible for distributing Disney 's Silly Symphony film series as well as

13188-446: The legal name of Time-Life which was kept as a brand name however, though the copyright disclaimer had it emphatically stated that it is "not affiliated with Time Warner Inc. or Time [& Life], Inc.," the former owners of the Time and Life magazines, and from which the company name originated from in the first place. At the time of the takeover, it was reported the Time-Life, Inc.'s turnover had contracted to US$ 350 million, turning

13345-427: The library of game shows including The Newlywed Game , The Dating Game , and The Gong Show ) for $ 200 million after hiring film producers Peter Guber and Jon Peters to run the company. On November 5, 1990, CPE folded its first-run syndication unit Guber-Peters Television into Columbia Pictures Television Distribution. On August 7, 1991, CPE changed its name to Sony Pictures Entertainment and TriStar Television

13502-577: The main Sounds of the Eighties series. Time Life Music too, was included in the December 31, 2003 sale of Time Life, Inc. to Direct Holdings Global, the former Time Warner owners having cited the "earnings drag of the direct-marketing music division" caused by the "challenging publishing environment where sales have suffered from a lack of hits and the downturn in the music business" as the reason to have

13659-412: The main book series had been. Yet, Time-Life Books was still able to sell 20 million books in 1985, which, at a US$ 260 million turnover that year (after having suffered a disastrous sales plunge to a mere US$ 1,6 million two years earlier ), made the subsidiary the largest single earning component of Time-Life, Inc. at that particular point in time – though it had to lay off over 200 employees (out of

13816-478: The master’s work but for the textual and pictorial presentation." Other examples standing out for their perceived picture/text quality included the 1970-72 LIFE Library of Photography series which featured for its time very high-quality duotone printing for its black-and-white reproductions in its original edition, having been able to draw on Life ' s own vast archive of journalistic and art photographs from virtually every major contemporary photographer (hence

13973-742: The merger, Columbia Pictures Television Distribution was renamed as Columbia TriStar Television Distribution. During that year, SPE acquired a vast back catalog of independently produced game shows with the acquisition of Stewart Television . Along with the Merv Griffin, Chuck Barris, Barry & Enright, and CPT game shows they had already owned, these were part of the basis of the Game Show Network, launched on December 1, 1994. In 1998, ELP Communications became an in-name unit of Columbia TriStar Television. In 1997, most new shows, as well as some existing CPT shows like Party of Five , dropped

14130-611: The mid-1990s, Time Life acquired Heartland Music, with the Heartland Music label then appearing as a brand. This company was subsequently sold off and is no longer associated with Time Life. On December 31, 2003, Time Life was sold by Time Warner to a group of private investors including Ripplewood Holdings L.L.C. and ZelnickMedia for an undisclosed price, who subordinated their acquisition under their jointly-owned, Direct Holdings Global L.L.C. holding company, founded in 1998. With that transaction, Direct Holdings US Corp became

14287-477: The mini-series became one of the very first to be also distributed through regular book store retail channels, sales picked up dramatically, thereby becoming a sales success after all. As a result, Time Life Books series, including the older ones that were still in print, were henceforth concurrently marketed through the regular book store channels as well, alongside the hitherto DTC-only channel – which incidentally, also encompassed Andrews' own 1996-98 Voices of

14444-457: The misfortunes of its erstwhile progeny), with its handful of surviving assets being broken up and sold piecemeal to a variety of third-party outsiders. In order to settle outstanding financial obligations pursuant their 2012 bankruptcy, Reader's Digest Association sold Time Life in 2013 to Mosaic Media Investment Partners. In 2023 and without so much as a whisper in contemporary media, Time-Life ended its six decades-long existence eventually, when

14601-431: The most popular of the series' tracks, and cover artwork and naming loosely based on the subscription/catalog-exclusive titles. Additionally, the "Classic Country" series had special 15-track single-CD versions of several of its volumes issued for retail sale (in addition to budget 3-CD sets). As of March 2023, Time Life began shutting down its DTC CD and DVD music service. Until May 2024, the company's website only listed

14758-427: The movie studio, CPT signed on to handle international distribution and off-net syndication of Castle Rock's programs, because Columbia had a 40% interest in the studio. On December 21, 1987, Coca-Cola spun off their entertainment holdings and sold it to Tri-Star Pictures, Inc. for $ 3.1 billion. Tri-Star was renamed as Columbia Pictures Entertainment (which they partially owned) after the film Ishtar turned out to be

14915-441: The new Columbia Pictures Television Distribution. All shows in the era ended with the Columbia logo between 1988 and 1991. As a result, many of the staff, including Barbara Corday , who had been as president of the studio since 1984 has been laid off, as well as former Coca-Cola Telecommunications presidents Herman Rush and Peter Seale, who had also been laid off and replaced mostly by Tri-Star alumnus, such as Scott Siegler , who

15072-637: The newly formed Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. for $ 24.5 million. Schneider was chairman of the holding company and Leo Jaffe president. Following the merger, in March 1969, CPI purchased Bell Records for $ 3.5 million (mainly in CPI stock), retaining Larry Uttal as label president. Nearly bankrupt by the early 1970s, the studio was saved via a radical overhaul: the Gower Street Studios (now called " Sunset Gower Studios ") were sold and

15229-433: The once highly successful division included in the sale as well. Through 2010, several different series Time Life had offered were available on a subscription basis, either by calling a 1-800 number or sending a completed postcard-sized card and payment to Time Life. Purportedly, the customer would get a specific volume (as advertised on TV or in a magazine) first, before receiving a new volume roughly every other month (on

15386-510: The ones covered in the late 1980s Understanding Computers and Voyage Through the Universe series which were already outdated before either series had even completed its run. Nor were their history series entirely exempt from this phenomenon either, especially the early 1960s ones, as new insights, archeological findings and new technology have the potential to completely rewrite history as understood in past decades. Mayan history for example,

15543-428: The only other known paperback book series the publisher released afterwards), the new subsidiary started out for real in 1962 with the 1960-67 LIFE World Library (the "Time" qualifier was only in 1966 added to the company's name and book logos, coinciding with the renaming of sire company "Time, Inc." to "Time & Life, Inc.") hardback series it had inherited from its mother company, with the hardback slated to become

15700-477: The others being TriStar Pictures , Affirm Films , Screen Gems , Sony Pictures Classics , and Stage 6 Films . Columbia's most commercially successful franchises include Spider-Man , Jumanji , Bad Boys , Men in Black , The Karate Kid , Robert Langdon , and Ghostbusters , and the studio's highest-grossing film worldwide is Spider-Man: No Way Home with box-office of $ 1.92 billion. The studio

15857-412: The period or subject featured. An essay published by Both Sides Now Publications noted that Time-Life's move into rock music came at a time when much of the adult audience Time-Life catered to grew up during the rock-and-roll era and, as such, the new series was consistent with its goal of catering to an adult audience. " The Rock 'n' Roll Era " series was a big success, and by the time the final volume

16014-519: The plethora of later output as the publisher moved away from soberly presented science and history toward sensationalism (that then with new age overtones imbued trend started in the mid-1980s with The Enchanted World and Mysteries of the Unknown series, followed in the early 1990s by the Library of Curious and Unusual Facts and True Crime series as prime sensationalist examples), less academically but more popularized written history (such as

16171-525: The popular series, Dance Fever , The Merv Griffin Show , and the two game shows, Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune ; (the nighttime versions were distributed by King World , which is now handled by successor CBS Media Ventures ). However, Sony Pictures Television handles off-net syndication reruns by broadcasting them on Game Show Network , while sister company Sony Pictures Home Entertainment owns DVD rights, though, as game shows, are unlikely to get

16328-485: The potential other-language editions in Europe. These European Time Life versions are far less common, if not outright rare, in used-book markets—the North American ones in particular—than Time Life's own proprietary releases are. The non-proprietary US home market releases on the other hand, are rare on European soil. Licensed series published under the Time-Life Books brand had the licensors dutifully mentioned in

16485-427: The preceding year, deeming them "too unprofitable". In essence, Time, Inc. emulated what former competitor Reader's Digest had been doing before them and what contemporary competitor National Geographic Books was still doing at that point in time, actually coming in more than one way full circle as they had done likewise themselves prior to their 1960 book series introduction. Somewhat confusingly, they began to employ

16642-644: The productions of the English studio Warwick Films (by producers Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli ), as well as many films by producer Carl Foreman , who resided in England. Columbia distributed some films made by Hammer , which was also based in England. In December 1956, Jack Cohn, co-founder and executive vice-president, died. In 1958, Columbia established its own record label, Colpix Records , initially run by Jonie Taps, who headed Columbia's music department, and later Paul Wexler and Lester Sill . Colpix

16799-525: The rare one, still commanding premium prices on Dutch/Belgian used-book markets for its extreme scarcity. Non-USA-specific topic series were habitually translated into other languages (French being the most predominant, due to Time Life's desire to have to bordering French-Canada served as well), and disseminated through local branches of Time-Life Books in the intended target markets. For several, usually smaller language areas, Time-Life regularly resorted to licensing out their publications to local publishers, as

16956-526: The reader’s intelligence, and, therefore, more worthy of praise". The same held equally true for the slightly earlier 1963–64 The LIFE History of the United States series where each of the volumes was written by an American historian of contemporary renown. Because of their intrinsic transient nature in regard to validity, most science book series quickly became ephemera of their time only a short while later on, especially those concerning fields in which developments followed each other at breakneck speed, such as

17113-481: The reincarnation of Rastar Pictures, which was acquired by Columbia Pictures in February 1980. Columbia Pictures also reorganized its music and record divisions. Clive Davis was hired as a record and music consultant by Columbia Pictures in 1974 and later became temporary president of Bell Records . Davis's real goal was to revitalize Columbia Pictures' music division. With a $ 10 million investment by CPI, and

17270-600: The remaining 19% in 1985. Around this time, Columbia put Steven Spielberg 's proposed follow-up to Close Encounters of the Third Kind , Night Skies , into turnaround . The project eventually became the highest-grossing film of the time, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial . Columbia received a share of the profits for its involvement in the development. On May 17, 1982, Columbia Pictures acquired Spelling-Goldberg Productions for over $ 40 million. With

17427-511: The responsibilities of Rush and Seale will have still have an unspecified corporate operation at CPE's headquarters for the New York area, allowing Herman Rush and Peter Seale had plans to set up a new syndicated company to handle the former CCT product. On February 2, 1988, Barry Thurston; vice-president of Columbia/Embassy Television, became president of Columbia Pictures Television Distribution. On December 26, 1988, writer Pamela Pettler signed

17584-727: The rights to such shows as All in the Family , Sanford and Son , The Jeffersons , Good Times , Maude , Diff'rent Strokes , Archie Bunker's Place , The Facts of Life , One Day at a Time , Who's the Boss? , and Silver Spoons , among others. AITF at the time however, was still distributed by Viacom Enterprises but under license by Embassy. Coke also made plans to spin off Embassy Pictures and Embassy Home Entertainment. Under Coca-Cola's ownership, Embassy saw success with 227 and Married... with Children . The same year, Columbia and LBS Communications launched What's Happening Now!! in first-run syndication . The show

17741-560: The sale of the other stations, and remained owned by the company until 1984. It was also the U.S. television distributor of programs from the BBC in the United Kingdom until Lionheart Television took over in 1982. Time-Life, Inc.'s progenitor company Time & Life, Inc. had remained throughout its entire existence headquartered in New York City. Its 1271 Avenue of the Americas location became Time-Life's nascent headquarters as well in

17898-422: The sciences, and (world civilization) histories, as well as an early series on contemporary life in various countries of the world. Content of all of these earlier series was somewhat academic in tone and presentation, providing the basics of the subjects in the way it might be done in a lecture aimed at the general public. One of the earliest such series concerned the 1965–68 Great Ages of Man history series, which

18055-542: The seat of its subsidiary Direct Holdings Global during their 2003–13 ownership of Time Life. In their post-August 2009 haste to quit the book publishing business as quickly as possible, Direct Holdings decided to liquidate their leftover book stock by dumping it wholesale on specialized US and European remainder book stores, which included relatively new, late-1990s, produced series like The Civil War: A Narrative – 40th Anniversary Edition or Myths and Mankind . Subsequent owner Mosaic Media Investment Partners too, kept

18212-600: The series temporary return to the "Life"-only title), remaining in print for over a decade besides spawning two spinoff photography series. In similar vein, the 1968–77 Foods Of The World series featured contributions by renowned contemporary food writers/critics and chefs such as M. F. K. Fisher , James Beard , Julia Child , Craig Claiborne , among others. The 1978–80 The Good Cook series, edited by Richard Olney , featured likewise contributions from Jeremiah Tower , fe Grigson, Michel Lemonnier, and many others. Other well regarded series covered nature, (urban) geography ,

18369-472: The short-lived cult following animated series The Critic on ABC and Fox in 1994. One of the most successful by far was Seinfeld , a Castle Rock Entertainment production which Columbia distributed in off-net syndication years later. On August 21, 1992, Columbia's subsidiary CAT Holdings, Inc. (Columbia Act III Television) and Franklin / Waterman Entertainment created a joint venture called Franklin/Waterman 2. On December 7, 1992, Sony Pictures acquired

18526-408: The songs, with the addition of placement on various Billboard magazine charts. Like the earlier box-sets featuring other musical styles and genres, the country and pop music series were advertised in magazines, catalogs and direct mail. By this time though, and like its Time-Life Books sibling division, most of these collections were advertised on television as well, vigorously so in effect. There

18683-1030: The studio acquired Pioneer Telefilms, a television commercial company founded by Jack Cohn's son, Ralph. Pioneer had been founded in 1947, and was later reorganized as Screen Gems. The studio opened its doors for business in New York on April 15, 1949. By 1951, Screen Gems became a full-fledged television studio and became a major producer of sitcoms for TV, beginning with Father Knows Best and followed by The Donna Reed Show , The Partridge Family , Bewitched , I Dream of Jeannie , and The Monkees . On July 1, 1956, studio veteran Irving Briskin stepped down as 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. On December 10, 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

18840-418: The studio as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn (CBC) Film Sales Corporation . It adopted the Columbia Pictures name on January 10, 1924 (operating as Columbia Pictures Corporation until December 23, 1968) went public two years later and eventually began to use the image of Columbia , the female personification of the United States, as its logo. In its early years, Columbia was a minor player in Hollywood, but began to grow in

18997-531: The studio signed the Three Stooges in 1934. Rejected by MGM (which kept straight-man Ted Healy but let the Stooges go), the Stooges made 190 shorts for Columbia between 1934 and 1957. Columbia's short-subject department employed many famous comedians, including Buster Keaton , Charley Chase , Harry Langdon , Andy Clyde , and Hugh Herbert . Almost 400 of Columbia's 529 two-reel comedies were released to television between 1958 and 1961; to date, all of

19154-726: The studio to displace Gerber as his program chief, who subsequently restarted plans to launch its own CPT-based production company. On June 13, 1977, CPT acquired worldwide distribution rights to Barney Miller and Fish from Danny Arnold , Quinn Martin 's Barnaby Jones , and Soap from Witt/Thomas/Harris Productions . On June 27, CPT bought domestic distribution rights to four series made by Spelling-Goldberg Productions including S.W.A.T. , Starsky & Hutch , Charlie's Angels , and Family from Metromedia . Later on in 1977, former MGM Television president Harris Katleman and Universal Television producer Harve Bennett joined forces to form Bennett/Katleman Productions with

19311-604: The studio's adaptation of the controversial James Jones novel From Here to Eternity (1953), On the Waterfront (1954), and The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) with William Holden and Alec Guinness , all of which won the Best Picture Oscar . Another significant film of the studio was the free adaptation of George Orwell 's dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1956). Columbia also released

19468-448: The studio's image. On May 6, 1974, Columbia retired the Screen Gems name from television, renaming its television division to the name of Columbia Pictures Television . The name was suggested by David Gerber , who was then president of Columbia's television division. The same year, Columbia Pictures acquired Rastar Pictures , which included Rastar Productions, Rastar Features, and Rastar Television. Ray Stark then founded Rastar Films,

19625-474: The subsidiary's staple book release format. The by the general populace perceived cachet of the hardback format where quality of both format and contents were concerned, actually lined up fully with the intent of original publisher Jerome Hardy, who had declared early on that his publishing company would succeed through a strategy to "give the customer more than he has any right to expect." Several of these book series garnered substantial critical acclaim unusual for

19782-810: The television assets of Time Life . A year later, Columbia (which Time-Life Television became a part of its sisters television company) joined with HBO and CBS to form TriStar Pictures . On May 17, 1982, Columbia Pictures acquired Spelling-Goldberg Productions for more than $ 40 million. Around the same year, former ABC executive Barbara Corday started a new Columbia-affiliated production company Can't Sing Can't Dance Productions. The 1980s brought significant changes to CPT. On June 22, 1982, beverage company The Coca-Cola Company bought Columbia Pictures for $ 750 million. In 1983, Coca-Cola formed CPT Holdings and demerged CPT from Columbia Pictures Industries in 1984 and transferred CPT to CPT Holdings. In 1983, actress Suzanne Somers through Hamel/Somers Productions had signed

19939-430: The time ( Charley Pride was the first artist featured) getting their own album. But until the mid-1980s, Time Life did not feature a rock music-intensive series for customers, preferring to cater to older adults with conservative music tastes. Time Life's first successful foray into rock music came in 1986, with a series called "The Rock 'n' Roll Era." Each volume in that series—like similar series that followed—focused on

20096-519: The time) in box-sets. Although there were television advertisements, Time Life advertised most of these sets in magazines, specialty catalogs and direct mail , just like it did with their book series. In the early 1980s, Time Life began branching out, offering a series of albums focusing on country music . The first series was 1981's "Country Music," with volumes focusing on a particular artist and featuring eight or nine tracks per album. Twenty volumes were issued, with many of country's greatest artists of

20253-567: The total 1,243 employee pool of 1983, spread over ten worldwide offices ) and shutter the Mexico City (Time-Life International de Mexico S.A. de C.V.) and Tokyo , Japan (Time Life International Publishing) operations to turn around the dramatic net operating losses suffered earlier that decade, but which also heralded the beginning of Time-Life Books' gradual withdrawal from the Far Eastern and Latin-American markets. Of some series it

20410-567: The trial began; on August 14, the court ruled in favor for Kerkorian. In 1979, Columbia agreed with Time-Life Video to release 20 titles on videocassette . On September 30, 1980, Kerkorian sued Columbia for ignoring shareholders' interest and violating an agreement with him. Columbia later accused him on October 2, of scheming with Nelson Bunker Hunt to gain control of Columbia. In 1981, Kerkorian sold his 25% stake in Columbia back to CPI. Columbia Pictures later acquired 81% of The Walter Reade Organization , which owned 11 theaters; it purchased

20567-412: The used-book market, due to their being published in millions of copies. The same incidentally, also applied for the handful of later stand-alone book titles the company had published that were not part of a series, such as the 1995 "Eyewitness: 150 years of photojournalism" ( ISBN   0848710223 ) title, but which were nonetheless usually conceived along the same thematic and format execution lines as

20724-493: Was Buck Jones , who signed with Columbia in 1930 for a fraction of his former big-studio salary. Over the next two decades Columbia released scores of outdoor adventures with Jones, Tim McCoy , Ken Maynard , Jack Luden , Bob Allen ( Robert (Tex) Allen ), Russell Hayden , Tex Ritter , Ken Curtis , and Gene Autry . Columbia's most popular cowboy was Charles Starrett , who signed with Columbia in 1935 and starred in 131 western features over 17 years. At Harry Cohn's insistence,

20881-760: Was a Columbia perennial that the studio had been releasing since the silent-movie days; producer-director Ralph Staub kept this series going through 1958. In the 1940s, propelled in part by the surge in audiences for their films during World War II , the studio also benefited from the popularity of its biggest star, Rita Hayworth . Columbia maintained a long list of contractees well into the 1950s; Glenn Ford , Penny Singleton , William Holden , Judy Holliday , The Three Stooges , Ann Miller , Evelyn Keyes , Ann Doran , Jack Lemmon , Cleo Moore , Barbara Hale , Adele Jergens , Larry Parks , Arthur Lake , Lucille Ball , Kerwin Mathews and Kim Novak . Harry Cohn monitored

21038-488: Was a difference though; did Time Life Books contend itself with the standard one-to-two minute long commercials, Time Life Music also made much more use of half hour commercials, which they poured in the guise of documentaries, the so-called " infomercials ", and not rarely presented by artists whose music was presented on the underlying release. The television advertisements used slogans (e.g., "Relive your high school days ..."), clips of songs included in each volume (along with

21195-432: Was a division of the entertainment sector of The Coca-Cola Company , and Coke formed a new first-run syndication unit; Coca-Cola Telecommunications due to Coca-Cola merging the distribution unit of Columbia Pictures Television and The Television Program Source (a syndicator that was a joint venture between Alan Bennett, former King World president Robert King, and CPT that was created on October 15, 1984, which Coca-Cola had

21352-451: Was a horizontally integrated company. It controlled production and distribution; it did not own any theaters. Helping Columbia's climb was the arrival of an ambitious director, Frank Capra . Between 1927 and 1939, Capra constantly pushed Cohn for better material and bigger budgets. A string of hits he directed in the early and mid 1930s solidified Columbia's status as a major studio. In particular, It Happened One Night , which nearly swept

21509-455: Was a sequel to the 1970s ABC sitcom What's Happening!! . Also that year, Barney Rosenzweig via his The Rosenzweig Company banner had signed a three-year, distribution deal with the studio to distribute their own projects. During that year, the company revived the previous Screen Gems brand name to market classic television shows for syndication. Major changes took place in 1986. On May 5, Coke acquired Merv Griffin Enterprises , producer of

21666-435: Was active until 1966 when Columbia entered into a joint agreement with RCA Victor and discontinued Colpix in favor of its new label, Colgems Records . Shortly after closing their short subjects department, Columbia president Harry Cohn died of a heart attack in February 1958. His nephew Ralph Cohn died in 1959, ending almost four decades of family management. The new management was headed by Abe Schneider, who had joined

21823-540: Was called Columbia Pictures Television Advertising Sales (a.k.a. "Columbia Television Advertising Sales"). The sales division handled series by TriStar Television and Merv Griffin Enterprises; as well as off-net series by Castle Rock Entertainment , HBO Independent Productions , and Brillstein-Grey Entertainment . CPT used other companies such as Group W Productions for Beakman's World , MTV 's One World Entertainment for Married... with Children , and Tribune Entertainment for Designing Women . From 1994 until March 1996,

21980-445: Was changed its name to Columbia Pictures Television. The studio changed its name from Screen Gems to Columbia Pictures Television on May 6, 1974, and was suggested by David Gerber , who was producer on such CPT/Screen Gems shows, and now executive vice president of the studio, displacing Art Frankel when he was at Screen Gems. He announced plans to launch a separate unit to concentrate on movie-of-the-week titles. John H. Mitchell, who

22137-552: Was critically acclaimed by the Los Angeles Times where it was stated in a 1966 editorial that the series "(…)demonstrates the imposing possibilities of pictorial history… This, of course, is to be expected from the TIME-LIFE specialists. What is even more important is the selection of scholars of the reputation of Bowra and Hadas for texts. Research is meticulous and relevant. This is history written with respect for

22294-553: Was featured in Time Life's early Great Ages of Man and The Emergence of Man series. However, historians were forced to largely rewrite Mayan history after their script had been fully unlocked and modern technology had revolutionized Maya archeology in the 21st century, making the Time Life book entries on the subject obsolete and outdated. This even held true for their 1993 "The Magnificent Maya" outing ( ISBN   0809498790 ) in their more recent Lost Civilizations series. Some other series were less highly regarded, especially

22451-659: Was for example the case with The Old West and The Enchanted World series. One major such licensee had been Barcelona, Spain-based Ediciones Folio, S.A. who for decades was signed for several Spanish-language series editions in Europe – for Latin America Time-Life Books resorted to (smaller) local publishers on an ad-hoc basis. The British, French, German and Dutch European edition releases though, were handled by Time-Life themselves through their in 1976 established subsidiary branch "Time-Life International (Nederland) B.V." (renamed to "Time-Life Books B.V." in

22608-508: Was founded in 1951 by Jerome Hyams, who also acquired United Television Films in 1955 that was founded by Archie Mayers. In 1957, two years before its parent company Columbia dropped UPA, Screen Gems entered a distribution deal with Hanna-Barbera Productions , which produced classic animated series such as The Flintstones , The Quick Draw McGraw Show , The Huckleberry Hound Show , The Yogi Bear Show , Jonny Quest , The Jetsons and Top Cat among others. Screen Gems distributed

22765-581: Was founded on June 19, 1918, as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn (CBC) Film Sales by brothers Jack and Harry Cohn and Jack's best friend Joe Brandt , and released its first feature film More to Be Pitied Than Scorned on August 20, 1922. The film, with a budget of $ 20,000, was a success, bringing in $ 130,000 in revenue for the company. Brandt was president of CBC Film Sales, handling sales, marketing and distribution from New York along with Jack Cohn, while Harry Cohn ran production in Hollywood. The studio's early productions were low-budget short subjects: Screen Snapshots ,

22922-563: Was issued in the early 1990s, more than 50 different volumes (including two Christmas albums) had been released. This paved the way for more country and pop music-intensive series, including " Country USA ," " Classic Rock ," " Sounds of the Seventies ," "Sounds of the Eighties," "Your Hit Parade" (a series featuring popular music of the 1940s through early 1960s) and " Super Hits ." Like the earlier series, each volume issued had its own paperback booklet containing liner notes and information about

23079-444: Was known as the direct-to-consumer (DTC) business model. From its very launch in 1961 it was a runaway success with sales already expected to reach US$ 100 million one year into its existence. Prior to the division's establishment, Time, Inc. had already dabbled with single-title book publications on an occasional, ad-hoc basis such as the 1957 "Three Hundred Years of American Painting" ( OCLC   339210 ) or 1961 "Great Battles of

23236-413: Was known that a particular series title enjoyed a much smaller print run than the other volumes in the series, resulting in the after-market value of that particular volume and/or the set as a whole increasing initially – though the general trend of waning interest in physical books, those of Time-Life included, has caused these prices to decrease again after the turn of the millennium. Examples include

23393-634: Was once premiered on The Playboy Channel . Columbia Pictures expanded its music publishing operations in the 1980s, acquiring Big 3 Publishing (the former sheet music operations of Robbins, Feist , and Miller ) from MGM/UA Communications Co. in 1983, Belwin-Mills Publishing from Simon & Schuster in 1985, and Al Gallico Music in 1987. On June 18, 1985, Columbia's parent acquired Norman Lear and Jerry Perenchio 's Embassy Communications, Inc. (including Embassy Pictures , Embassy Television, Tandem Productions , and Embassy Home Entertainment), mostly for its library of television series such as All in

23550-549: Was president of the studio since 1958 when the studio was Screen Gems, said that they would take the division more closely to the parent company and to help achieve an interrelationship among all of its divisions. As the successor in interest to Screen Gems, it assumed productions of the daytime soap operas Days of Our Lives and The Young and the Restless , as well as the NBC police show Police Story . Its first produced series

23707-417: Was president of the studio, and former Columbia/Embassy executives were assigned to the new unit, namely Gary Lieberthal, who had the same title as Columbia/Embassy, would assume the position of the new CPT, and Barry Thurston, president of CET, will have the same title for the new CPT. Other executives retained by CPE were Arnold Mesnser, who was previously president of Tri-Star Telecommunications, who took over

23864-688: Was re-established under the Screen Gems brand; Columbia's leading cartoon series were Krazy Kat , Scrappy , The Fox and the Crow , and (very briefly) Li'l Abner . Screen Gems was the last major cartoon studio to produce black-and-white cartoons, producing them until 1946. That same year, Screen Gems shut down but had completed enough cartoons for the studio to release until 1949. In 1948, Columbia agreed to release animated shorts from United Productions of America ; these new shorts were more sophisticated than Columbia's older cartoons, and many won critical praise and industry awards. In 1957, two years before

24021-460: Was relaunched on October 10. That year, the company signed a deal with Brillstein-Grey Entertainment to distribute programming. Throughout the 1990s, the studio launched such successful shows as Beakman's World on TLC and CBS in 1992, Mad About You on NBC in 1992, Ricki Lake in syndication which lasted 11 years, The Nanny on CBS in 1993, Party of Five on Fox , NewsRadio on NBC, Malcolm & Eddie on UPN in 1996, and

24178-507: Was replaced by that of Columbia TriStar Television, with Days of Our Lives being the last known show to feature the separate CPT logo, just in time when NBC started doing split-screen credits. On October 25, 2001, CTT and CTTD merged to form Columbia TriStar Domestic Television. On September 16, 2002, Sony Pictures changed the name of its television division as Sony Pictures Television . Columbia Pictures Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. , commonly known as Columbia Pictures ,

24335-520: Was responsible for turning out 9 of the top 10 grossing films in Columbia's history. In the fall of 1978, Kirk Kerkorian , a Vegas casino mogul who also controlled Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer , acquired a 5.5% stake in Columbia Pictures. He then announced on November 20, that he intended to launch a tender offer to acquire another 20% for the studio. On December 14, a standstill agreement was reached with Columbia by promising not to go beyond 25% or seeking control for at least three years. On January 15, 1979,

24492-528: Was started in black-and-white, but when Cohn saw how well the project was proceeding, he scrapped the footage and insisted on filming in Technicolor. In 1948, the United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. anti-trust decision forced Hollywood motion picture companies to divest themselves of the theater chains that they owned. Since Columbia did not own any theaters, it was now on equal terms with

24649-538: Was the first contract costume designer hired by the studio, and he established the studio's wardrobe department. Kalloch's employment, in turn, convinced leading actresses that Columbia Pictures intended to invest in their careers. In 1938, the addition of B. B. Kahane as vice president would produce Charles Vidor 's Those High Grey Walls (1939), and The Lady in Question (1940), the first joint film of Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford . Kahane would later become

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