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Columbia Pictures Television

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Columbia Pictures Television (CPT) was the second name of the Columbia Pictures television division Screen Gems (SG). The studio changed its name on September 4, 1974.

History

Early years

CPT was home to the popular daytime soap operas Days of our Lives and The Young and the Restless. During the 1970s and 80's, CPT made many co-productions with Spelling-Goldberg Productions, including S.W.A.T., Starsky & Hutch, Charlie's Angels, Fantasy Island, Hart to Hart, and T.J. Hooker.

CPT also made some co-productions with Screen Gems, including I Dream of Jeannie, Bewitched, The Partridge Family, The Monkees, The Flying Nun, and Gidget.

The 1970s

1974

  • Screen Gems is renamed Columbia Pictures Television, Inc. and CPT Holdings, Inc.1 is created. The company keeps the Eric Siday/Van Alexander Screen Gems jingle with their logo. (It is later re-recorded with an electric piano.)

1976

  • The company retires the Eric Siday/Van Alexander Screen Gems jingle and the first CPT logo, replacing it with a shortened version of the new theatrical logo, with a synthesized jingle by Suzanne Ciani. They used the latter part of the theatrical Columbia Pictures logo, and the theatrical version was blue, and the television version was varying shades of red.

The 1980s

1982

  • The Coca-Cola Company bought Columbia Pictures Industries and its new logo added the byline "A Unit of The Coca-Cola Company", continuing to use a shortened version of the Cianni jingle, used in the previous CPT logo.

1984

1985

1986

  • The partnership between CPT and Embassy Television was called Columbia/Embassy Television (CET, simply referred to as Embassy Communications). CET continued to use CPT and EC as their separate names on the air. Embassy added a Coca-Cola byline this year.

  • CPT went on to produce the hit sitcom, Designing Women.

  • CET acquired Merv Griffin Enterprises, known for producing the popular game shows, Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune.

1987

  • The venture "Colex Enterprises" ended and the company was succeeded by Columbia Pictures Television Distribution (CPTD).

  • Coca-Cola launched a television distribution arm of CPT called Coca-Cola Telecommunications. This logo was only seen on the syndicated version of The Real Ghostbusters, Dinosaucers, and on some Punky Brewster reruns, distribution of the latter show having been acquired from NBC.

  • A merger took place in 1987 when CET acquired TriStar Television (TSTV, first spelled Tri-Star) from partners CBS and HBO.

  • December 21: CET and TSTV merged to form a brand new Columbia Pictures Television, as part of the new Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc. (CPE). A modified logo is made to reflect the changes, with a new byline and a new jingle.

1988

  • The shows that were produced by Embassy Communications were now produced by CPT, but in the closing credits, the copyright was going to the new ELP Communications.

1989

  • Sony Corporation bought CPT's parent, Columbia Pictures Entertainment, from Coke.

The 1990s

1991

1994

1995

  • Columbia TriStar Television Distribution (CTTD), the TV distribution arm of CTT, was created to distribute shows from its library, as well as produce and distribute new syndicated shows, and distribute the Columbia TriStar movie library.

  • Columbia TriStar International Television (CTIT), the international TV distribution arm of CTT, was formed to distribute its movie and TV libraries around the world.

1996

1997

1998

  • ELP was consolidated to CTT after Beakman's World was cancelled.

  • The group celebrated 50 years of television entertainment since the re-activation of Screen Gems as Columbia's TV division.

1999

  • CTTD introduced Screen Gems Network, the first programming block to air classic shows from the 1950s to the 1980s from the CTT vault. Featuring an ident based on the Screen Gems TV logo from the 1950s, the program was cancelled in 2001, due in part to the recent re-activation of Screen Gems (this time as a feature film company).

  • TriStar TV was folded into CTT after Mad About You and The Nanny went off the air, but TriStar still kept its name on Early Edition and Malcolm & Eddie, which both got cancelled and ended its name in 2000.

2000s

2001

  • July 2: CPT was folded into CTT, however, SPE kept the name CPT Holdings on The Young and the Restless.

  • CTT and CTTD merged to create Columbia TriStar Domestic Television (CTDT).

2002

  • Between July and September: Sony Pictures announced that it would change its TV subsidiary from CTDT to Sony Pictures Television.

Notes

CPT Holdings, Inc.

CPT Holdings, Inc.1 was introduced in 1974 as a copyrighting name and the holder for classic shows for Columbia Pictures Television from recent buyouts. It is currently a service mark of Sony Pictures Television

Other than its own series Designing Women and its daytime drama The Young and the Restless, the company holds What's Happening!!, The Joker's Wild, incarnations from Pyramid, The Dating Game, The Newlywed Game, and 3's a Crowd.

During the years of Columbia Pictures Television, the company identified itself in the credits as Columbia Pictures Television, CPT Holdings, Inc., Columbia Pictures Television, Inc. and Columbia Pictures Television Distribution.

Colex Enterprises

Colex Enterprises2 was created in 1984 as a partnership between CPT and Lexington Broadcast Services Co. The venture ended in 1987 and was succeeded by CPTD, which was succeeded in 1995 by CTTD, then in 2001 by CTDT which is now known as SPT since 2002.

Colex was most popularly known for distributing classic shows from the libraries of Screen Gems and CPT.

See also

External links



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Last updated on Tuesday February 05, 2008 at 18:53:02 PST (GMT -0800)
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