ABC Films Syndication In spring 1954,
American Broadcasting-Paramount Theatres, Inc. created ABC Films Syndication, Inc. (AFS), or ABC Films, a subsidiary headed by George Shupert, which specialized in
syndication and in-house program production. By , AFS formed a 50/50 joint venture production company, Rabco Productions, with
Hal Roach Jr. In , AFS announced an expansion in production and sales staff for the year. Five new properties were acquired by the company and all received pilots, with two set for syndication if not placed nationally. Two were to be produced by John Gibbs and Meridian Pictures,
Renfrew of the Mounted and ''
Ripley's Believe It or Not!'', while Rabco's Bernard Fox was assigned with
Forest Ranger. The two pilots set for production were
The Americano, directed by Martin Gosch and filmed in Spain, and
The Force produced by
Victor Stoloff about the plain clothed
Canadian Mounties division. Two shows,
Code 3 and
The Three Musketeers were already under production for syndication. Kevin O’Sullivan later became president of the company. In 1965, it became an international syndicator for the
NBC series
Branded, which marked one of a few times ABC distributed a series not actually airing on the network.
Worldvision Enterprises In 1971, the
FCC barred the participation of networks in the syndication of their own programs, though this rule was eliminated by 1993. Worldvision Enterprises was formed by five former ABC Films executives to purchase the network's syndication assets on March 30, 1973. In 1974, Charles Fries and his Alpine Productions company had struck a distribution contract with the studio. Worldvision had obtained good relations from
the Big Three networks who produced it, notably NBC, who produced
Little House on the Prairie, and
CBS, who produced ''
Spencer's Pilots'', which Worldvision distributed for international syndication. Around the same time, Worldvision decided to return distribution rights to the game show
The Dating Game back to
Chuck Barris Productions, and to retain distribution rights to
The Newlywed Game until its completion of its network run. In 1977, Worldvision Enterprises had entered into an agreement with television producer
Mark VII Limited, who had disaffiliated from
Universal Studios, and became an independent producer, to distribute its productions, including
Project U.F.O. and
Sam. On November 7, 1981, Worldvision launched a home video subsidiary Worldvision Home Video, Inc., which was enabled to distribute videocassette titles of content from the Taft Entertainment Company, most notably its Hanna-Barbera cartoon product, the
Jack Nicklaus'
Golf My Way instructional video series, as well as the QM Productions library, with Albert Hartigan headed executive vice president and Martin Weinstein as the sales manager of the company. Worldvision has been owned by many companies over the years. The growth of its
home video division was primarily under the ownership of
Taft Broadcasting, which acquired the company in 1979. As a result of Taft's purchase of Worldvision, Taft merged its syndicated arms Taft H-B Program Sales and Taft H-B International into the company. In 1981, Worldvision launched subsidiary Evergreen Programs to generate sales of its own programming already aired by networks and stations. In October 1987, Taft's assets, including Worldvision, were acquired by Great American Communications. Television producer
Aaron Spelling, attempting to find an outlet to distribute his programs, attempted to buy Worldvision from Great American, but chief company shareholder
Carl H. Lindner told Spelling that he was not interested in selling the company. Lindner did agree to sell Worldvision to Spelling Productions for 50% of Spelling, Inc., the combined company, in 1988. In 1994, Worldvision's home video division was folded into
Republic Pictures' Home Video division after Spelling Entertainment's purchase of Republic in the same year. Also that same year,
Blockbuster Inc., operator of the now-defunct video store chain, briefly held a controlling interest in Spelling, and its logo appeared on programs alongside Worldvision's. When Spelling Entertainment Group merged with
Viacom on May 26, 1999, Worldvision's operations were folded into
Paramount Domestic Television, then given over to
CBS Corporation at the end of 2005 when Viacom and CBS were split into different companies. On December 4, 2019, CBS Corporation and
Viacom remerged into a single entity as
ViacomCBS (later Paramount Global and currently
Paramount Skydance Corporation), which currently distributes the Worldvision library through
CBS Media Ventures. The Hanna-Barbera library (including most of the pre-1991
Ruby-Spears Enterprises library) is currently distributed by
Warner Bros. Discovery through
Warner Bros. Animation. == References ==