Spelling Television

Spelling Television, Inc.

Former type	Corporation
Fate	Still operates but as an in-name-only unit of CBS Television Studios.
Founded	1969
Defunct	2006
Headquarters	Los Angeles, California, USA
Products	Television Production
Parent	Independent (1969-1993) Blockbuster, Inc. (1993-1994) Spelling Entertainment Group (1994-1999) Viacom (1999-2006) CBS Corporation (2006-Present)
Subsidiaries	Worldvision Enterprises (1988-1999, folded into Paramount Domestic Television) Laurel Entertainment Torand Productions Big Ticket Television

Spelling Television Inc. (first known as Aaron Spelling Productions, Spelling Entertainment Inc. later as Spelling Entertainment Group) was a television production company that produced popular shows such as Charmed, Beverly Hills, 90210, 7th Heaven, Dynasty and Melrose Place. The company was founded by television producer Aaron Spelling in 1969. The company is currently an in-name-only unit of CBS Television Studios.

History

Aaron Spelling Productions went public in 1986 after raising $80 million. In 1988, Aaron Spelling Productions acquired Laurel Entertainment and most of the Taft Entertainment Company, including Worldvision Enterprises, Inc. All three companies became part of Spelling, Inc. - though Worldvision was the only Taft division to continue operating. The sale was completed on March 1, 1989. A share in the company was acquired by Blockbuster Entertainment (which was being sold to Viacom) in 1994. In 1993, Spelling Entertainment acquired Republic Pictures. On September 29, 1994, Blockbuster merged with Viacom. Blockbuster by then owned 67% of Spelling Entertainment. The remainder of Spelling Entertainment was then acquired by Paramount/Viacom in 1999, but the deal closed in 2000.

Before the merger with Viacom, most of Spelling's shows were distributed by Worldvision, with older Spelling shows distributed by several others including Warner Bros. Television, 20th Television and Sony Pictures Television.

After the merger, Spelling Entertainment integrated Worldvision into their Republic Pictures unit, thus dismantling Worldvision as a production company. Worldvision distribution functions continued for a short time until Paramount Television assumed distribution functions (Viacom had bought Paramount Pictures in 1994).

The company can be credited with helping several networks (ABC, Fox, the WB, and the CW) with successful shows.

In the 1970s/early 1980s at one point at ABC, Spelling-produced shows outweighed other production companies by a large margin. Aaron Spelling had so many shows on ABC, industry insiders dubbed ABC "Aaron's Broadcasting Company." Spelling himself was never amused with this name.

In the early 1990s Beverly Hills, 90210 and Melrose Place helped propel Fox even higher and reach a new generation of young teen viewers.

In the 1990s the WB was launched and their longest running, highest rated and most successful show during their time in operation was 7th Heaven for ten seasons. By 2006, another new network, the CW, used 7th Heaven in their first season in operation as the newest network.

Spelling's ABC, Fox, and WB shows were enormously successful for the company and they wasted no time entering into the world of merchandise in the 80's and 90's.

The company also was one of the first production companies to actively run a website for a show they produced when the internet was just taking off in the 1990s. The website was for Melrose Place.

The company's first home was a suite of offices on the old Warners lot in Hollywood. A newer base followed when the company was an original anchor tenant of the Wilshire Courtyard buildings in LA's revitalized Miracle Mile district. Aaron Spelling was said to have loved his old office's 1970s shag carpet so much that he had it removed piece by piece and installed in the new office. The company grew so large with so many different entities that at one point it leased all three top floors of the 5700 building and held additional office space across the street. Aaron Spelling had one of the largest offices in Hollywood for a single executive. Upon the company's exit, media companies from all over Los Angeles vied for the desirable office suites; the newly formed CW Network briefly looked at the offices when considering a location for the new start-up network. Spelling Television briefly moved to smaller offices in Santa Monica in 2006.

By 2000, Aaron Spelling remained active and involved as CEO until his death in 2006. Company president Jonathan Levin handled day to day operations and longtime Spelling producing partner, E. Duke Vincent helped guide the successful production company.

Spelling Television was eventually downsized even further & became a small "production shingle" under CBS Paramount Television (now CBS Television Studios), a division of CBS Corporation, with a small staff. The company became an in-name-only unit of CBS Television Studios after Aaron Spelling's death in 2006.

7th Heaven was the last series produced by Spelling Television broadcast on network television.

Spelling's library today

Currently, all television programs that were produced by Spelling Television are distributed by CBS Television Distribution.

The Spelling Television company logo and series were seen on broadcast television for the last time during the rerun of the 7th Heaven series finale on September 16, 2007. Spelling's logo continues to appear on the covers of DVD releases of the Spelling library (except for Twin Peaks, and those shows owned by Sony Pictures Television).

In late 2008, some of Spelling Television's productions, including Beverly Hills, 90210, Melrose Place, Twin Peaks, and The Love Boat began streaming full episodes live on CBS's website under the classic's page. Beverly Hills, 90210 for example streams at the following link: http://www.cbs.com/classics/beverly_hills_90210.

Aaron Spelling's television programming lives on through the internet albeit with the CBS Paramount Television, CBS Television Studios or CBS Television Distribution logos now firmly slapped on the end of every episode even though originally they had nothing to do with their production. It is interesting to note how in later years, CBS as a network lost interest in doing business with Aaron Spelling and Spelling Television while all other networks did not. It's ironic that CBS Corporation now controls Spelling's most successful series.

Spelling Entertainment Group

The Spelling Entertainment Group logo.

Before the full acquisition by Viacom, where only Spelling Television would be left standing as a separate operating unit after the acquisition, Spelling Entertainment Group's holdings consisted of the following:

• Spelling Entertainment Group:
  • Spelling Television and most of the libraries of ancestor companies (excluding Spelling-Goldberg Productions properties which were sold off to Columbia Pictures Television)
    • Big Ticket Television launched in 1994 (now a unit of CBS Television Studios)
    • Spelling Daytime Television launched as a separate dba for daytime production based at NBC.
    • Torand Productions
    • Laurel Entertainment, Inc.
  • Spelling Films
  • Republic Pictures including:
    • much of its own library of films and in-house TV series
    • The inherited holdings of National Telefilm Associates (NTA), which itself includes:
      • It's a Wonderful Life
      • Most of Paramount's own classic animated library
      • Some early United Artists material (including High Noon)
      • Pre-1973 NBC shows, such as Get Smart and Bonanza
  • Worldvision Enterprises acquired in 1988:
    • The Sunn Classic Pictures and Titus Productions libraries
    • Majority of the Quinn Martin library.
    • Pre-1973 ABC shows, as well as US television rights to NBC's Little House on the Prairie (premiered in 1974)
    • The Selznick International Pictures library (excluding Gone with the Wind, which was sold to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1944, later to Turner Entertainment Co. in 1986; Turner merged with Time Warner in 1996)
    • The television rights to most of the Carolco Pictures library

After the late 2005 corporate split between Viacom and CBS Corporation, some of the above have gone to each company. Films mostly went to Viacom's Paramount Pictures unit and television with CBS Corporation's CBS Television Distribution unit, while the Selznick films went to the various territorial television syndication divisions of Disney/ABC, as ABC itself holds the rights to the Selznick films.

As for DVD rights, these are also split:

• CBS Home Entertainment owns worldwide DVD rights to the television library, with distribution by Paramount (one exception being the UK rights to Twin Peaks, which, due to prior contracts, are owned by Universal Studios Home Entertainment through its Universal Playback label; coincidentally, Universal had merged with CBS rival NBC in 2004, while Twin Peaks itself originally aired on ABC). Another exception is Holocaust, a mini-series Spelling acquired in the Taft Entertainment acquisition - CBS has licensed DVD rights to various other companies outside the US, while Paramount owns the US rights.

• In the US, a few of the films (most notably It's a Wonderful Life) have DVD rights owned by Paramount, but the rest are distributed by Lionsgate Home Entertainment, successor to previous Spelling/Republic video licensee Artisan Entertainment. In the rest of the world, DVD rights to the films are owned by various other companies (for example, Universal in the UK, and Paramount themselves in France and Region 4).

Past names

• Aaron Spelling Productions (1969–1989);
• Spelling Entertainment Group (1989–1992);

See also

• Aaron Spelling
• Spelling-Goldberg Productions
• Worldvision Enterprises
• Republic Pictures