MGM Television

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MGM Television (first known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Television, and later MGM/UA Television) is an American television production/distribution company that was launched in 1955 and a subsidiary of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc. In 1982, it became MGM/UA Television after the merger with United Artists in 1981. From 2005 to the present, MGM Television programs are distributed by Sony Pictures Television.

1 History
2 The Sony Distributorship
3 The MGM Library
- 3.1 Owned by Warner Bros. through Turner Entertainment
- 3.2 Owned by MGM (Distributed by Sony Pictures Television)
4 External links

[edit] History

In 1986, Ted Turner bought MGM/UA from Kirk Kerkorian, including all of the movies and television shows by MGM/UA. Turner gave Kerkorian all of United Artists and the MGM trademark 74 days later, which is on October 17, 1986. Turner kept the pre-1986 MGM television shows. Then, in 1996, Time Warner acquired Turner Broadcasting System, and the pre-1986 MGM/UA TV shows are now owned by Warner Bros. (via its Turner Entertainment unit).

After the Turner sale, the television banner was renamed to MGM/UA Television Productions, and the TV distribution arm MGM/UA Telecommunications was launched in 1987. All were under the new company MGM/UA Communications Co. MGM/UA Television still kept producing the series Fame until 1987, the 1980s version of The Twilight Zone until 1989, and Kids Incorporated until 1993. On July 2, 1992, MGM/UA was reverted back to "Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer" and the television name became MGM Worldwide Television Group in 1992 and its distributor MGM/UA Telecommunications Group as the early MGM Television. (Note: The logos didn't appear on TV until 1993).

In 1996, the name was renamed to MGM Television for different television brand labels known as MGM Television Entertainment, MGM Domestic Television Distribution, and MGM Worldwide Television. In 1997, MGM bought Orion Pictures Corporation, The Samuel Goldwyn Company, and Motion Picture Corporation of America from Metromedia (who are best known as the former owners of several TV stations that are now FOX O&O's), thus MGM Television distributed the movies/shows originally handled by Filmways, Inc., Orion Television, American International Television, Heatter-Quigley Productions, and Samuel Goldwyn Television. MGM Television Entertainment is the network television arm launched in 1997.

[edit] The Sony Distributorship

In 2005, Sony Pictures Television assumed worldwide distribution and certain domestic distribution of the television library from MGM Television and the US television distribution arm of MGM Television suddenly became MGM Worldwide Television Distribution. However, MGM uses other names in the credits of their television shows such as MGM Global Television, Inc., MGM Global Holdings, Inc., and MGM Television Entertainment, Inc. The company used the name MGM Worldwide Television, Inc. from 1994-1998. Since 2005, all of MGM/UA's shows are distributed by Sony Pictures Television. However, on May 31 2006, MGM announced that it would drop Sony as its TV and home entertainment distributor by shifting its home video output to 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, and relaunching its TV production/distribution arm. Sony Pictures, however, still owns 20% of MGM.

[edit] The MGM Library

This is a list of the MGM television shows. The first half is owned by Warner Bros. Television through Turner Entertainment Co. and the second is owned by MGM.