Screen Gems/Columbia Cartoons on TV

[Mr. Mike]

In light of the recent discussion of the classic Tom & Jerry cartoons on TV during the 1970s and 1980s, I thought I'd bring up the subject of cartoons that were rarely seen on TV around that time, in this case the Screen Gems cartoons released by Columbia Studios from 1929 to 1948 and the UPA cartoons released by that same studio from 1948 to 1959.

According to Jeff Lenburg's Encyclopedia of Animated Cartoons, the early 1930s Screen Gems cartoons were first syndicated to early television through the Unity Films cartoon package. As for the UPA shorts released by Columbia, there doesn't seem to be any mention of when it was released to broadcast syndication. In addition, some of the Screen Gems cartoons may have also been seen on the Ruff and Reddy animated TV series during the late 1950s (The R&R series was the first TV series done by Hanna-Barbera, after they left the MGM studios, which produced the Tom and Jerry shorts).

The last time they were seen on TV was in a compilation series called Totally Tooned In, which was syndicated internationally in 1999. For whatever reason, though, the show never aired in the United States.

Between that time, the only way to view these cartoons was to either buy 8mm or 16mm copies for sale, which were available during the 1960s and 1970s, or prerecorded videocassettes. As a matter of fact, in 1980 Columbia's home video division began releasing a number of cartoon shorts to video (twelve volumes in all by 1989). Incidentally, the majority of the cartoons released on those VHS tapes were the UPA theatrical cartoons.

So does anyone know if and when both the Screen Gems and UPA theatrical shorts aired on local TV stations between the time they were first syndicated and the premiere of the Totally Tooned In TV series?

 

[EddieTheRapFan]

As a side note, they're currently being aired on Antenna TV on early Saturday mornings.

 

[cd637299]

^ On top of that, they air 3 hours' worth, 6 half-hour episodes (7 to 10am EST Saturdays). Episode guide here, and Antenna TV follows it to the hilt:

http://www.cartoonresearch.com/tooned1.html

cd

 

[Mr. Mike]

Thanks for the tip about Totally Tooned In being on Antenna TV nowadays. Antenna TV is avaliable in the St. Louis area on Charter digital cable channel 167. IIRC, KTVI-DT is Antenna TV's local affiliate on digital channel 2.2.

As for when they aired on local TV before January of this year, I have no idea which St. Louis area TV stations before 2011 aired these cartoons. That would include KPLR-TV 11 and KDNL-TV 30, both of which were independents in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.

Incidentally, I alluded to the fact that the UPA theatrical shorts were the only Columbia cartoons available on video in the 1980s. I was first introduced to these cartoons sometime in either '87 or '88 when I rented a video called "The Columbia Pictures Cartoon Classics". I didn't see that video again until late 1992, and it was only a few years later that I was able to purchase one to keep. I eventually got all 12 volumes thirteen years before, in the year 1997.

I've always regarded the Columbia cartoons (both the Screen Gems and UPA shorts) as being the most difficult to access, be it on video or on TV. I don't know why they seemed to drop from sight after they were first televised in the 1950s.
Nowadays, in addition to Antenna TV, some of these cartoons have popped up on video sharing websites like YouTube. I'd wish that I could see these cartoons released on DVD sometime in the near future.

 

[hubcity]

Here's an odd place to acquire some of the UPA shorts: the deluxe edition of the movie "Hellboy". The character has a thing for Gerald McBoing Boing cartoons, so the disc set includes three of them, plus UPA's adaptation of "The Tell-Tale Heart" (narrated by James Mason.)

 

[wbhist]

I've always regarded the Columbia cartoons (both the Screen Gems and UPA shorts) as being the most difficult to access, be it on video or on TV. I don't know why they seemed to drop from sight after they were first televised in the 1950s.

As has been noted in some places, what sealed the doom of Screen Gems shorts on TV in the '50's (as well as more obscure studios like Van Beuren or Ub Iwerks) was the availability of the pre-1948 Warner Bros. cartoons after 1956, plus the release of the Fleischer and Famous Popeye cartoons beginning a year later.