Entertainment Rights

Entertainment Rights

Former type	Public
Industry	Global media company
Fate	Acquired by Boomerang Media
Successor	DreamWorks Classics
Founded	1989
Defunct	2009
Headquarters	London, England, United Kingdom
Products	Children and family television programming
Parent	Boomerang Media DreamWorks Animation NBCUniversal (Comcast)

Entertainment Rights Plc was a global media company. Its main business was in children's and family television programming.^[1] The group was established in 1989 as Sleepy Kids; it was renamed in 1999 to Entertainment Rights^[2] and was focused on the creation and exploitation of major children's characters and brands.

On 1 April 2009, after falling into administration, Entertainment Rights was acquired by Boomerang Media, which was formed by the founders of ER subsidiary Classic Media. The company took on the Classic Media brand worldwide following this purchase.^[3][4][5][6] Classic Media was, in turn, acquired by DreamWorks Animation in 2012.^[7] As of 2016, most of back catalog library of Entertainment Rights are owned by NBCUniversal which bought DWA.

History

The company began life as Sleepy Kids Plc, also called The Sleepy Kids Co. Ltd., which was founded in 1989 by Martin and Vivien Schrager-Powell to produce Potsworth & Co., a children's animated series the pair created. The company was in partnership with Hanna-Barbera, and within a few months of its inception, it was floated on the stock exchanges. Sleepy Kids later went on to co-produce Dr. Zitbag's Transylvania Pet Shop ^[8] and Budgie the Little Helicopter.

Between 1998 and 1999 the company expanded rapidly. It acquired Siriol Productions^[9] and merged with The Richard Digance Card Co, Clipper Films Ltd. and Ridgeway Films Ltd. in December 1998. During 1999, Boom Boom Ltd.—the owners of Basil Brush, Carrington Productions International—owner of a library of children's animation films from Ventureworld Films, and Dr. Zitbag's Transylvania Pet Shop were all bought as part of a long-term plan to build a substantial business owning intellectual property rights.

The company was renamed to SKD Media just after these takeovers. A year later the company was renamed to Entertainment Rights.^[10]

The company expanded by acquiring rights to properties from other studios such as Link Entertainment (who distributed programs produced by Woodland Animations,^[11] Varga London, Hibbert Ralph Entertainment, and Maddocks Animation, among others) and Little Entertainment Co. in 2001. In 2004 they acquired Tell-Tale Productions^[12][13] and most of the rights to the Filmation library from Hallmark Entertainment. At the end of 2004, Entertainment Rights employed on average 95 people. The company reported on 30 June 2005 that its turnover was £12.4 million. The company also tried to take over Chorion but the offer was rejected.^[14][15]

In 2005, a management buyout of Siriol Productions occurred; it was renamed Calon. The deal included all current projects and some of the back catalogue, but most of the rights of previously made programmes continued to be held by Entertainment Rights.^[16] On 14 December 2006, Entertainment Rights announced it would acquire Classic Media for US$210 million (£106.9 million). The deal was completed on 11 January 2007. Before the acquisition of Classic Media by Entertainment Rights was completed, both companies announced distribution and production agreements with Genius Products, LLC.^[17]

In December 2008, the company appointed of Deborah Dugan, former president of Disney Publishing Worldwide, as its Chief Executive Officer (CEO). This was part of a number of management changes to remedy cashflow problems and allow the company to operate on a more stable footing.^[18] By January 2009 the company had cut a third of its staff and its market value collapsed from £267 million in March 2007 to just £5.5 million.^[19] By February 2009, six companies had enquired about buying Entertainment Rights.^[20] Also at the start of February, Entertainment Rights was fined £245,000 by the Financial Services Authority for failing to inform shareholders of "a potential $14 million earnings hit in a timely manner".^[21]

This resulted in the company going into Administration on 1 April 2009.^[22][23] Within days, Boomerang Media acquired all Entertainment Rights subsidiaries—ER, Big Idea and Classic Media, which resolved all outstanding problems around the company.^[24] Boomerang Media was created by former owners of Classic Media until it was sold to Entertainment Rights in 2006.

List of programmes and films

Some were made in conjunction with other studios, while many others were brought into the companies portfolio with acquisitions and takeover. A few of the shows are only licensing deals, and Entertainment Rights never created certain series, such as Postman Pat.

Banksia Productions

• The Curiosity Show
• Hot Science
• Kids Down Under
• The Music Shop

Cosgrove Hall

• Discworld (co-produced with Channel 4, Carrington Productions International and ITEL)
• Lavender Castle (co-produced with Carrington Productions International)
• Postman Pat (2003)
• Postman Pat and the Greendale Rocket
• Postman Pat and the Pirate Treasure
• Postman Pat Clowns Around
• Postman Pat's Magic Christmas
• Rupert Bear, Follow the Magic...

Filmation

• For a full list of shows, films, shorts and specials, see Filmation.

Hibbert Ralph Entertainment

• The First Snow of Winter (co-produced with Link Entertainment and BBC)
• The Forgotten Toys (both the TV series and the special; co-produced with United Productions, Meridian Broadcasting and Link Entertainment)
• The Second Star to the Right (co-produced with BBC)
• Spider! (later sold to Evergreen Entertainment)

Link Entertainment

• Animal Antics
• Barney (co-produced with Barney Entertainments Ltd)
• Bill the Minder (produced by Bevanfield Films)
• Christopher Crocodile (co-produced with Mixpix and BBC)
• Fairy Tales (produced by Bevanfield Films)
• Ethelbert the Tiger (co-produced with Millimages)
• Eye of the Storm (co-produced with Meridian Broadcasting and Pater Tabern)
• Grabbit the Rabbit
• Hamilton Mattress (co-produced with Harvest Films, Egmont Imagination and BBC)
• Jack and Marcel
• The Morph Files (co-produced with Aardman Animations)
• Orm and Cheep
• Preston Pig (co-produced with Varga London)
• Tales of a Wise King
• The Slow Norris (co-produced with HTV)
• The Spooks of Bottle Bay (co-produced with Fugitive/Playboard Puppets and Carlton Television)
• Teddybears (co-produced with United Productions)
• There's A Viking In My Bed (co-produced with BBC)

Little Entertainment Co.

• Little Red Tractor
• Merlin the Magical Puppy

Maddocks Animation

• Caribou Kitchen
• The Family-Ness
• Jimbo and the Jet Set
• Penny Crayon

Queensgate Productions

• Stoppit and Tidyup (co-produced with CMTB Animation)
• The Trap Door (co-produced with CMTB Animation)

Sleepy Kids

• Dr. Zitbag's Transylvania Pet Shop (co-produced with Fairwater Films, PMMP Productions and Carlton Television)
• Budgie the Little Helicopter (co-produced with HTV and Fred Wolf Films)
• Potsworth & Co. (co-produced with Hanna-Barbera and BBC)

Tell-Tale Productions

• BB3B
• Boo!^[25] (co-produced with Universal Pictures, BBC and CBeebies)
• Fun Song Factory
• Jim Jam and Sunny (co-produced with Wish Films)
• Tweenies (co-produced with BBC)

Transformers

• Transformers: Animated (co-produced with Hasbro, Takara Tomy, The Answer Studio, MOOK DLE, Studio 4°C and Cartoon Network Studios)
• Transformers: Armada (co-produced with Hasbro, Takara Tomy, Æon, Dangun Pictures, Hangzhou Feilong Animation Ltd, M.S.J. Musashino-Seisakujo, Paramount Domestic Television and SD Entertainment)
• Transformers: Cybertron (co-produced with Hasbro, Takara Tomy, We've Inc, TV Aichi, GONZO, Sun Woo Entertainment and Voice Box Productions)
• Transformers: Energon (co-produced with Hasbro, Takara Tomy, We've Inc, ACTAS, Inc., A-CAT, Studio Galapagos and TV Tokyo)

Trumptonshire

• Camberwick Green (co-produced with BBC)
• Chigley (co-produced with BBC)
• Trumpton (co-produced with BBC)

Woodland Animations

• For a full list of shows and details, see Woodland Animations.^[26][27]

Miscellaneous

• Cubeez (co-produced with Starsound B.V. and Cubeedobeedo Ltd)
• Custer's Last Stand-up (co-produced with BBC and RTÉ)
• Dr Otter (co-produced with Red Balloon Productions)
• Finley the Fire Engine (co-produced with RHI Entertainment)
• Inuk (co-produced with Tube Studios)
• Katie and Orbie (season 1 only; co-produced with Lacewood Productions)
• The New Adventures of He-Man (co-produced with DIC Entertainment, Jetlag Productions, Parafrance Communications and LBS Communications)
• Titch (co-produced with Hutchins Film Company and Yorkshire Television)

References

External links

• Entertainment Rights at the Internet Movie Database

Animation industry in the United Kingdom
Active Animation Studios/Companies	Aardman Animations Art You Grew Up With Astley Baker Davies Bird Studios Blacknorth Blue-Zoo Productions bolexbrothers BreakThru Films Cake Entertainment Cartoon Network Development Studio Europe CHF Entertainment Collingwood & Co. DHX Media UK Fine Arts Films Framestore Fred & Eric Gateway Films Hot Animation Illuminated Film Company King Rollo Films Littlenobody LTL Production Melendez Films Nexus Productions Passion Pictures Ragdoll Productions Red Kite Animation Renga Media Smallfilms Spider Eye Productions Spite Your Face Productions Splash Entertainment Straandlooper Synthetic Dimensions
Defunct Animation Studios/Companies	Bumper Films Cosgrove Hall Films Entertainment Rights FilmFair Halas and Batchelor Qurios Entertainment Silver Lining Productions Spy Pictures
Related topics	Arthur Melbourne-Cooper Jerry the Troublesome Tyke