 Print logo used since 2015 | |
| Formerly | Nova Pictures (1982–1983) Tri-Star Pictures (1983–1991) |
|---|---|
| Company type | Subsidiary |
| Industry | Film |
| Predecessor | Nova Pictures (1982–1983) |
| Founded | March 2, 1982; 43 years ago (1982-03-02) (as Nova Pictures),Burbank, California, U.S. |
| Founders | Victor Kaufman David Matalon |
| Headquarters | 10202 West Washington Boulevard,Culver City, California, U.S. |
Area served | Worldwide |
Key people | Nicole Brown (president)[1] |
| Products | Motion pictures |
| Owner | Columbia Pictures (1982–1987) CBS (1982–1985) HBO (1982–1985) |
| Parent | Sony Pictures Entertainment (1987–present) |
| Divisions | TriStar Productions |
| Website | sonypictures.com |
TriStar Pictures, Inc. (spelled asTri-Star until 1991) is an American film production label that is part of theSony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division ofSony Pictures Entertainment, which is part of the Japanese conglomerateSony Group Corporation.[2] The company was founded on March 2, 1982, asNova Pictures, a joint venture ofColumbia Pictures,CBS, andHBO, whose video units handled video, broadcast, and pay cable rights to its products.[3] It was renamed a year later to Tri-Star to avoid confusion with thePBS seriesNova.[4]
Among its notable releases areTerminator 2: Judgment Day,Basic Instinct,Rambo: First Blood Part II (all of these movies are produced byCarolco Pictures), and Hollywood’s firstGodzilla. The company scored box-office hits with modestly budgeted fare in the 1980s. It also cut fortuitous distribution deals with theProducers Sales Organization,[5]Carolco Pictures[6] and theTaft Entertainment Group;[7] acquiredLoews Theatres; and formed atelevision arm. Among the various hits TriStar scored on its own during the decade wereAbout Last Night,The Muppets Take Manhattan,Real Genius,Nothing in Common,Peggy Sue Got Married,The Principal,Look Who's Talking andSteel Magnolias.
Columbia Pictures bought CBS' stake in the joint venture on November 15, 1985,[8] and HBO's stake in 1986.[9] On December 21, 1987, Tri-Star Pictures was merged with Columbia Pictures Entertainment byThe Coca-Cola Company, which owned 80% of CPE.[10] In January 1988, CPE's stocks somewhat fell, and Coca-Cola decreased its shares in CPE to 49%. On April 13, 1988, the Tri-Star Pictures label was revived.[11] On November 8, 1989,Sony Corporation of Japan acquired Columbia Pictures Entertainment for $3.4 billion. On August 7, 1991, under Sony Pictures Entertainment, the hyphen was officially removed from the name of the studio.
During the 1990s, TriStar operated autonomously from Columbia. Although its products were mostly indistinguishable from that of its sister studio, it soon scored a string of hits at the box office with such films asSleepless in Seattle,Philadelphia,The Mirror Has Two Faces,Jerry Maguire,As Good as It Gets,Bugsy andJumanji, and it also scored a major video hit withDanny DeVito'sMatilda.[12] However, in 1998, the company fell on hard times following the box-office disappointment of its productionGodzilla. Sony quickly responded by merging the studio with Columbia.[13] The TriStar name was subsequently used by Sony on a very limited basis until 2004, when the company decided to turn the studio into a genre label that specialized in acquisitions.[14] In 2013, Sony formedTriStar Productions as a vehicle for film and television productions.[15] TriStar Pictures is currently being used as a vehicle for distribution of films from that new entity and others from Sony Pictures.[16]
TriStar Pictures is currently one of the five live-action labels of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, alongside Columbia Pictures,Screen Gems,Sony Pictures Classics, and3000 Pictures.
The concept for Tri-Star Pictures can be traced to Victor Kaufman, a senior executive ofColumbia Pictures (then a subsidiary ofthe Coca-Cola Company),[17] who convinced Columbia,HBO, andCBS to share resources and split the ever-growing costs of making movies, leading to the creation of a new joint venture on March 2, 1982. On May 16, 1983, it was given the name Tri-Star Pictures (when the new company was formed and did not have an official name, the press used the code-name "Nova", but the name could not be obtained as it was being used as the title for thePBSscience series).[4][18] Tri-Star embarked on a 12 to 18 feature film slate per year, with a combined budget of $70 to $80 million and signed producer Walter Colbenz as vice president of the Tri-Star feature film studio, and signed initial development deals with directorJohn Schlesinger and producers Jeffrey Walker and Michael Walker.[19] Tri-Star's first project to roll out wasThe Muppets Take Manhattan.[20]
On May 11, 1984, Tri-Star's first produced film was released,The Natural starringRobert Redford. Tri-Star's first release, however, was the film,Where the Boys Are '84; a 1984remake of the 1960Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) picture,Where the Boys Are that was co-distributed on behalf ofITC Entertainment afterUniversal rejected it; the film was a commercial flop.[21]
Many of Tri-Star's productions were released on VHS byRCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video,HBO/Cannon Video, orCBS/Fox Video. In addition, HBO owned exclusive cable distribution rights to the films, with broadcast television licenses going to CBS.[3]
On May 8, 1984, Tri-Star Pictures secured North American distribution rights for the filmSupergirl fromWarner Bros., which enabled the film to be ready for distribution by Christmas 1984.[22] On May 15, 1984, the studio hit big through its association withCarolco Pictures, with the release ofRambo: First Blood Part II, which eventually became a smash hit for the studio the following year.[6][23] The company also partnered withProducers Sales Organization to handle theatrical distribution of the PSO titles,[5] while both Tri-Star and Columbia struck a deal for film financing with Delphi Film Associates.[24]
CBS dropped out of the Tri-Star venture in November 1985.[8] HBO also dropped out of the venture and sold half of its shares to Columbia Pictures following a month.[9][25] Despite the changes in majority ownership, Tri-Star continued ambition-laden expansion plans. Chief among these plans was an expansion of their successful relationship with Carolco; a new extension of their pre-existing deal included Tri-Star gaining theatrical distribution rights to various Carolco projects, includingRambo III andAir America; Carolco retained all foreign, cable, television and videocassette rights.[26] Taft/Barish Productions, a joint venture ofTaft Broadcasting andKeith Barish Productions, signed a $200 million domestic distribution deal with Tri-Star (much like Carolco, Taft/Barish retained non-theatrical and ancillary distribution rights). Of the four films to emerge from this pact, onlyThe Running Man would become a major success.[7]
Another avenue of expansion was acquiring the storiedLoews Theaters chain of cineplexes in October 1986 for $300 million, after a deal to purchaseUnited Artists Theaters fromTele-Communications, Inc. did not come to fruition. At the time, Loews had 260 theaters in six states.[27][28][29]
1987 was another ambitious year for Tri-Star; plans were in place to take Tri-Star from a relatively new, untested film company into a major film studio. Components of these plans included the formation ofTriStar Television, and joining forces withStephen J. Cannell Productions andWitt/Thomas/Harris Productions to create a television distribution company known as TeleVentures; they also proposed forming their own home video label, Tri-Star Video, taking over from the trio of distributors (RCA/Columbia, CBS/Fox and HBO/Cannon).[30][31] A full-on international distribution arm was also in the planning stages.[32] Another distribution deal was signed by Tri-Star andHemdale Film Corporation in September 1987, but only one film,High Tide, would result from that deal.[33]
However, Tri-Star's ambitions were curtailed by yet more change in ownership.The Coca-Cola Company boosted its stake in Tri-Star to 29.3% that September.[34] That December, following several high-profile flops (includingIshtar), Coca-Cola began a plan to get out of the media industry; Tri-Star Pictures, Inc. was renamed as Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc., and Coca-Cola sold its entertainment business to Tri-Star for $3.1 billion. Coca-Cola would then gradually reduce their holdings in the new company to 49%. Both studios continued to produce and distribute films under their separate names; a new Tri-Star Pictures, Inc. entity was created in April 1988.[10][11]
As a result, Tri-Star's television division was consolidated into a single operating entity withColumbia/Embassy Television and Coca-Cola Television to form a new incarnation ofColumbia Pictures Television.Merv Griffin Enterprises would continue to operate separately.[35][36] Similarly, Tri-Star's nascent video division was absorbed into RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video.[37]
In 1989, Columbia Pictures Entertainment, Inc. was acquired by Japanese conglomerateSony Corporation, which merged Columbia and Tri-Star, but continued to use the separate labels. On July 11, 1990, Tri-Star Pictures dissolved and sold its venture in TeleVentures to Stephen J. Cannell Productions and TeleVentures became Cannell Distribution Co. Most of the series and the Tri-Star film packages that were distributed by TeleVentures were transferred to Columbia Pictures Television Distribution.[38]Sony Pictures Entertainment later revived TriStar Television as a television production banner in 1991 (by way of acquiring rights to shows fromNew World Television) and merged with its sister television studioColumbia Pictures Television (CPT) to formColumbia TriStar Television (CTT) on February 21, 1994.[39][40] Both studios continued to operate separately under the CTT umbrella until TriStar Television folded in 1999 and CPT folded in 2001.
In addition to its own slate, TriStar Pictures was the theatrical distributor for many films produced byCarolco Pictures (the rights to only one of its films,Cliffhanger, has been retained by TriStar). TriStar Pictures also theatrically distributed someFilmDistrict films. In 1992, TriStar Pictures, along withJapan Satellite Broadcasting signed an agreement withThe IndieProd Company to distribute movies produced by IndieProd in order to fill the void left by Carolco, whose deal with TriStar Pictures was on the verge of expiring amid financial troubles.[41]
Around summer 1998, SPE merged Columbia and TriStar to form the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, but just like Columbia Pictures Entertainment, both divisions continued producing and distributing films under their own names. Some of the movies slated to be released by TriStar Pictures, includingStepmom would go to Sony's flagship labelColumbia Pictures following the merger.[13]
TriStar was relaunched on May 13, 2004, as a marketing and acquisitions unit that had a "particular emphasis on genre films".[14] Screen Gems' executive vice president Valerie Van Galder was tapped to run the revived studio after being dormant.[42] However, the release of its 2013 filmElysium represented the label's first big-budget release sinceThe Mask of Zorroin 1998.
The same year, former20th Century Fox co-chairmanTom Rothman joined Sony Pictures and createdTriStar Productions as a joint venture with existing Sony Pictures executives. The new TriStar would develop, finance and produce up to four films per year, as well as television programming and acquisitions, starting on September 1.[15][43][44] Sony's TriStarPictures unit is currently being retained for "other product, including titles fromSony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions", and is distributing product from TriStar Productions.[16]
TriStar's logo features the winged horsePegasus (either stationary or flying across the screen). The idea came from executive Victor Kaufman and his family's interest in riding horses. The original logo was created with the assistance ofSydney Pollack, who was an adviser at Tri-Star. The horse in the original filmed logo was the same one used in Pollack's filmThe Electric Horseman.[45]
| Rank | Title | Year | Worldwide gross |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Terminator 2: Judgment Day | 1991 | $520,881,154 |
| 2 | Godzilla | 1998 | $379,014,294 |
| 3 | Basic Instinct | 1992 | $352,927,224 |
| 4 | As Good as It Gets | 1997 | $314,178,011 |
| 5 | Hook | 1991 | $300,854,823 |
| 6 | Rambo: First Blood Part II | 1985 | $300,400,432 |
| 7 | My Best Friend's Wedding | 1997 | $299,288,605 |
| 8 | Look Who's Talking | 1989 | $296,999,813 |
| 9 | Elysium | 2013 | $286,140,700 |
| 10 | Jerry Maguire | 1996 | $273,552,592 |
| 11 | Jumanji | 1995 | $262,821,940 |
| 12 | Total Recall | 1990 | $261,317,921 |
| 13 | Cliffhanger | 1993 | $255,000,211 |
| 14 | The Mask of Zorro | 1998 | $250,288,523 |
| 15 | Sleepless in Seattle | 1993 | $227,799,884 |
| 16 | Baby Driver | 2017 | $226,945,087 |
| 17 | District 9 | 2009 | $210,888,950 |
| 18 | Philadelphia | 1993 | $206,678,440 |
| 19 | Rambo III | 1988 | $189,015,611 |
| 20 | Looper | 2012 | $176,506,819 |
| 21 | Legends of the Fall | 1994 | $160,638,883 |
| 22 | Starship Troopers | 1997 | $121,099,956 |
| 23 | Pompeii | 2014 | $117,831,631 |
| 24 | Mary Shelley's Frankenstein | 1994 | $112,006,296 |
| 25 | Planet 51 | 2009 | $105,647,102 |
The label will have a particular emphasis on genre films
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