National Telefilm Associates
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| corporation | |
| Fate | Renamed as Republic Pictures. |
| Founded | 1954 |
| Defunct | 1985 |
| Owner | Independent |
| Parent |
Republic Pictures (Viacom) |
National Telefilm Associates (otherwise known by its initials, NTA) was an audio-visual marketing company that primarily handled syndication of American film libraries to television, including the Republic Pictures film library, which did so well on cable television in the 1980s that the company renamed itself Republic Pictures and undertook film production and home video sales as well .
NTA was founded by Ely Landau and Oliver A. Unger in 1954 when Ely Landau, Inc. was reorganized in partnership with Unger and Harold Goldman. NTA was the successor company to U.M. & M. TV Corporation, which it bought out in 1956.
In October 1956, NTA launched the NTA Film Network, a syndication service which distributed both film and live programs to television stations not affiliated with NBC, CBS, or ABC (DuMont had recently gone out of business). The ad-hoc network's flagship station was WNTA-TV, channel 13 in New York. The NTA Network was launched as a "fourth TV network", and trade papers of the time referred to it as a new television network.
The NTA network launched on October 15, 1956, with over 100 affiliate stations. NTA programming included syndicated programs such as Police Call (1955),How to Marry a Millionaire (1957-1959), The Passerby, Man Without a Gun (1957-1959), and This is Alice (1958). The network also distributed 52 Twentieth Century Fox films in 1956. In November of the same year, it was announced that 50% of the network had been purchased by Twentieth Century-Fox, which would also produce original content for the network.
In January 1959, Ely Landau was succeeded by Charles C. Barry, who took over as president of network operations. Landau continued to chair National Telefilm Associates. Bernard Tabakin became the president of National Telefilms Associates in 1962 and retained that position until 1975. During his tenure, NTA became the largest independent television distributor in the industry and acquired various film libraries, including NBC Films and Republic Pictures.
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