U.M. & M. TV Corporation
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| Film distributor | |
| Fate | Acquired by National Telefilm Associates |
| Founded | 1954 |
| Defunct | 1957 |
U.M. & M. TV Corporation is an American media company best known as the original purchaser of the pre-October 1950 short films and cartoons produced by Paramount Pictures, excluding Popeye and Superman. The initials stand for United Film Service (which once employed Walt Disney and other animators many years earlier), MTA TV (Motion Picture Advertising Service) of New Orleans, and Minot T.V.
Operations of the three above-mentioned companies were consolidated into a new company, U.M & M., in October 1954. The companies were previously producing TV commercials. Matty Fox, head of Motion Pictures for Television, signed a ten-year agreement with U.M & M. to handle sub-distribution of its TV series.
U.M. & M. handled the physical distribution of the television series Paris Precinct and Sherlock Holmes, and others. It did not market the shows, leaving the actual syndication to Guild Films.
In 1955, Paramount Pictures announced it was selling its short films and cartoons, and even a few of its features, including the Max Fleischer animated features Gulliver's Travels and Mr. Bug Goes to Town.
Represented by A. W. Schwalberg, a former Paramount sales executive, U.M. & M. won the bid in December 1955, buying 1,600 short subjects for $3.5 million. U.M. & M. got most of the material that Paramount put up for sale. The Popeye cartoons (including his first appearance, the Betty Boop cartoon Popeye the Sailor) were sold in April 1956 to Associated Artists Productions (and in succeeding years to United Artists, MGM/UA Entertainment Co. and Turner Entertainment Co. – today Turner is a division of Time Warner). The Superman cartoons were not included in the sale, as their rights had already reverted from Paramount to National Comics when the studio's film rights to the character expired; TV rights to those shorts were licensed by National to Flamingo Films, distributors of the Adventures of Superman television series.
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