29 Facts About Orion Pictures

The executives formed Orion Pictures Company, named after the constellation which they claimed had five main stars.

Orion Pictures held a $100 million line of credit and its films would be distributed by the Warner Bros.

Orion Pictures was contractually given free rein over distribution and advertising as well as the number and type of films the executives chose to invest in.

In late March 1978, Orion Pictures signed its first contract, a two-picture deal with John Travolta's production company.

Orion Pictures developed a co-financing and distribution deal with EMI Films.

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Later that year, Orion Pictures released Blake Edwards' 10 which became a commercial success, the first for Edwards in over a decade.

Out of the 23 films Orion Pictures released between April 1979 and December 1981, only a third of them made a profit.

Orion Pictures executives were conflicted over financing big-budgeted films and passed on Raiders of the Lost Ark for that reason.

Orion Pictures was now looking to have its own distribution network by acquiring another company with such capabilities.

In 1983, Orion Pictures introduced art-house division Orion Classics with executives who had previously run United Artists Classics.

In September 1984, Orion Pictures distributed Amadeus, which garnered many accolades, winning eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture.

That year, on April 3,1984, Orion Pictures launched Orion Entertainment Group, that would consist of four groups, Orion Television, Orion Home Video, Orion Pay Television and Orion Television Syndication, and the new organization would produce and distribute product for television, home video, pay and syndicated markets, with Jamie Kellner serving as president.

In 1987, Orion Pictures achieved further success with RoboCop and No Way Out.

In late November 1987, Orion Home Video, the home video division of Orion Pictures, had inked a deal with upstart distributor Orange Entertainment, a group headed by Leland Nolan and Eric Van Ginkle to distribute a dozen of made-for-video comedy films that were produced by the film studio, which included Dr Dub's Mangled Movies: Volume I: Crocodile Gandhi and Father Guido Sarducci's Ninja Summer Camp.

Soon Kluge started buying more Orion Pictures stock, leading to his and Redstone's battling it out to take over the company.

In 1989, Orion Pictures suffered from a disastrous slate of films, placing themselves dead last among the larger Hollywood studios in terms of box office revenue.

In February 1990, Orion signed a deal with Columbia Pictures Entertainment in which the much larger studio would pay Orion $175 million to distribute Orion's movies and television programs overseas.

Orion Pictures had previously licensed its films to individual distributors territory by territory.

On November 25,1991, Orion Pictures sold its Hollywood Squares format rights to King World Productions after Orion Pictures closed down its television division.

In December 1991, Orion Pictures was in talks with New Line Cinema, a successful independent film company, to acquire the bankrupt studio.

The good news is that Orion Pictures was just purchased, and the bad news is it was bought by the House of Representatives.

Orion Pictures brought with it a two-thousand film library, ten completed movies and five direct-to-video features for future release and the Krevoy and Stabler movie put picture distribution deal.

In 2013, Orion Pictures returned to television production with a new syndicated series, Paternity Court.

In 2017, Orion Pictures TV added another court series, Couples Court, to its syndicated line up.

Under his leadership, the "new" Orion Pictures will produce, market and distribute four to six modestly budgeted films a year across genres and platforms, and both wide and limited releases for targeted audiences.

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On February 5,2019, MGM and Annapurna Orion Pictures expanded their US joint distribution venture Mirror, rebranding it as United Artists Releasing.

However, in most cases, the 1980s Orion Pictures logo has been retained or added, in the case of the Filmways and AIP libraries.

Orion Pictures retains a controlling interest in The Cotton Club, although major rights are now with Lionsgate, which owns the library of presenting studio Zoetrope Corporation.

Orion Pictures releases produced by the Hemdale Film Corporation and Nelson Entertainment are included in MGM's library as well, and are incorporated into the Orion Pictures library.