National Telefilm Associates
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National Telefilm Associates (otherwise known by its initials, NTA) was an independent distribution company that handled reissues of American film libraries, including much of Paramount Pictures' animated and short-subjects library.
Founded in 1958 by Ely Landau, NTA was the successor company to U.M.&M. T.V. Corp., which Landau acquired upon NTA's founding. Among NTA's holdings:
- Most of the pre-1946 feature films produced by Twentieth Century-Fox (these would later go back to Fox themselves)
- Most of Paramount's short-subject library, including the Max Fleischer cartoons (except Popeye and Superman) and the live-action comedies, musicals, and novelties (Burns & Allen, Robert Benchley, Eddie Cantor, Rudy Vallee, Louis Armstrong, Speaking of Animals, Mack Sennett comedies, Hedda Hopper's Hollywood, etc.);
- A majority of the pre-1952 United Artists library
- The Frank Capra film It's a Wonderful Life
- The original Republic Pictures library (NTA had acquired Republic's catalog after the latter company ceased production in 1957)
- New York City's television station broadcasting on Channel 13. It was WNTA during NTA's ownership, then sold to become WNDT and eventually WNET, a major PBS outlet. A notable WNTA production syndicated to other commercial stations was the dramatic anthology series, The Play of the Week.
In April 1973, NTA bought the library of NBC Films, the syndication arm of the NBC television network, after the FCC ruled TV networks could not syndicate their own shows. Notable titles include Bonanza, The High Chaparral, Car 54, Where Are You?, and Get Smart.
Like its U.M.&M. predecessor, NTA altered the original negatives to the Paramount animated shorts, replacing the front-and-end titles. References to Paramount and Technicolor were blacked out, with the NTA logo replacing the Paramount mountain.
At the end of color prints, the NTA logo had a U.M.&M. copyright byline below it, but on black and white prints, the U.M.&M. copyright appeared where the original Paramount copyright had been.
By 1984, NTA initiated a home video division to handle its backlog. Before the end of the decade, NTA changed its name to Republic Pictures, having bought the latter's name and trademark.
NTA/Republic changed hands in succeeding years, and the distribution of the NTA holdings as we know today is split--the theatrical rights are handled by Paramount Pictures, while television rights lie with CBS Paramount Television, all of this as the result of Viacom's 2006 corporate split into two separate companies.
However, Republic's video licensee, Lions Gate Home Entertainment, continues to hold the home video rights to the theatrical catalog (except It's a Wonderful Life, which Paramount now distributes on DVD), while Paramount Home Entertainment (through CBS DVD) handles the television library for home video.
