Does WB own the RKO/Van-Buren cartoons?

[Patrick McCart]

I know they're mostly in the public domain, but does WB own the RKO cartoons since Turner bought the RKO library?

I wondered this because the Van Buren version of "Wizard of Oz" was included on the Wizard of Oz DVD (WB Edition).

It was a horrible print, but it was a rare Technicolor version.

[Sogturtle]

Patrick~

In a word... noooo. Warners doesn't own the RKO/Van Buren toon library. I haven't seen the DVD... I have to assume that the animated Wizard Of Oz is the version made by Ted Eshbaugh (evidently in Hollywood) and in Technicolor and scored by Carl Stalling. This cartoon never made it to theatrical release, and Eshbaugh accepted employment at Van Buren immediately after.

[BobChief]

The only thing Warners has relative to RKO is the perpetual TV and video rights to their pre-1958(?) feature films, e.g. Citizen Kane. (I'm going by a reply to a question I asked them about Turner Entertainment Co., last year or the year before)

RKO, which is still in business (http://www.rko.com/), holds all other rights to properties it produced (that would not, say, include the D~sn~y toons they distributed for a time)

For instance, The Magnificent Ambersons, Welles' followup to Kane which was sliced and diced by the studio's management at the time, is being re-developed as a miniseries still being planned for airing this year on A&E here in the States.

[Argus Sventon]

A part of the RKO Van Beuren cartoons are owned by Columbia, through Columbia's buyout of Unity Pictures in the 50's. Viacom owns the Commonwealth library in the same way that the Betty Boop cartoons were purchased.

[Nelson]

I may be wrong here guys but.....I think the company that owns the entire Van Bueren cartoons are FILM PRSERVATION ASSOCIATES.
RKO Radio Pictures didn't acquire the VB cartoons until mid-1931 but before then, the Pathe Film Exchange have been releasing the cartoons since the early twenties before Amadee J. Van Bueren took over the (known then as Aesop's Studios)NYC cartoon studio in 1928, he was already familar with the Aesop Film series when he took over.

In 1931 Pathe was absorbed into RKO/PATHE pictures, and the VB cartoons were distributed by RKO for release, meaning that RKO never owned the copyrights to the Van Bueren cartoon series, just like MGM never own the Flip The Frog cartoons, but relesed the cartoon series through distribution only.Keep in mind that the VB studios was an independent cartoon studio having their films released thru a major Hollywood studio from 1928 to 1936, until Disney signed a major contract with RKO in 1936 which led to the closing of the NYC based studio.

Ted Turner did not have the Van Bueren cartoons, when be bought the entire RKO Radio film library back in the eighties, and since then, nobody knew who exactly who owned the classic cartoons.Film Preservation Assoc.restored most of the one-reel VB cartoons which this may lead to the current copyright holder of the classic cartoons, Film preservation Associates.