Castle Rock Entertainment is an American film and television production company founded in 1987 by Martin Shafer, director Rob Reiner, Andrew Scheinman, Glenn Padnick and Alan Horn. It is a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which in turn is a unit of Time Warner.

 

Company

Reiner named the company in honor of the fictional Maine town that serves as the setting of several stories by Stephen King (which was named after the fictional Castle Rock in Lord of the Flies), after the success of his film Stand by Me, which was based on The Body, a novella by King.

 

The company was originally backed by The Coca-Cola Company, the then-parent company of Columbia Pictures. Coke and the company's founders jointly owned a stake in the company. Months after the deal, Coke exited the entertainment business, succeeded by Columbia Pictures Entertainment (now Sony Pictures Entertainment).

 

In 1989, Castle Rock was supported by another backer, Group W, a subsidiary of Westinghouse.Castle Rock later struck a deal with Nelson Entertainment, the company that owned the domestic home video rights to Reiner's This is Spinal Tap, The Sure Thing, and The Princess Bride, to co-finance Castle Rock's films.

 

Under the deal, Nelson also distributed the films on video in North American markets, and handled international theatrical distribution, while Columbia, which Nelson forged a distribution deal with, would receive domestic theatrical distribution rights. Some of Nelson's holdings were later acquired by New Line Cinema, which took over Nelson's duty.

 

Columbia, shortly after the company's formation, thereafter had to re-invest with a substantial change in terms when accumulated losses exhausted its initial funding.

 

Castle Rock has also produced several television shows, such as the successful sitcom Seinfeld and the animated sitcom Mission Hill.

 

Distribution

On August 1993, Ted Turner agreed to acquire Castle Rock, along with co-financing partner New Line Cinema. The sale was completed in 1994. Turner Broadcasting System eventually merged into Time Warner in 1996.

 

In 1999, Warner Bros. and Universal assumed distribution rights beginning with The Green Mile (WB handled domestic distribution, while Universal handled the foreign rights). Soon after, Universal backed out of their contract (and later gave international rights to The Green Mile back to WB), WB assumed full distribution of all Castle Rock films worldwide. However, a few post-1998 films still had distribution by Columbia or a related company, such as Envy (distributed by Columbia outside the US, as DreamWorks had American rights), or the 2007 remake of Sleuth (through the Sony Pictures Classics division in North America; Paramount Pictures handled distribution in a few other English-speaking countries). Presumably, WB passed on distributing these films.

 

In several international markets in the mid-1990s, Columbia did not distribute Castle Rock films theatrically. In Germany, they distributed their own films via a joint venture between them, Concorde Filmverleih, and Turner Pictures (a subsidiary of Castle Rock's then-parent company Turner Broadcasting). Many of the company's early films were distributed by Palace Pictures in the United Kingdom, under license from Nelson.

 

New Line Cinema and Castle Rock Entertainment had recently collaborated on Fracture, which opened April 20, 2007; their first joint venture since the mid-1990s before both companies were bought by Turner. Also, Columbia and Castle Rock co-financed Did You Hear About The Morgans?, which was released on December 18, 2009.

 

Distribution changes

Castle Rock Entertainment owns the rights to nearly all of its films and television series, as they were copyrighted by the company (which is often shared by other companies on a few films). However, the distribution rights to these films have often shifted from company to company over the years.

 

Pre-1994

The distribution rights to all Castle Rock films prior to 1994 (with the exception of co-productions with Columbia such as In the Line of Fire and A Few Good Men) were originally held by New Line; the company later sold off the Nelson and Castle Rock libraries to PolyGram. These films are now part of the pre-1996 PolyGram Filmed Entertainment library owned by MGM. Warner Bros., however, holds some partial distribution rights to these films, including television rights to select titles that in turn include the films co-financed by Nelson (notably excluding the co-productions with Columbia which are owned by Sony Pictures Television)

 

Theatrical distribution of the pre-1994 Castle Rock library came full circle in 2005, when MGM was sold to a Sony-led partnership. As Sony owns Columbia (through Sony Pictures Entertainment), that studio has assumed theatrical distribution rights to the MGM-owned features. SPE also handled TV and video distribution for a short time. In 2006, MGM returned to self-distribution on TV, and switched video distribution to 20th Century Fox.

 

One pre-1994 Castle Rock film, The Spirit of '76, is also currently distributed by Warner since Nelson Entertainment did not have a role in the film's production.

 

1994 onward

The 1994-99 Castle Rock films (except the US distribution rights to The Story of Us and The Last Days of Disco, along with the international rights to The American President, all of which are held by Universal) are now part of WB's library, although some have ancillary rights held by WB's Turner division.

 

As aforementioned, WB has re-acquired the international distribution rights to The Green Mile from Universal. However, also as aforementioned, three other films with partial distribution by Universal were not part of the deal, and Universal still handles some interest in these films.

 

Selected films

 

The original Castle Rock Entertainment logo used from 1990 to 1994.
 

• Winter People (1989)

• When Harry Met Sally... (1989)

• Lord of the Flies (1990)

• Sibling Rivalry (1990)

• Spirit of '76 (1990)

• Misery (1990)

• City Slickers (1991)

• Year of the Comet (1992)

• Mr. Saturday Night (1992)

• Honeymoon in Vegas (1992)

• A Few Good Men (1992)

• Amos & Andrew (1993)

• In the Line of Fire (1993)

• Needful Things (1993)

• Malice (1993)

• Josh and S.A.M. (1993)

• City Slickers II: The Legend of Curly's Gold (1994)

• Little Big League (1994)

• North (1994)

• Barcelona (1994)

• The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

• Before Sunrise (1995)

• For Better or Worse (1995)

• Dolores Claiborne (1995)

• Forget Paris (1995)

• Beyond Rangoon (1995)

• A Midwinter's Tale (1995)

• The American President (1995)

• Othello (1995)

• The Run of the Country (1995)

• Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995)

• The Spitfire Grill (1996)

• City Hall (1996)

• Some Mother's Son (1996)

• Lone Star (1996)

• Striptease (1996)

• Extreme Measures (1996)

• SubUrbia (1996)

• Absolute Power (1996)

• Ghosts of Mississippi (1996)

• Hamlet (1996)

• Alaska (1996)

• Waiting for Guffman (1997)

• The Last Days of Disco (1998)

• Zero Effect (1998)

• My Giant (1998)

• Palmetto (1998)

• Sour Grapes (1998)

• Mickey Blue Eyes (1999)

• The Story of Us (1999)

• The Green Mile (1999)

• Bait (2000)

• Best in Show (2000)

• Proof of Life (2000)

• Miss Congeniality (2000)

• Hearts in Atlantis (2001)

• The Majestic (2001)

• The Salton Sea (2002)

• Murder by Numbers (2002)

• The Adventures of Pluto Nash (2002)

• Two Weeks Notice (2002)

• A Mighty Wind (2003)

• Kangaroo Jack (2003)

• Dreamcatcher (2003)

• Envy (2004)

• Before Sunset (2004)

• Kangaroo Jack: G'Day U.S.A.! (2004)

• The Polar Express (2004)

• Miss Congeniality 2: Armed and Fabulous (2005)

• For Your Consideration (2006)

• In the Land of Women (2007)

• Music and Lyrics (2007)

• Fracture (2007)

• No Reservations (2007)

• Michael Clayton (2007)

• Sleuth (2007)

• Chaos Theory (2008)

• Did You Hear About the Morgans? (2009)

• Flipped (2010)

• Faster (2010)

• Bernie (2011)

• Friends with Benefits (2011)

• The First Time (2012)

• The Magic of Belle Isle (2012)

• You Belong to Me (2013)

• Before Midnight (2013)

 

Television shows

• Heart & Soul (1988)

• Seinfeld (1989–1998) (Sony Pictures Television currently owns distribution rights)

• Partners in Life (1990)

• Morton & Hayes (1991)

• My Old School (1991)

• Please Watch the Jon Lovitz Special (1992)

• The Powers That Be (1992) (with ELP Communications and Columbia Pictures Television)

• Helicopters with Elvira (1993-1995)

• Thea (1993–1994) (Sony Pictures Television currently owns distribution rights)

• The Second Half (1993–1994)

• 704 Hauser (1994, pilot only)

• The Single Guy (1995–1997)

• The Lazarus Man (1996)

• Reunited (1998)

• The Army Show (1998)

• Mission Hill (1999–2002)

• Movie Stars (1999)

• The Michael Richards Show (2000–2001)

• Zero Effect (2001, pilot) (with Warner Bros. Television)

• Bliss (2002–2004) (with Warner Bros. Television)

• Lucky (2003)