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RKO Animation Studios is an American animation studio which is part of RKO Pictures, the flagship company of RKO Holdings.
History[]
Origins as Avenue Studios[]
In 1938, a New York based satellite division of Walt Disney Productions known as Avenue Studios was founded. Led by Miles Becker, a former animator from the main studio and served as a "net pool" for young and up-and-coming talent in the East Coast area. For a good amount of its early history, it was merely an assistance studio to its parent owner and had no original films and IPs to its name.
The division was formed when Walt Disney signed a multi-film deal with RKO Pictures, with possible plans for an outright acquisition later down the line.
Split with Disney and formation of RKO Cartoon Studios[]
As a result of financial and marketing problems, Disney would ultimately pull their deal with RKO in 1954, but would fully complete the termination of the distribution contract by 1956, forming Buena Vista Film Distribution to distribute its own titles. However, Disney would sell its Avenue Studios division to RKO for an estimated $23 million. The deal was supposedly done as a "fair trade". The sale was completed by late 1956.
After the sale, RKO would relaunch Avenue Studios as RKO Cartoon Studios with Miles Becker becoming the very first president of the division. The first major project as part of RKO was the "Otto the Sea Lion" line of short films, co-created by Becker and his creative partner Logan Bartlett, which proved to be an early success for the new company.
1984 split[]
At the start of 1984, freshly-appointed studio head Tom Bloomer ordered the studio split into two halves - a "feature animation" unit to compete with Disney productions, and a "television animation" unit to compete with the low-budget television cartoons popular during that time.
1990s success and acquisition of Apollo[]
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Reformation and continued success[]
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Studio[]
Locations[]
RKO Animation Studios' main two units are the Western Unit in Burbank, California and the Eastern Unit in New York City, New York. Since 2000, the Western Unit has been based out of the Amedee J. Van Beuren Animation Building in Burbank, across from the RKO Pictures Studios. The Eastern Unit was originally based out of Astoria, Queens, based in a building near Kaufman Astoria Studios, and since 2006 it has been based in an office development in Brooklyn Navy Yard across from Steiner Studios.
The company maintains satellite animation studios in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (RKO Animation Studios Toronto); Prague, Czech Republic (RKO Animation Studios Prague); Łódź, Poland (RKO Animation Studios Poland); and Mumbai, India (RKO Animation Studios India).