Rhodes Productions
James Fabiano, Jude Cormier and Kylejaker1988
Editions by
V of Doom, Shadeed A. Kelly, and Bob Fish
Video captures courtesy of
Eric S. and Stephen Cezar
Background
Rhodes Productions was a television distribution company that was founded in 1970 by Taft Broadcasting. It was later acquired in 1975 by Filmways, which held ownership until Rhodes broke apart from the company and became independent again in 1980 after American International Television was folded into Filmways Television. Rhodes was SCTV 's original U.S. syndicator since 1977. In 1983, John Blair & Company acquired Rhodes from its owners and renamed the company Blair Entertainment, and continued operate under that moniker until 1992. The rights to The Cisco Kid currently rest with the Peter Rodgers Organization (most likely on behalf of the Rhodes family; Rhodes Enterprises is credited on the official DVD releases). As for SCTV, Western International Communications (WIC), who had since absorbed SCTV 's co-producer Allarcom, would obtain the rights in 1998. Rights to the show are currently administered by its co-producers (the Second City Toronto and Fireworks Entertainment, who inherited WIC's rights after they were merged with Fireworks by CanWest).
(1975-1983)
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Logo: On a black background, the words "Syndication through" in white appear to the left, then letter by letter come the words: RHODES PRODUCTIONS Both are in the Bauhaus 93 font. After the letters appear, 22 white stars appear in a haphazardly-placed arrangement on the right.
Variants:
- Sometimes, a byline for Filmways (with the Filmways logo) appears after the stars finish appearing.
- On the syndicated edition of the original Hollywood Squares and Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, this logo had an on-screen appearance in the end credits and a Filmways byline was present, but would later have the regular full logo animation on screen.
- On the recovered syndicated version of the original Hollywood Squares, the phrase "World Wide Syndication through" appeared over the company name (seen stacked in a font similar to the later Filmways logo) on 1971-1975 episodes.
FX/SFX: The words and stars appearing gradually to the music, or none.
Music/Sounds: An ascending 8-note Moog synthesizer tune (the eighth note rapidly tremolos for the stars' appearance before it's released once the stars finish appearing). In some cases, the closing theme of the show was used.
Availability: The animated version is extinct. Seen at the end of the game show Pitfall, and as a still shot in the end credits of episodes of the original run of Hollywood Squares. Was also seen during the original syndicated run of SCTV (1977-81) and also seen later on some episodes of the 1984 syndicated repackage of the show and on Nick at Nite airings (as the shows used the original ending credits on certain 1977-81 episodes) but was replaced with the Blair Entertainment logo on Comedy Central reruns. Was also responsible for prints of The Cisco Kid that aired on the syndicated version of SCTV in 1981. However, the in-credit version is rare and seen on the first season of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, which is available on DVD.
