Turner Classics Deals for 36 Columbia Oldies

By JOHN DEMPSEY

Columbia Pictures has sold 36 of its golden-oldie theatricals to the Turner Classic Movies network for an exclusive three-year window, at a license fee of $ 5 million (about $ 140,000 a title).

The package spans four decades (the '30s through the '60s), and the titles include "It Happened One Night," "Dr. Strangelove," "The Lion in Winter," "Suddenly Last Summer," "Holiday" and "Picnic."

TCM starts receiving the titles in January.

Although Tom Karsch, senior VP and G.M. of TCM, declined to confirm the price , he put the Columbia buy in the context of three previous output deals TCM has engineered since it went on the air in April 1994:

A 1,000-title pickup from MGM/UA (including "Some Like It Hot," "Annie Hall," "Elmer Gantry" and "Red River").

Two hundred pictures from Warner Bros., highlighted by "Around the World in 80 Days," "A Streetcar Named Desire" and "Mister Roberts."

Three hundred Paramount picss, among them "Breakfast at Tiffany's," "Sunset Boulevard" and "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance."

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