Concord Originals, the film and TV division of music company Concord, has acquired storied film studio RKO, giving the Nashville-based music company a wealth of opportunities to promote and capitalize on its publishing and recorded music catalog.
RKO is one of Hollywood’s oldest studios and produced numerous timeless films and TV productions from the ‘20s to ’50s, including King Kong, Citizen Kane, The Best Years of Our Lives, It’s a Wonderful Life, Suspicion and The Woman in the Window. Legendary industrialist Howard Hughes owned RKO for a brief stretch, buying the company in 1947 and selling it to General Rubber and Tire in 1955.
The acquisition covers derivative rights for remakes, sequels, stage productions and stories — “anything that someone with creative intent and with a little bit of sweat equity could theoretically turn into a project,” Concord CEO Bob Valentine tells Billboard. Concord’s deal for RKO gives it the opportunity “to develop new and interesting projects around that original IP,” Valentine explains. Turner Broadcasting System, now owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, acquired the distribution rights to the original RKO library in 1987.
RKO’s library includes what Valentine calls “some of the most seminal musicals” created in the mid-20th century, many of which have not yet been adapted for live performance. Among RKO’s musicals are films starring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers such as Top Hat and Swing Time. “I wouldn’t underestimate the potential for theatrical development,” he says.
RKO will continue to operate as a standalone entity within Concord Originals after the transaction. Sophia Dilley, head of Concord Originals, and current RKO president Mary Beth O’Connor will run RKO has co-presidents. RKO chairman and CEO Ted Hartley will stay on as lead producer and chief storyteller of active RKO projects.
Dilley’s six-person team will expand to nine after the acquisition. RKO’s Brian Anderson will work across both companies as director of contract, administration and distribution, according to Dilley. As part of a recent restructuring at Concord Originals, Wesley Adams was upped to vp of production and distribution, Charlie Hopkins was promoted to vp of development and Imogen Lloyd Webber was given the new role of executive vp of marketing and communications of Concord Originals and Theatricals.
“Our plan will be to grow strategically, because a lot of these film companies grow too fast, they have overhead too fast,” says Dilley. “Our mission is to be really frugal and careful about how we put this together so that it’s set up for success long term.”
Concord Originals was founded in 2021 as an outgrowth of Concord’s realization that it could be “a more direct beneficiary” of derivative works that involved the company’s music rights, says Dilley. Among the productions by Concord Originals are Stax: Soulsville USA, a Peabody Award-winning, four-part HBO documentary that was co-produced with Polygram Entertainment and Warner Music Entertainment, and Let the Canary Sing, a documentary about singer Cyndi Lauper produced with Fine Point Films and Sony Music Entertainment. Concord Originals is also working on a biopic on blues legend Robert Johnson, whose publishing catalog is represented by Concord Music Publishing.
In addition, Concord Originals has a partnership with Skydance Entertainment and Jennifer Lopez’s Nuyorican Productions to develop original projects. One such project is a limited series based on Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella. Rogers & Hammerstein’s catalog was acquired by Concord in 2017 through its purchase of Imagem Music Group.
