The company was founded by Michael Redstone in 1936 in the Boston suburb of Dedham as Northeast Theater Corporation, operating a chain of movie theaters in the region. In 1959, when the founder's son Sumner Redstone joined the company, it was renamed National Amusements.
In March 2005, due to Viacom's declining stock price, National Amusements announced that it would split its media subsidiary into two companies that would remain under its control.[4] The original Viacom would become the second incarnation of CBS Corporation as it kept CBS, Simon & Schuster,[5] and Paramount Network Television (now CBS Studios), among other assets, while MTV Networks, BET Networks, and Paramount Pictures would spin-off to a sister company under the Viacom name. The split was closed on December 31, 2005; the second iterations of Viacom and CBS Corporation commenced trading on January 3, 2006.[6]
At the end of 2008, due to financial troubles, owners Sumner Redstone and Shari Redstone sold $400 million of nonvoting shares in National Amusements.[7][8] In October 2009, the company sold almost $1 billion of its interest in the stock of CBS and Viacom[9] and sold 35 theaters to Rave Motion Pictures. Today these theatres are owned by Cinemark, AMC, Alamo, or have closed. National Amusements now almost exclusively operates theaters in the Northeastern United States (with the exception of one location in Ohio).[10] The following year, National Amusements planned to sell $390 million of notes to refinance a large part of the company's bank owed debt.[11]
In 2019, it was announced that the multinational media conglomerates controlled by National Amusements — Viacom and CBS Corporation — would re-merge to form a new company named ViacomCBS.[12] Viacom and CBS announced that the merger would close on December 4;[13][14] following the official close,[15] the company began trading on NASDAQ the following day. In 2022, the company was renamed Paramount Global.[16]
Current operations
City Center 15 Cinema de Lux in White Plains, New York. The lobby includes a waiting area with a television, newspaper rack and sofas (left), a piano (right of center), and a restaurant (not pictured).
The company operates more than 1,500 movie screens across the Northeastern United States, the United Kingdom, and Latin America under its Showcase Cinemas, Showcase Cinema de Lux, Multiplex Cinemas, and Cinema de Lux. In Canada, National Amusements also owned Famous Players theatres through Viacom which today are now owned by Cineplex Entertainment and Landmark Cinemas. In 2004, National Amusements acquired the Brazilian operations to cinema chain UCI, and revamping it to be more in line with Showcase. They also share some of the corporate identities of Showcase and have XPlus & De Lux rooms in selected cinemas, as well as fully reclining seats.
National Amusements owns a 10.2% equity stake and 79.4% voting interest in Paramount Global. The company may hold an unspecified stake in Audacy, Inc., as part of the reverse Morris trust that spun CBS's radio assets off to that company; CBS Corporation shareholders overall held a 72% stake in the then-named Entercom as of the spin-off.[17]
Stewart, James B.; Rachel Abrams (2023). Unscripted: The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy. New York: Penguin Press. ISBN9781984879424. OCLC1365390478.
