How Ted Turner went from cinema’s “butcher” to its champion |
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How Ted Turner went from cinema’s “butcher” to its champion
Turner shocked Hollywood by colorizing classic film gems. Founding Turner Classic Movies cleaned the slate
Published May 8, 2026 12:00PM (EDT)
In 1986, Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert dedicated a full episode of their syndicated series “At the Movies” to sounding the alarm about the industry’s fascination with colorizing black-and-white films. “Hollywood’s New Vandalism,” they called it, placing the blame for this creative abomination on two of the main companies leading the charge — and one man, Ted Turner.
During the prior year, Turner had acquired the MGM studio’s library of more than 3,500 films for $1.25 billion, in a deal that made him the owner of cinematic gems like “Gone with the Wind,” “The Wizard of Oz” and “Casablanca.” Two of those films were originally presented in color, including “Gone with the Wind,” which launched Turner Network Television in 1988. The third, “Casablanca,” was not.
America’s foremost film critics ridiculed the colorized version of the 1942 film “Yankee Doodle Dandy” that Turner had recently broadcast on what was then known as SuperStation WTBS and warned that a colorized version of 1941’s “The Maltese Falcon” was on the way.
That film’s director, John Huston, joined Jimmy Stewart and fellow Directors Guild of America members, including George Lucas, in accusing Turner and other colorizers of cultural butchery. But Turner wasn’t just undeterred. He was emboldened.
(Rick Maiman/Sygma via Getty Images) Ted Turner launches Turner Classic Movies
“I personally don’t think it makes that much difference in the end,” he told The Los Angeles Times a couple of weeks after Siskel and Ebert called him out. “I think editing these movies makes a hell of a lot more difference in........