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Harvey Films facts for kids

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Harvey Films
Harvey Entertainment
In-name-only unit
Industry Animated TV shows
Theatrical feature films
Founded 1957; 68 years ago (1957) (as animation arm)
2001; 24 years ago (2001) (as in-name-only unit)
Headquarters
United States
Parent DreamWorks Classics
(DreamWorks Animation)
(Universal Pictures)
(NBCUniversal) (Comcast)

Harvey Films, also known as Harvey Entertainment, is a company that makes animated TV shows and movies. It started as a family business in the 1940s. By 1957, it became a full animation studio. They are famous for bringing popular comic book characters like Casper the Friendly Ghost and Richie Rich to life on screen.

In the early 1960s, the company created Harvey Funnies. This was the original entertainment part of the business. It produced shows like The New Casper Cartoon Show.

Today, Harvey Films is part of DreamWorks Classics. This company used to be called Classic Media. DreamWorks Classics is owned by DreamWorks Animation, which is also owned by NBCUniversal. All these companies are part of Comcast.

Harvey Films and the Ghostbusters Lawsuit

In 1986, Harvey Films had a legal disagreement with Columbia Pictures. Harvey Films thought the logo for the movie Ghostbusters looked too much like their own characters. They felt the ghost in the Ghostbusters logo was similar to Fatso, one of their Ghostly Trio characters.

Columbia Pictures disagreed. They pointed out that their logo had only one ghost, while Harvey's Ghostly Trio had three. They also said the Ghostbusters logo included a "no" sign (like a prohibition symbol). The court looked at both logos closely. They decided that the logos were quite different. The ghosts had different expressions, and the overall designs were not confusing.

The court said that even if people thought the Ghostbusters logo reminded them a little of "Casper" characters, it didn't mean they would get confused. They wouldn't think Ghostbusters was a "Casper" cartoon or made by the same company. Because of this, the court decided that Harvey Films' claim was not strong enough, and the case was dismissed.

Popular Shows and Movies by Harvey Films

Harvey Films has created many well-known cartoons and movies over the years. They often worked with other big studios to bring their characters to the screen.

Movies for Theaters

These are films that were shown in movie theaters:

TV Series and Specials

Harvey Films produced many animated shows for television:

Direct-to-Video Movies

These movies were released directly to home video, like VHS or DVD, without first being shown in theaters:

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