National Screen Service (NSS) in the UK
was originally a British office of the American National
Screen Service. The American company started in 1919 providing trailers
and received their first contract for producing and distributing posters
and supplies in 1939and actually started shipping posters in 1940. The NSS
in America was the dominate force for printing, warehousing and distributing
movie trailers, posters and assessories.
The NSS office in the UK opened around 1930
to supply trailers. Cecil
Hepworth was one of the early managers in the 1930s. We have not been
able to find ANY pressbooks in the early 1940s where NSS supplied posters.
We did find records on Paul Kimberley, who had opened the Thanhouser
Film Ltd pre-WW1, formed Imperial Films, and been the governor of the
British Film Institute from 1940 until
1943, took over as managing director of NSS from 1943 to 1945.
The FIRST studio that NSS signed to handle
their posters and assessories for in the US was Paramount
in 1939. We checked pressbooks for films released in the UK from Paramount
DURING the war and found NO sign of NSS involvement. We can only assume
that NSS didn't start their expansion in the UK until just AFTER the war.
With the new distribution systems set up
in America to handle trailers, posters and supplies, a branch office of
the complete operation was set up as National Screen Service Limited. Pressbooks
after the war give their location as Nascreno House, Soho Square, W.1
NSS printed, warehoused and shipped material
for the studios. To the theaters, they provided trailers and rented posters.
In the mid 1970s (again without
records, we're having to go on what we were told), the NSS managers got
together and bought the UK company from the parent company making it a private
UK owned company. Operations continued as usual under the
new ownership.
Unlike the American NSS though, they did
NOT mark their posters (NSS marks are WONDERFUL for collectors). BUT they
did put the NSS ownership tag like their US counterpart. The NSS tag would
normally go across the bottom of the poster in block or single line form
and state:
"This copyright advertising material
is licensed and not sold and is the property of National Screen Service
Ltd. and upon completion of the exhibition for which it has been licensed
it should be returned to National Screen Service Ltd."
This NSS tag was used UNTIL the
early 1990s, when the NSS STOPPED renting posters and the tag was dropped.
In 1998, Carlton Advertising bought out
NSS-UK and made it a division of Carlton.
National Screen today is still doing business
as a subsidiary of Carlton Advertising and provides a wide variety of services
for the industry.
Currently NSS has the following offices:
A printing operation
at: Westminster Business Square, 1-45 Durham Street Vauxhall, London SE11
5JH
Warehousing at: Perivale Industrial Park,
Horsenden Lane South, Greenford, Middlesex UB6 7RL
Main offices at:12 Golden Square, London
W1F 9JE
Here is a link to their brand new website:
http://www.nationalscreen.co.uk/
