Field Selling Panavision to British Firm

Frederick W. (Ted) Field, a film producer and an heir to the Marshall Field department store fortune, has agreed to sell the movie industry’s prestigious camera supplier, Panavision, to a British firm for $147 million, it was announced Wednesday.

The price for the Tarzana firm includes $100 million cash, with purchaser Lee International of London assuming $47 million of debt, the parties said.

Field has controlled Panavision since 1985 through his 100%-owned Interscope Communications. Lee is a manufacturer and distributor of theatrical equipment, with several U.S. holdings. It also is a major owner and operator of film studios in Great Britain.

Panavision, which rents but does not sell its cameras, is known as an innovator of cameras that revolutionized the film-making process in the 1970s. Robert Gottschalk, a co-founder in 1953, was its long-time president. Although it was sold in 1965, Gottschalk continued to head it until his death in 1982.

Robert Burkett, Interscope’s senior vice president of corporate affairs, said Field is “deeply committed” to continuing in the entertainment industry. Interscope expects to be even more active in production of movies and television films, Burkett said.

The transaction “should be viewed” as a merging of Lee and Panavision, according to Benny Lee, Lee’s managing director and a major shareholder, and John Farrand, Panavision’s chairman and chief executive.

An investor group, Boston Ventures Ltd. Partnership, was associated with Field in the purchase of Panavision from Warner Communications Inc. in early 1985, but later that year sold out its interest.