J. Tushinsky; Introduced Sony to U.S.

Joseph Tushinsky, a conductor and film producer whose company became the first to bring Sony products to the United States, died of pneumonia Monday at his home in Encino. He was 78.

One of four brothers born into a musical family in New York, Tushinsky came to Los Angeles ostensibly to work in films but the brothers soon formed a company called Superscope, which developed an early wide-screen projection process. The Chatsworth company eventually purchased the Marantz Co., once a world leader in electronic communications.

In 1957 Joseph Tushinsky was in Tokyo to introduce Superscope to the Japanese film industry and became interested in a small firm exporting $2,000 a month in tape recorders that were manufactured in a quonset hut. He negotiated a contract to become Western Hemisphere distributor for Sony tape recorders.

At its peak in the early 1970s, that contract became worth $80 million annually. The arrangement ended in 1979, when Sony decided to work through its own U.S. subsidiary.

The brothers purchased Marantz from Sol Marantz in 1962. Tushinsky retired as chairman last year when the company was bought by Cobra/Dynascan.

In 1984 Tushinsky was in the news when he won a $6-million jury award for malicious prosecution from his estranged wife, who had accused him of molesting his stepdaughter. Tushinsky successfully contended that the accusation grew out of the couple’s bitter divorce and property settlement.