City Lights Entertainment (1986–1990)

In 1986, Joseph Toufik Merhi and Richard Joseph Pepin, indie film directors and producers, founded the production company City Lights Entertainment with Ronald L. Gilchrist for their first movies, the comedy Hollywood In Trouble and slasher film Mayhem.^[1] The films were successful and caught the VHS direct-to-video boom beginning in the mid-late 80s.

However, in 1989, the relationship between Pepin/ Merhi and Gilchrist turned sour and their partnership was dissolved with Gilchrist and City Lights keeping the rights to the films already produced or in production.^[2] The last films released by City Lights were Payback and Contra Conspiracy in 1990.^[3][4] City Lights Entertainment produced eleven films from 1986 to 1990.^[5]

PM Entertainment Group Inc. (1989–2000)

Around 1989, after splitting from Ronald Gilchrist, Richard (Rick) Pepin and Joseph Merhi started PM Entertainment (PM Entertainment from surnames Pepin-Merhi). Based on the successful formula pioneered at City Lights Entertainment, PM Entertainment entered into an exclusive distribution contract with HBO and George Shamieh joined as the third partner and head of sales.^[6] The first film produced by PM Entertainment was L.A. Heat directed by Merhi and starring Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs and Jim Brown. The film was quickly followed by two sequels, L.A. Vice (1989) and Chance (1990) with Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs reprising his role as Jon Chance. He also directed Angels of the City in 1989 and cameos as Jon Chance, but the film's plot is not a sequel to L.A. Heat.

The company began bringing together a company of actors and directors to work over multiple projects, including Wings Hauser, who directed and starred in three films for the company in the early 90s,^[7] and Jeff Conaway, who starred in three films and directed Bikini Summer II.^[8]

Although the company focused primarily on the action market and exploitation films, they attempted to diversify into children's films (Magic Kid and Bigfoot: The Unforgettable Encounter) and dramas (Cellblock Sisters: Banished Behind Bars) with limited success. During the '90s, PM Entertainment had success within the kickboxing and martial arts genre and championed Cynthia Rothrock and Don "The Dragon" Wilson in multiple film projects.

In 1996, PM Entertainment diversified into television production with the TV series L.A. Heat, which is largely unrelated to their earlier film, L.A. Heat as neither Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs nor his character, Det. Jon Chance, appear in the show. Instead, it focuses on Chester "Chase" McDonald (Wolf Larson) and Detective August Brooks (Steven Williams), two Los Angeles police detectives investigating robbery/homicides. The series aired on TNT for two seasons beginning on March 15, 1999. Following the success of L.A. Heat, PM developed a second TV series, Hollywood Safari, which acted as a continuation of their 1997 film of the same name with Ted Jan Roberts reprising his role as Josh Johnson and was joined by Sam J. Jones playing his father, Troy. The show ran for one season before its cancellation.

In 1997, PM Entertainment decided that they wanted to double its own facilities on Sun Valley, in order to move to a nearly 15-acre site.^[9]

The Harvey Entertainment Company (2000–2002)

PM Entertainment's business model changed in the late '90s to accommodate distributors' requirement that films hire bankable names for projects, and they began making films such as Inferno with Jean-Claude van Damme which greatly affected their profit margin. Joseph Merhi and Richard Pepin sold the company to The Harvey Entertainment Company in early 2000 $6.5 million in cash and a further $1.45 million in stock.^[10] George Shamieh remained as head of the company under the new owners.^[11] The company continued to produce star vehicles such as Layover with David Hasselhoff and Camouflage with Leslie Nielsen, but Shamieh departed the company in late 2000 due to financial restructuring of The Harvey Entertainment Company.^[12]

CineTel Films was brought in to market the library of PM Entertainment and sell rights for upcoming productions Con Express and Lost Treasure with Stephen Baldwin.^[12] These would be the last films produced under the PM Entertainment banner. Facing liquidation, in 2001, The Harvey Entertainment Company sold off its assets, excluding PM Entertainment, to Classic Media, although PM Entertainment remained in the hands of Harvey chief Roger Burlage,^[13] which later placed the company up for sale,^[14] and two years later, the company sold PM Entertainment and its library of over 150 films and 2 TV series to Echo Bridge Entertainment, who also acquired the assets of CineTel Films.^[15] In 2021, as part of Echo Bridge's folding into SP Distribution, PM Entertainment Group's library was sold to FilmRise, which 4 years later would be acquired by Lionsgate Studios, which now owns the rights to the PM Entertainment Group catalog, however Minerva Pictures still handles international distribution rights to the catalog such as Pure Danger and Running Red.