After Tonight

The film 'After Tonight', starring Constance Bennett and Gilbert Roland, was released in the United States in 1933. Under the Copyright Act of 1909, works published in the US before 1964 required a renewal of copyright with the US Copyright Office during the 28th year of the first term to extend protection for a second term. If no renewal was filed, the work entered the public domain. A search of the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database and the Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE) reveals no renewal registration for this title. While the film was originally registered by RKO Radio Pictures, Inc. on October 26, 1933 (Registration LP4241), the studio or its successors (such as General Tire or United Artists, who acquired various RKO interests) failed to file a renewal in 1960 or 1961. This lapse is documented in Hurst and Baer's 'Film Superlist: Motion Pictures in the U.S. Public Domain 1894-1939', which lists the film as having a non-renewed copyright. Consequently, the film fell into the public domain in the United States at the end of its first 28-year term.