Film and TV distribution for Cleveland filmmakers. Mann Robinson Distribution licenses finished indie titles to platforms including Tubi. You keep ownership.
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Mann Robinson Distribution handles film and television distribution for filmmakers in Cleveland, licensing finished independent titles to major streaming platforms and networks, including Tubi. It is an independent film and television distribution company headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, with presence in Detroit and Los Angeles, and it works with filmmakers across Cleveland and Northeast Ohio.
The working relationship is straightforward. The filmmaker keeps ownership of the film. Mann Robinson Distribution licenses distribution rights for a two year term that renews yearly, delivers the title to platforms, and reports what the film earns through a portal login. Finished films can be submitted at mannrobinsondistribution.com/submit, and questions go to distribution@mannrobinsonstudios.com.
Cleveland has an established independent film scene: a festival running since 1977, a state production incentive, a standalone film school and a trained local crew base. The Cleveland International Film Festival began at the Cedar Lee Theatre in Cleveland Heights and is now centered on Playhouse Square. It is Academy Award qualifying in all three short film categories, animated, live action and documentary. The fiftieth edition ran April 9 to 18, 2026 and programmed 326 films from 57 countries, with screenings split between Playhouse Square and the Cedar Lee Theatre.
The city supports more than one kind of independent film. The Greater Cleveland Urban Film Festival, founded in 2012 and held each September, platforms urban storytelling and filmmakers from the African Diaspora, and the 2026 edition runs September 17 to 25. The Chagrin Documentary Film Festival takes place each October in and around Chagrin Falls, with the seventeenth annual edition running October 6 to 11, 2026. Between them, a Cleveland filmmaker has a local festival path for a narrative feature, a short or a documentary.
The production infrastructure behind that is real. The Greater Cleveland Film Commission is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, and more than 300 productions have filmed in the region, tied to the Ohio Motion Picture Tax Incentive created in 2009. The Cleveland State University School of Film and Media Arts, Ohio's first standalone film school, opened in 2018 inside the Idea Center at Playhouse Square. The Tri-C Film Academy at Cuyahoga Community College runs a six week Film Crew Intensive Training course developed with the Greater Cleveland Film Commission and members of IATSE Local 209.
Studio productions have worked in the region as well. Cherry, directed by Cleveland natives Anthony and Joe Russo, shot around Cleveland including Gordon Square and Little Italy. Judas and the Black Messiah filmed largely in Cleveland, with Slavic Village dressed as 1960s Chicago. Noah Baumbach shot White Noise for Netflix in the Cleveland area. The location range is part of the appeal: Lake Erie, flat farmland west of the city, Appalachian foothills roughly an hour east, and architecture spanning the 1800s to the present, all within a short drive.
Cleveland is a strong place to make a film and a strong place to premiere one. The step after the festival run is distribution, carrying a locked cut to a national streaming audience, and that is the work Mann Robinson Distribution does.
Mann Robinson Distribution licenses finished independent projects to streaming platforms and networks, then reports the earnings back to the filmmaker. In practice that means:
The terms are stated up front.
A Cleveland filmmaker holding a completed feature can weigh those five points before making contact.
Typically about 90 days from upload to go live. It is worth planning around that window. A film uploaded coming out of a spring festival run in Cleveland would typically go live in the summer.
The term is two years and then renews yearly, so a filmmaker should be comfortable committing the title on that basis before signing.
Payment is quarterly by ACH, about 90 days after each quarter closes, and on ad supported platforms earnings are impressions multiplied by CPM, not per view. That distinction matters when you are forecasting. Impressions count the ad views a title generates. CPM is the rate paid per thousand of those impressions. Multiplied together, the two produce the gross the film earned, and the 20 percent distribution fee comes off that gross.
Every filmmaker gets a portal login. The portal shows impressions, CPM and earnings broken out per platform, alongside statements and payment history, so a filmmaker in Cleveland can see how a title is performing between quarterly payments.
Have the film genuinely finished and the paperwork in order before you make contact. General preparation:
Coming off a festival run is a sensible moment to make contact. The cut is locked, the artwork exists, and the credits are already assembled for the program listing.
No. Mann Robinson Distribution is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, with presence in Detroit and Los Angeles, and works with filmmakers in Cleveland remotely. Submissions come through the website.
No. The filmmaker keeps ownership. Mann Robinson Distribution licenses distribution rights only, for a two year term that renews yearly.
Features, documentaries, shorts, vertical microdramas, and series and TV shows, including sitcoms and reality series.
Quarterly, by ACH, about 90 days after each quarter closes. For example, a film that goes live in the first quarter is first paid in the first week of July. Statements and payment history sit in the portal, along with impressions, CPM and earnings for each platform.
No. The credit is a production side incentive administered by the Ohio Department of Development: a 30 percent refundable credit on eligible in state spending, with a minimum spend of $300,000 and a $50 million annual allocation, and applications accepted year round. It applies to what you spend making the film in Ohio, not to how the finished film is distributed.
Through the same page, at mannrobinsondistribution.com/submit. What matters at submission is that the film is finished and the rights position is clear, so bring the details of anything you have already signed or committed elsewhere.
Use the online form to submit your film. Every submission goes through that form.
We deliver films and series to networks including Netflix, HBO Max, Apple TV, Amazon, Peacock, Tubi, BET, Roku, YouTube and TIVI, and microdramas to Urban Operas, ReelShort, Mansa and DramaBox. You keep 100 percent ownership, and you see your numbers every day in your Backlot.
Submit your film