FremantleMedia

FremantleMedia Group is a British international television content and production/distribution subsidiary of Bertelsmann's RTL Group, Europe's largest TV, radio, and production company. Its world headquarters are located in London.

The company acquired various British, Australian, and American production companies including Talkback, Thames Television (the last two later merged as Talkback Thames), Reg Grundy Organisation, Crackerjack Productions (now merged to become FremantleMedia Australia), the Carruthers Company, and Goodson-Todman Productions (later Mark Goodson Productions, now FremantleMedia North America). Early on, it merged with Germany's largest television production company, UFA.

Production and rights holdings

The company holds the rights to shows such as Let's Make a Deal, Family Feud and Press Your Luck. Fremantle also produced Temptation and an interactive gameshow Quizmania for ITV Play.

In addition, they also own (along with Columbia Pictures) the rights to most of the post 1948 Bob Hope film catalog that includes The Seven Little Foys, The Lemon Drop Kid, and Son of Paleface. They were also the distributors of the television series Baywatch.

Mark Goodson

Mark Goodson (January 14, 1915 – December 18, 1992) was an American television producer who specialized in game shows.

Early life and early career

Mark Goodson was born in Sacramento, California on January 14, 1915. His parents, Abraham Ellis and Fannie Goodson, emigrated from Russia in the early 1900s. As a child, Goodson acted in amateur theater with the Plaza Stock Company. The family later moved to Hayward, California. Originally intending to become a lawyer, Goodson attended the University of California, Berkeley. He financed his education through scholarships and by working at the Lincoln Fish Market. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1937 with a degree in Economics.

That year, he began his broadcasting career in San Francisco, working as a disc jockey at radio station KJBS (now known as KFAX). In 1939 he joined radio station KFRC, where he produced and hosted a radio quiz called "Pop the Question" in which contestants selected questions by throwing darts at multi-colored balloons.

Bill Todman

William S. "Bill" Todman (July 31, 1916 – July 29, 1979) was an American television producer born in New York City. He produced many of television's longest running shows with business partner Mark Goodson.

Early life

Bill Todman was the son of a Wall Street accountant, Frederick S. Todman, CPA, whose accounting firm was known as Frederick S. Todman & Co. and for many years was located at 111 Broadway, downtown Manhattan. The firm represented some of the United States biggest companies, including The New York Stock Exchange, American Stock Exchange, Polaroid, Eastman Kodak, Chase Manhattan Bank among many others. Frederick S. Todman lectured in post WWII Japan as part of that country's economic reconstruction and wrote several quintesseential books on Wall Street Accounting. Bill Todman's brother, Howard, was Vice President and Treasurer for Goodson-Todman Productions.

Game shows

Todman teamed up with Mark Goodson for radio shows. According to radio historian J. David Goldin, among their early work together was the show Treasury Salute, a program syndicated by the Treasury Department which honored military members. They later collaborated in producing game shows for radio, then moved into television, where they produced some of the longest-running game shows in history. Their many shows included Beat the Clock, Card Sharks, Family Feud, Match Game, Password, Tattletales, The Price Is Right, To Tell the Truth and What's My Line?.