Our long national nightmare (Big Corporations Arguing About Beloved Game Shows Edition) is now finally over, as THR reports that Sony and CBS have settled their year-long squabbles over the fates of Wheel Of Fortune and Jeopardy!. In language that wouldn’t feel out of place in a “conscious decoupling” post from a dissolving celebrity couple, the two companies stated that they’ve reached an “amicable resolution” over the fight, with Sony to slowly take over distribution for both shows.
As fans of game show behind-the-scenes minutiae know, the fight over the two shows grew out of their partially bifurcated ownership: Both series are actually produced and owned by Sony Pictures Television, but long-standing agreements meant that their distribution and syndication rights were owned by CBS. This got fractious in recent years, as Sony started to feel that CBS and parent company Paramount weren’t doing everything they could to promote the shows, while also cutting deals that Sony didn’t like for international distribution of the series. That led Sony to accuse its “partners” of breaching the contract, and basically try to take control of Jeopardy! and Wheel Of Fortune‘s distribution duties—and profits—for itself, leading the two entertainment giants to start swapping a bunch of increasingly threatening legal paper as the months progressed.
Now, though, it’s apparently been resolved, with the two corporations releasing a joint statement today saying “We look forward to working together to continue bringing these beloved shows to audiences and stations around the world.” That includes an agreement in which Sony will steadily take on most of the back-end duties for both shows over the next three years, including a slow hand-off of distribution, marketing, syndication, and cross-promotion management. CBS, meanwhile, will solidify its hold over the shows’ ad sales, handling that side of the business through 2030.
The upshot of this for us, meanwhile, is pretty simple, and pretty much good news: Neither Jeopardy! or Wheel Of Fortune will be facing any business-based interruptions—at least, from these specific arguments—in the near future.
