Jack Barry's Death and The Formation of Kline and Friends
Jack Barry died in May 1984, not too long after completing production of the 1983-84 season of Joker. Upon his death, Dan Enright immediately succeeded his longtime producing partner. Not long after, Kline and some B&E staff members left and formed Kline and Friends.
With Kline running his own company, Break the Bank (completely unrelated to the earlier game) premiered in the Fall of 1985, with Gene Rayburn as host. By year's end, Rayburn was let go and replaced by Joe Farago.
After that show ended, he teamed up with Bert Convy, Burt Reynolds, and Buena Vista Television to produce Win, Lose or Draw beginning in 1987. This series had concurrent runs on both NBC and in syndication, with Vicki Lawrence hosting the network version and Convy hosting the syndicated series. Win, Lose or Draw ended its run in 1989 on NBC and in 1990 in syndication. Convy left the syndicated series at the beginning of its final season to preside over another co-production with Kline, 3rd Degree, and Robb Weller took over for him at Win, Lose or Draw.
In 1990, Kline, along with Jack Barry's two sons Jon C. Barry and Douglas C. Barry, put together another revival of The Joker's Wild, which was hosted by future Shop 'til You Drop and The Big Spin star and future infomercial producer, Pat Finn.
In 1994, just a couple of years after Enright's death, Kline also produced and directed the short-lived kids game show, Masters of the Maze, hosted by game show veteran, future reality show host and producer, J. D. Roth, before ex-teen actor Mario Lopez hosted the following season. The show was based on TimeBomb, but he quickly changed it.
In the late 1990s, Kline produced a television version of the board game Pictionary, hosted by Alan Thicke, which used a nearly identical format to that of Win, Lose or Draw a decade earlier. This was one of Kline and Friends' most recent game shows to have been produced.
Read more about this topic: Richard S. Kline
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