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Organisations, Production companies, HiT Entertainment, Mattel Creations

HiT Entertainment

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HiT Entertainment was the owner and production company of Thomas & Friends from the eighth to the twentieth series. They also helped to finish the seventh series.

HiT was originally formed as Henson International Television (hit!) in 1983 as a branch of the Jim Henson Company in order to coordinate the co-production of Fraggle Rock in London, England, United Kingdom. This subsidiary was later sold and retains none of the original Henson company architecture except for the name. It later rebranded itself as "HiT Entertainment".

They acquired Gullane Entertainment in 2002. Then, Gullane was purchased and went defunct in 2003. After Hit purchased Gullane, it produced their own series of Thomas episodes and merchandise. HiT acquired the television rights for Thomas & Friends in 2002, during the airing of the sixth series and the filming of the seventh.

On 1 February 2012, it was announced that Mattel purchased HiT Entertainment from Apax Partners for $680 million (US). Other bidders included Viacom, Disney, Chorion, Hasbro, Saban Brands, and Tomy.

In May 2017, HiT Entertainment merged with Mattel Playground Productions, forming Mattel Creations. As of mid-2018, Mattel no longer uses the HiT Entertainment brand name for shows and their website redirects to Mattel's website. 9 Story Media Group took over HiT Entertainment's role of their distribution for Barney & Friends, Angelina Ballerina and its spin-off series, Angelina Ballerina: The Next Steps, while WildBrain took over HiT Entertainment's role of their distribution for Bob the Builder and Fireman Sam. Mattel Creations took over the role for the other DVDs as well. HiT Entertainment still, however, exists as a copyright holder for shows and merchandise only. As of 2019, Mattel changed the name of Mattel Creations to Mattel Television.

Staff

Jocelyn Stevenson, Lenora Hume, Christopher Skala, Karen Barnes, Marion Edwards, Michael Carrington, Christopher Keenan, and Edward Catchpole acted as executive producers.

Ian McCue produced the series for HiT from the sixteenth to twentieth series. He also worked as a line producer for the fifteenth series.

Sharon Miller and Jo Jordan served as creative producers. The latter also served as a post-production producer for Hero of the Rails, while the former worked as script editor of the ninth, tenth and eleventh series.

Denise Green served as line producer for Hero of the Rails, Misty Island Rescue, the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth series. Micaela Winter also served as line producer for The Great Race, Bubbling Boilers and the twentieth series.

Claire Waxler and Sam Barlow served as supervising producers.

Karen Davidsen served as head/director of production from the nineteenth and twentieth series, Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure and The Great Race.

Karen Davies is the director of content services.

Releases

UK VHS and DVD Releases

HiT Favourites DVD Releases

AUS VHS and DVD Releases

US VHS and DVD Releases

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