The manufacturing firm behind Have I Acquired Information For You has bounced again into the black after launching the hit panel present within the US for the primary time.
Hat Trick, which additionally makes Mastermind, Derry Ladies and Whose Line is it Anyway?, reported pre-tax income of virtually £857,000 final yr. In 2023, the corporate reported a pre-tax lack of £377,000.
Nonetheless, turnover on the firm, the maker of hits together with Father Ted, Set off Level and Outnumbered, fell nearly 28% from £48.4m to £35m yr on yr.
The return to revenue got here as Hat Trick efficiently debuted a 10-episode sequence of Have I Acquired Information for You within the US on CNN within the run-up to final November’s US presidential election, with an extra 20 episodes operating this yr.
Hat Trick Productions produced the sitcom Father Ted. {Photograph}: Ronald Grant
The variety of sequence produced, a key measure of the corporate’s efficiency, rose from seven to 10 final yr.
In complete, the London-based firm paid out an interim dividend of £1m, down on the £4.7m in 2023.
Of this, £900,000 was paid to Jimmy Mulville and his spouse, Karen, who acquired a £4.2m payout in 2023, whereas the chair, Patrick McKenna, acquired £100,000.
Hat Trick was based in 1986 by Mulville – an aspiring standup turned TV govt – and his ex-wife, Denise O’Donoghue, who collectively created comedy reveals together with Drop the Useless Donkey and Room 101 earlier than her departure from the corporate in 2005.
Earlier this yr Mulville spoke about his try and “purchase out” Graham Linehan from a deliberate Father Ted musical. Mulville mentioned Linehan, the co-creator of the hit sequence that ran between 1995 and 1998, refused to grant Hat Trick permission to make it even when he “drops useless”.
In gentle of Linehan’s activism and outspoken views on transgender points, Mulville mentioned he steered to him the controversy could be a hindrance to getting the Father Ted musical into theatres.
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“The ebook and the songs have been written, and we have been able to go however that’s when all of it turned very bitter,” he advised the Insiders: The TV Podcast, which he co-hosts with the TV govt Peter Fincham. “I had a dialog with Graham wherein I mentioned: ‘Look, this present isn’t going to get made along with your title on it, there’s no respected theatre that can make it.’
“Issues went from unhealthy to worse … he even mentioned that if he drops useless it’s in his will that we are able to’t do the musical.”
Linehan has beforehand mentioned he was “ready to minimise my involvement, simply coming alongside to the odd rehearsal to see the way it was going. ‘No,’ I used to be advised; they needed a clear break.” He in the end rejected a proposed deal, which he described as an “insult”.
Final month Linehan appeared in court docket to face expenses of felony injury and harassing a young person, which he denies.
