have the same title for the new CPT. Other executives retained by CPE were Arnold Mesnser, who was previously president of Tri-Star Telecommunications, who took over the responsibilities of Rush and Seale will have still have an unspecified corporate operation at CPE's headquarters for the New York area, allowing Herman Rush and Peter Seale had plans to set up a new syndicated company to handle the former CCT product. On February 2, 1988, Barry Thurston; vice-president of Columbia/Embassy Television, became president of Columbia Pictures Television Distribution. On December 26, 1988, writer Pamela Pettler signed a deal with the studio. On February 2, 1989, Columbia Pictures Television formed a joint-venture with Norman Lear's Act III Communications called Act III Television to produce television series instead of managing. The Sony years to the end (1989–2001) On November 8, 1989, Sony bought Columbia Pictures Entertainment for $3.4 billion and the next day, Sony acquired The Guber-Peters Entertainment Company (formerly game show production company Barris Industries with the library of game shows including The Newlywed Game, The Dating Game, and The Gong Show) for $200 million after hiring film producers Peter Guber and Jon Peters to run the company. On November 5, 1990, CPE folded its first-run syndication unit Guber-Peters Television into Columbia Pictures Television Distribution. On August 7, 1991, CPE changed its name to Sony Pictures Entertainment and TriStar Television was relaunched on October 10. Throughout the 1990s, the studio launched such successful shows as Beakman's World on TLC and CBS in 1992, Mad About You on NBC in 1992, Ricki Lake in syndication which lasted 11 years, The Nanny on CBS in 1993, Party of Five on Fox, NewsRadio on NBC, Malcolm & Eddie on UPN in 1996, and the short-lived cult following animated series The Critic on ABC and Fox in 1994. One of the most successful by far was Seinfeld, a Castle Rock Entertainment production which Columbia distributed in off-net syndication years later. On August 21, 1992, Columbia's subsidiary CAT Holdings, Inc. (Columbia Act III Television) and Franklin/Waterman Entertainment created a joint venture called Franklin/Waterman 2. On December 7, 1992, Sony Pictures acquired the Barry & Enright Productions game show library. In 1992, CPT has the potential by possibly going off-net syndication rights to a company backed by a joint venture between RHI Entertainment and Trilogy Entertainment Group. Later that year, director Jonathan Lynn had signed a deal with the