A list of Britain's 100 richest media moguls published today by Broadcast Magazine showed that canny celebrities have converted their creativity into multimillion pound empires.
Rowan Atkinson is worth £60m sterling thanks to his take from the worldwide box office success of 'Mr Bean', the bumbling comic he created.
Heading the list with a £185m sterling fortune is Sir Peter Michael, the 62-year-old chairman of the radio station Classic FM who once said: 'I still haven't made up my mind what I am going to do when I grow up.'
One brilliant idea can create amaire overnight, and many entertainers showed they were canny boardroom operators too.
Top woman at number three in the list is Anne Wood. She built her £130m sterling fortune from 'The Teletubbies,' the BBC children's programme that has become an international hit.
Paul Smith, the man behind the worldwide success of the quiz show 'Who Wants To Be Amaire?', is just that -- he is worth £108m sterling and at number five in the rankings.
Noel Edmonds quit the BBC after ratings for his show 'Noel's House Party' plummeted.
He may not have been on television for two years but his business empire -- covering everything from video-conferencing to aviation, is now valued at £70m sterling.
Comedian Jasper Carrott, interviewer David Frost and former singer Bob Geldof were other celebrities with multimillion-pound bank balances.
Katy Elliott of Broadcast Magazine said: 'This year's rankings are a fair reflection of the fact that all commercial TV and radio programmes are suffering because of the crash in advertising spend.
'But it shows there is still huge money to be made in making TV programmes - over 80% of the top 100 have built their fortunes on the back of TV productions.'
The list, compiled by Philip Beresford and Dominic Prince, showed that the moguls' combined wealth had fallen by £200m sterling to £2.3bn sterling this year.
The oldest multimillionaire was 74-year-old local newspaper and radio mogul Ray Tindle. The list contained just 14 women.
