TV & VIDEO - Dec. 29, 1987

The French have taken “Wheel of Fortune” and spun it into a hit game show just as popular in Paris as it is in Peoria. USA Today reported Monday that the show, known as “Rou de la fortune,” started slowly after its debut on French TV network TF-1 on Jan. 12, 1987. But after installing Christian Morin as a Pat Sajak-style host and Annie Pujol as the Gallicized Vanna White, the show now has more than 15 million viewers nightly, according to the newspaper. The show’s executive producer, Marc Guarnaud, thinks the show works in France “because it is so simple. Most French game shows are difficult, very complicated.”