A 25-year veteran of the media and entertainment industry, Reinout Oerlemans is chairman and chief creative officer of 3BMG (3 Ball Media Group). The domestic and international content and production enterprise incubates, fosters and supports the growth and vision of both well-established and emerging producers, and encompasses iconic unscripted content studio 3 Ball Productions, as well as a series of high-profile, joint ventures that include Jeff Jenkins Productions, Parabolic Content, Lost Arts Pictures and Superluna Studios. Current hit series across the 3BMG group include Netflix sensations Bling Empire, My Unorthodox Life and Coming Out Colton; CBS’s new competition format Come Dance with Me with LL Cool J and Chris O’Donnell; Paramount Network’s long-running Bar Rescue; Facebook Watch’s Unfiltered: Paris Jackson; Guardians of the Glades for Discovery; and many others in various stages of production and development across the group. The company also houses 3BMG International, which focuses on original format creation and acquisition, international sales, distribution and local co-production across Europe – including the new straight-to-series format Tiny House Battle from Lost Arts Pictures, for RTL Nederland.
Prior to becoming one of the industry’s most successful producers of global film and TV content, Oerlemans launched his career in front of the camera. In 1989, while studying law at the University of Amsterdam, he was cast as a lead in the first Dutch daytime drama (“Goede Tijden, Slechte Tijden”); he went on to host such hit entertainment programs as American Idol in Holland and his own talk show, PULSE, for network RTL. In 2001, he founded his own production company, Eyeworks, together with Robert van den Bogaard and Ronald van Wechem, which grew to encompass 16 companies across continental Europe, Scandinavia, South America, New Zealand, Australia and the US. Oerlemans’ original formats include Test The Nation, broadcast in more than 50 territories; Who Wants to Marry My Son; Flikken Maastricht (Cops); and Celebrity Splash for ITV. His feature films include The Happy Housewife, New Kids Turbo, and Jackie, featuring Oscar winner Holly Hunter. In 2009, he made his feature directing debut with Stricken, the highest-grossing Dutch movie of the decade, and in 2011 brought Dutch cinema its first movie in 3D: Nova Zembla, also a box office success.
In February 2014, Oerlemans sold the Eyeworks group to Warner Bros. Television Group. The acquisition encompassed all Eyeworks territories outside the United States, with Oerlemans then becoming chairman of Eyeworks USA. In January 2015, he rebranded that company 3 Ball Entertainment (now 3 Ball Productions) and served as its chairman, before launching 3BMG with CEO Ross Weintraub.