UPDATE, 4/3/26 at 7:31 a.m. ET: Longtime The Price Is Right producer Roger Dobkowitz denied recent claims against the game show’s late host Bob Barker.
Dobkowitz explained in a recent Facebook statement that he initially “avoided commenting” on E!’s Dirty Rotten Scandals docuseries. He has since decided to speak out in a lengthy social media post.
“Since this program doesn’t seem to have received much traction anyway (probably since the purported incident took place 30 years ago on a daytime game show and, consequently, fewer people care or remember it), I feel it is OK for me to reveal my thoughts and, most importantly, defend the dignity and integrity of our great show,” he wrote. “This so-called ‘expose’ makes me realize that there are some people in this world who will happily exaggerate and create falsehoods in order to justify a personal hateful vendetta against a person in order to draw attention to themselves.”
Dobkowitz added, “Making the situation worse is the fact that the accused is deceased and therefore, making it impossible for the accused to defend himself. The adjective ‘brave’ should never be used in reference to a person attacking a dead person.”
The producer shared his plans to write a book and share “36 years of observations with Bob, the models, and the staff” as a way to “clear up lots of misconceptions and dismiss many wrongful accusations.”
Dobkowitz said The Price Is Right set was “a happy place” and a “working environment [that] was the envy of other shows.”
“Staff rarely quit … the dozens of women who were in our repertoire of models came back year after year, happy to be on our show,” he concluded. “The only unhappy people, as would be found in any company, were the ones that didn’t get the raise they wanted, the ones that didn’t get the promotion they thought they deserved, and the ones that were terminated for not doing their job.”
Original story below:
The late Bob Barker’s rep is denying recent allegations of harassment on The Price Is Right set.
“Barker was and is beloved, and people to this day love him,” Barker’s longtime rep Roger Neal told USA Today in a statement on Wednesday, March 18. “He was part of the fabric of American pop culture. He was the greatest MC in TV history. I was honored to have represented him.”
Barker, who died at age 99 in August 2023, was the Price Is Right host from 1972 to 2007.
A clip from E!’s Dirty Rotten Scandals docuseries released by People on Tuesday, March 17, showed two of “Barker’s Beauties,” Kathleen Bradley and Holly Hallstrom, alleging that there were several inappropriate instances with men who worked on the show during the Barker era.
“Over a course of time, I kind of noticed the guys were kind of talking, looking, gawking at the girls,” Bradley, now 75, said. “I found out this is a little more commonplace than I thought.”
Bob Barker was a household name in the entertainment industry among generations. Decades before becoming a beloved game show host, Barker was born in Washington. After spending his formative years in South Dakota and Missouri, he and late wife Dorothy Jo Gideon moved to Florida after college graduation, where he began his career in entertainment […]
She claimed that one of the men “would rub up against us, joking around.” Bradley added, “I learned the stagehand had been around on the set for a long time and was probably doing it to all the other girls.”
Bradley stated it was “totally inappropriate,” so she allegedly reported it to producers. “To my surprise, no action was taken. I was really taken aback,” she recalled. “This was really sexual harassment.”
At one point she “accidentally on purpose” hit one man in the groin when he attempted to show her how to play golf.
“We were so exhausted and tired of the treatment,” Bradley said. “You just have to do what you have to do.”
Hallstrom, now 73, brought up Barker by name.
“If anyone had gone to Bob because Bob was in charge of the show and said, ‘I have a problem, I have a complaint,’ he would have told her to get over it or look for a new job,” she alleged.
After several complaints, CBS implemented a rule regarding The Price Is Right models.
There was apparently a “10-second rule,” in which no one could “openly stare at a model for more than 10 seconds,” the clip alleged.
“There was no one monitoring how long the guys were staring at the models. It was a joke. It was an appeasement,” Hallstrom claimed. “They did things that made it look like they were taking action so you will stop complaining and go away.”
