Author Topic: Monty Hall says... (Read 12852 times)

Jimmy Owen · « **Reply #60 on:** March 11, 2009, 06:57:40 PM »

How about the games that debuted in 74? My must-sees were "Jackpot," "Celeb. Sweepstakes," "Big Showdown," and "Money Maze." Enjoyed "Tattletales," "Dealer's Choice," "High Rollers" "Now You See It" "Name That Tune" and (because of Bill Cullen) "Winning Streak."

Gosh, I guess I liked all the games that premiered in 74.

That Don Guy · « **Reply #61 on:** March 11, 2009, 09:28:42 PM »

[quote name=\'calliaume\' post=\'210129\' date=\'Mar 11 2009, 03:50 PM\']Seriously, anyone who's seen Give 'n' Take or Magnificent Marble Machine once can rest assured: it didn't get any better.[/quote]
What was that bad about Give-N-Take? As for MMM, "it didn't get any better" doesn't begin to describe what happened to that show.

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' post=\'210130\' date=\'Mar 11 2009, 03:57 PM\']
How about the games that debuted in 74? My must-sees were "Jackpot," "Celeb. Sweepstakes," "Big Showdown," and "Money Maze." Enjoyed "Tattletales," "Dealer's Choice," "High Rollers" "Now You See It" "Name That Tune" and (because of Bill Cullen) "Winning Streak."

Gosh, I guess I liked all the games that premiered in 74.
[/quote]
+1
Not a clinker in the bunch on that list. In fact, the closest to "bad" shows among the 1974 premieres (going by the list in EoTVGS) was the Jeopardy! redo (how could they get rid of Final Jeopardy?) and Masquerade Party (although to be honest, I've only seen clips of this).

-- Don

DoorNumberFour · « **Reply #62 on:** March 12, 2009, 10:46:18 AM »

[quote name=\'That Don Guy\' post=\'210146\' date=\'Mar 11 2009, 09:28 PM\']
...the closest to "bad" shows among the 1974 premieres (going by the list in EoTVGS) was the Jeopardy! redo (how could they get rid of Final Jeopardy?)
[/quote]
Did they eliminate Final Jeopardy in '74? I thought the winner after Final J picked from the Jackpot Board.

Matt Ottinger · « **Reply #63 on:** March 12, 2009, 10:55:53 AM »

[quote name=\'DoorNumberFour\' post=\'210179\' date=\'Mar 12 2009, 09:46 AM\']Did they eliminate Final Jeopardy in '74? I thought the winner after Final J picked from the Jackpot Board.[/quote]
Yeah, the "bad" Jeopardy redo was the '78 version.

As for Masquerade Party, I've seen one episode of the 74 version and it's not bad if you like that sort of lightweight celebrity froth.

whewfan · « **Reply #64 on:** March 12, 2009, 12:59:45 PM »

[quote name='That Don Guy' date='Mar 11 2009, 09:28 PM' post='210146']
[quote name='calliaume' post='210129' date='Mar 11 2009, 03:50 PM']Seriously, anyone who's seen Give 'n' Take or Magnificent Marble Machine once can rest assured: it didn't get any better.[/quote]
What was that bad about Give-N-Take? As for MMM, "it didn't get any better" doesn't begin to describe what happened to that show.

Based on what I've seen of both shows...

Give n Take didn't seem to have much to it. The game was basically, prize plug, toss up question, the player that answers right controls the plunger to start the arrow, and whomever the arrow lands on decides whether to keep the prize or pass it to another player, hoping to get that player over the $5000 limit. It was basically "wash, rinse, repeat". For me, the prize plugs really slowed down the game. The toss ups were really pointless, because all they did was give a player control of the arrow. The premise is a variation of Say When. The only difference was, with Say When, you always knew your running total, and there was really no "luck" involved, providing you might have some idea of the prices of the prizes. Also, there was a $2100 limit on Say When.

Magnificent Marble Machine, I think, suffered from too many format changes with the pinball round. Those changes might've confused the regular viewer. The qualifying round was nothing revolutionary. Basically, you were told the number of letters in an answer, then Art reads a clue that scrolls across the screen. Some of the clues were clever. In the episode I have, Art keeps having to remind the celebs that they cannot help the contestants. I suppose MMM didn't last because I would imagine after maybe a couple weeks, the novelty of watching people play pinball wears off. I remember when Art James called us at GSC8, we talked about MMM and he quipped "Anyone want to buy a used 50 foot pinball machine?"

Neumms · « **Reply #65 on:** March 12, 2009, 01:24:13 PM »

[quote name=\'whewfan\' post=\'210190\' date=\'Mar 12 2009, 11:59 AM\']
Magnificent Marble Machine, I think, suffered from too many format changes with the pinball round. Those changes might've confused the regular viewer.
[/quote]

That's when he started watching "The Young and the Restless" instead.

BillCullen1 · « **Reply #66 on:** March 12, 2009, 02:43:49 PM »

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' post=\'210130\' date=\'Mar 11 2009, 06:57 PM\']
How about the games that debuted in 74? My must-sees were "Jackpot," "Celeb. Sweepstakes," "Big Showdown," and "Money Maze." Enjoyed "Tattletales," "Dealer's Choice," "High Rollers" "Now You See It" "Name That Tune" and (because of Bill Cullen) "Winning Streak."

Gosh, I guess I liked all the games that premiered in 74.
[/quote]

The problem with Winning Streak was that it had a new format every week. I wasn't there, but I was told by someone who attended tapings a lot in those days, that one day, they changed the format one time too many, and Bill Cullen said "Stop the tape, I don't understand the rules." This was BILL CULLEN, not John Davidson or Mike Darrow. Bob Stewart had a tendency to tinker with his shows once they made it on the air. Winning Streak may have lasted longer if they had just picked a format and stayed with it.

Ian Wallis · « **Reply #67 on:** March 12, 2009, 03:24:04 PM »

Quote

How about the games that debuted in 74? My must-sees were "Jackpot," "Celeb. Sweepstakes," "Big Showdown," and "Money Maze." Enjoyed "Tattletales," "Dealer's Choice," "High Rollers" "Now You See It" "Name That Tune" and (because of Bill Cullen) "Winning Streak."

Gosh, I guess I liked all the games that premiered in 74.

So did I. I guess '74 had a better track record than '75, didn't it? I liked all the ones that were mentioned, but for me, a few of my all-time favorites premiered that year: Celebrity Sweepstakes, Dealer's Choice, Tattletales and High Rollers.

I think what's so memorable about the '70s is that new formats were tried. By the time the '80s rolled around, most of the shows were just remakes of earlier ones - Hollywood Squares, Newlywed Game, Password, Card Sharks, etc. You rarely saw the crazy new formats you did in the '70s.

BillCullen1 · « **Reply #68 on:** March 12, 2009, 03:34:57 PM »

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'210181\' date=\'Mar 12 2009, 10:55 AM\']
[quote name=\'DoorNumberFour\' post=\'210179\' date=\'Mar 12 2009, 09:46 AM\']Did they eliminate Final Jeopardy in '74? I thought the winner after Final J picked from the Jackpot Board.[/quote]
Yeah, the "bad" Jeopardy redo was the '78 version. [/quote]

I agree (X gets the square). The joke at the time was that the '78 Jeopardy didn't work because Don Pardo wasn't the announcer. That was the LEAST of the show's problems. The elimination of a contestant after Round One and a totally different end game were too much for most viewers to deal with. Merv learned that hard way not to fix something that wasn't really broken. I also heard Art Fleming wasn't thrilled with California.

chris319 · « **Reply #69 on:** March 12, 2009, 06:05:39 PM »

Quote

I think what's so memorable about the '70s is that new formats were tried. By the time the '80s rolled around, most of the shows were just remakes of earlier ones - Hollywood Squares, Newlywed Game, Password, Card Sharks, etc. You rarely saw the crazy new formats you did in the '70s.

How I miss the days when I could literally walk into Ira Skutch's office with an idea and if it was any good it would be developed in-house. If the networks liked it, it would get piloted and hopefully go to series. That's basically how Steve Ryan got Blockbusters on the air. In those days innovation, novelty and original ideas were encouraged and pretty much de rigueur but were damn hard to come by. Damn hard. An idea merely consisting of quiz questions, answers and points was likely to be rejected, either for being "too much like" a past show or for not having an innovative element as Blockbusters did. I always give props to Jay Wolpert for at least trying to innovate. Unfortunately I didn't start having even halfway viable ideas until after I left the company.

I cite Bamboozle as a, um "derivative" of TTTT, Hot Potato as a "derivative" of Family Feud, and Power of 10 as Card Sharks meets Grand Game (I use the term "derivative" as a euphemism").

clemon79 · « **Reply #70 on:** March 12, 2009, 06:21:54 PM »

[quote name=\'chris319\' post=\'210221\' date=\'Mar 12 2009, 03:05 PM\']
That's basically how Steve Ryan got Blockbusters on the air.[/quote]
So I'm curious: when Ryan pitched Blockbusters, did he refer to the board game Hex at all? 'Cuz really, that's always been my one-sentence rundown of the show to people who ask: "What if Hex were a game show."

chris319 · « **Reply #71 on:** March 12, 2009, 07:16:30 PM »

Oh yes, he had gone to the library and looked up Hex in some game books. In Scandinavian countries they play hex on hexagonally-tiled floors. He made a little wooden tabletop mockup of the game board in his shop at home.