Game Show TV Milestone Of The Week

[uncamark]

[quote name=\'gameshowsteve\' date=\'Nov 24 2003, 06:10 PM\'][quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Nov 24 2003, 02:25 PM\']they were just contestants, selected like any other contestants of the day were. They were already seated behind the contestant desk when the show started.[/quote]
Were all contestants of the day taken out of the audience?

[quote name=\'DrBear\' date=\'Nov 24 2003, 02:55 PM\']you didn't find anyone going back and bidding a dollar because they thought the others were too high.[/quote]
It happened from time to time. Contestants were allowed to "underbid" the first time around the block, if they felt an opponent started the bidding too high.[/quote]
And you could underbid or, if it was in force, bid under the minimum increase, but that was considered an automatic "FREEZE!  FREEZE!"

And the audience shouting of "HIGHER!  HIGHER!" and "FREEZE!  FREEZE!" was something that supposedly was started spontaneously early on--Bob Stewart, being no dummy, made it part of the show from that point forward, despite the mocking, tut-tuting and pronouncements of the end of Western civilization as we know it from the press (including Steve Allen's obvious contempt when "IGAS" did a "TPIR" bit involving Bill during Allen's stint as host).

[AH3RD]

[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Nov 24 2003, 05:06 PM\'] You have to ask yourself...did he FORGET those facts, or did he simply choose not to bury us in a sea of minutae? [/quote]
Wrong on both counts.

Actually I was totally unaware of these facts. Thanks, GSWitch!

[tomobrien]

[quote name=\'gameshowsteve\' date=\'Nov 24 2003, 06:10 PM\']Were all contestants of the day taken out of the audience?
[/quote]
Well, yes...as  Bill says in one the episodes still around, the contestants for the next day's show were chosen from the current day's audience.

[Steve McClellan]

[quote name=\'tomobrien\' date=\'Nov 25 2003, 10:42 AM\']as Bill says in one the episodes still around, the contestants for the next day's show were chosen from the current day's audience.[/quote]
I know that was the case on TPIR. My question was about other shows of the era. Chris said TPIR contestants were "selected like any other contestants of the day were," and I asked if that meant that most shows picked their contestants right out of the audience.

[Matt Ottinger]

It was a very common custom for the game shows of the sixties to get contestants out of a previous day's studio audience.  I couldn't tell you specifically how many or which ones (Concentration did for a long time) but it was a normal procedure.

[HYHYBT]

Well, then, were there really shows that did like the one on "The Dick Van Dyke Show" and picked contestants moments before air?

[GSWitch]

[quote name=\'AH3RD\' date=\'Nov 25 2003, 12:09 PM\'] Wrong on both counts.

Actually I was totally unaware of these facts. Thanks, GSWitch! [/quote]
 You're welcome, my pretty (CACKLING!!!).