CBS 60's Password Question

[TimK2003]

After recently watching a slew of CBS Password episodes, with a handful taped on each coast, my wife had a question on the use of the set:

1) Did they use the exact same set on both coasts, transporting it cross country between east & west coast tapings?
2) Did they make two exact sets on one coasts at the same time and send the other to the other coast?    Or...
3) Did they make one set on each coast?

Just a random musing...

[davemackey]

After recently watching a slew of CBS Password episodes, with a handful taped on each coast, my wife had a question on the use of the set:

1) Did they use the exact same set on both coasts, transporting it cross country between east & west coast tapings?
2) Did they make two exact sets on one coasts at the same time and send the other to the other coast?    Or...
3) Did they make one set on each coast?

Just a random musing...

Number 1 would have been cost prohibitive. Number 2 is unlikely because the scenery shop in L.A. would have to build the set (unions, y'know). Number 3 sounds the most plausible; see Number 2.

[Vahan_Nisanian]

Slightly off-topic, but when $10,000 Pyramid briefly moved to Los Angeles in November 1973 for three weeks, they brought the entire set over, unlike Password.

I never got why they moved to L.A. I heard one account say that it was due to CBS Game Shows doing special celebrity themed weeks (would be interesting if TJW and Gambit actually had them), another that Bob Stewart wanted to try something different, and another that it was per CBS custom at the time with celebrity game shows. Which is it?

[joker316]

Slightly off-topic, but when $10,000 Pyramid briefly moved to Los Angeles in November 1973 for three weeks, they brought the entire set over, unlike Password.

I never got why they moved to L.A. I heard one account say that it was due to CBS Game Shows doing special celebrity themed weeks (would be interesting if TJW and Gambit actually had them), another that Bob Stewart wanted to try something different, and another that it was per CBS custom at the time with celebrity game shows. Which is it?

IIRC they did with Gambit having celebs play with singles as partners and TJW doing the "stars are the categories" format with the celebs answering one question for half value and the player answering a second question for the other half. Could be wrong on the timing of TJW, but I do remember 10k and Gambit being promoted heavily in primetime.

[Ian Wallis]

The Joker's Wild week where the stars were the categories aired in January 1974.  I suppose they could have taped it the same time that they taped Pyramid, and the others.  I don't remember ever seeing that Joker's Wild week, but if they asked their returning champion to come back the week after this special week, then it could have been a stand-alone week and aired anywhere.  If the champion came back for that week, that's when the scheduling doesn't work

[chris319]

I'm betting that they shipped the New York Password set to California. It would have been much more expensive and labor intensive to build a whole new set (they would have had to build a duplicate of Ted's elaborate Lightning Round mechanism) and they would then have had to pay to store the set when they were finished with it, and all this for just a few weeks of shows. In addition to the Lightning Round mechanism there was an elaborate conveyor system for putting passwords into play that Frank Wayne would call for on the fly.

When NBC cancelled HS in 1980, they added insult to injury over the game board. It turns out that H-Q did not own the game board and NBC wanted to sell it to them for a ridiculous price. H-Q said "F-U" to NBC and had a new board built for less than NBC's asking price, which they took with them to Las Vegas.

[Bryce L.]

Speaking of sets, how did the Joker's Wild game board work? I know it had slide projectors, and had a rotating brake drum of some kind, but the remaining details are fuzzy to me. Also, how would a 2011 version of TJW's board most likely work?

[Clay Zambo]

I have no idea, really, but would like to suggest that perhaps it was both: the Lightning Round mechanism and conveyer would be relatively easy to ship, as would having the CA crew build a desk and some flats.

[chris319]

I have no idea, really, but would like to suggest that perhaps it was both: the Lightning Round mechanism and conveyer would be relatively easy to ship, as would having the CA crew build a desk and some flats.

Right, but disassembling that mechanism and installing it in a newly-built desk could be quite tricky, and they would still have to pay storage on it, operating under the assumption that they would need it on subsequent trips to CA. The set was struck after each taping in studio 52 in New York, so it would be simple to load it into a big truck, destination Hollywood.

The Joker's Wild set used three slide projectors as seen in the dual-drum unit in the foreground of this picture:

http://www.vtoldboys.com/editingmuseum/images/tn_filmchain.jpg

The drums had been modified, adding a motor to spin the drums and a mechanism to stop their rotation when needed. A mirror controlled which of the two drums was projected. They could thus load slides for the main game in one drum and keep the end game slides in the other. This was likely another of Ted Cooper's creations, as the Joker's Wild pilot with Allen Ludden was a G-T production.

[trainman]

Also, how would a 2011 version of TJW's board most likely work?

You start with three LCD monitors mounted vertically...

[Twentington]

Also, how would a 2011 version of TJW's board most likely work?

You start with three LCD monitors mounted vertically...

I wonder if the folks at Wheel still have the video screen slot machine they made for the Vegas episodes in 2005?

[Bryce L.]

Also, how would a 2011 version of TJW's board most likely work?

You start with three LCD monitors mounted vertically...

Would PowerPoint work for making the slides?

[chris319]

Would PowerPoint work for making the slides?

For making them or for displaying and controlling them? Just about any graphics program could be used to make the artwork.

These kinds of things tend to be custom written. The guys at CBS Electronics, the stage electronics department at Television City, do magnificent work with these things.

[narzo]

After recently watching a slew of CBS Password episodes, with a handful taped on each coast, my wife had a question on the use of the set:

1) Did they use the exact same set on both coasts, transporting it cross country between east & west coast tapings?
2) Did they make two exact sets on one coasts at the same time and send the other to the other coast?    Or...
3) Did they make one set on each coast?

Just a random musing...

I always assumed #3 because if you remember watching the color episodes that GSN has rerun, when they played the "lightening round" on the west coast the mechanism that raised and lowered the words was much louder and "clunkier" sounding then the one on the NYC episodes.

[Jeremy Nelson]

Also, how would a 2011 version of TJW's board most likely work?

More than likely, three rather large LCD TVs turned on their sides. That, plus a computer program is the cheapest, easiest way to do it.

As cool and elaborate as some of the old game show sets were, if you compare them to what can be done with LCDs and a single computer, they really aren't cost effective in the long run with maintenance and extra hands operating them and all. I remember reading somewhere that the Winner's Circle board took six people to operate; far more expensive than Donnymid, where they probably needed need one person in a control room operating the whole board from any old keyboard.

BTW the Wheel backdrops from Vegas 05 were very cool. Much better than the "virtual backdrops" they use now.