Game Shows on Christmas Day

[zachhoran]

[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 12:10 AM\']
I remember on one ep. of TTD 90, Patrick Wayne noted that the female contestant was dressed in X-mas colors, green and red. Don't know if they actually did a Christmas ep., but now I want to say that they did. [/quote]
 The last first run ep. of TTD90 aired on 12/7/90(it didn't end with the divorced couples tournament, either), so they didn't have any Xmas-themed episodes.

[Ian Wallis]

How about network game shows on New Year's Day? Both CBS and NBC pretty much showed parades and football (back when NBC aired the Rose Bowl).

ABC usually aired their regular schedule on New Year's Day, so most ABC games had a New Year's episode.

CBS and NBC most years had the special programming as mentioned above.

[Ian Wallis]

Xmas Eve and New Year's Eve 1993 saw CBS air a rerun of 80s $25K Pyramid.

I remember seeing that listed in TVGuide, but forgot to watch.  Does anybodyknow what episodes were aired?  Were they Christmas and New Year's episodes, or just random episodes?

There was a Christmas special episode of Celebrity Sweepstakes during its run, with Pat Boone and Flip Wilson playing for the Boy Scouts and the American Cancer Society, respectively. (It was the first show with the white lights in the nubmers, which made it much easier to see which podiums were lit on black-and-white TVs.)

That was Christmas 1975.  I almost wonder if that show was an after-thought, because it wasn't taped at the same time as the other episodes from that week.  It featured the panel of celebrities who were on during New Year's week, and it featured the white lights in the numbers (as mentioned above) which the Christmas week episodes that year did not.

"Celebrity Sweepstakes" is one show I definately wish there was more of around in the trade curcuit.

[Jimmy Owen]

The $25KP eps CBS showed in 1993 were repeats of two shows from a Billy Crystal-Lynn Redgrave week that originally aired the week of 1/10/83.

[BrandonFG]

[quote name=\'zachhoran\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 08:36 AM\'] [quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 12:10 AM\']
I remember on one ep. of TTD 90, Patrick Wayne noted that the female contestant was dressed in X-mas colors, green and red. Don't know if they actually did a Christmas ep., but now I want to say that they did. [/quote]
The last first run ep. of TTD90 aired on 12/7/90(it didn't end with the divorced couples tournament, either), so they didn't have any Xmas-themed episodes. [/quote]
 That may be so, Zach, but I distinctly remember Patrick Wayne mentioning to that contestant's red and green outfit and how festive it was. I also remember TTD having episodes with a 1991 copyright.

[zachhoran]

[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 12:25 PM\']
That may be so, Zach, but I distinctly remember Patrick Wayne mentioning to that contestant's red and green outfit and how festive it was. I also remember TTD having episodes with a 1991 copyright. [/quote]
 I thought it only lasted 13 weeks. Anyone who was brave enough to tape any episodes could tell if there were new episodes aired beyond December(thus having a 1991 copyright)

[uncamark]

[quote name=\'PeterMarshallFan\' date=\'Dec 9 2003, 08:35 PM\']Was TJW bicycled like the G-T panel shows and MG?[/quote]
Not exactly like the other game shows, but similar.  The bicycling pattern was similar to how talk shows like Mike Douglas and Phil Donahue were distributed.  To explain:

Let's say your show is on in 150 markets.  You have 30 tapes duplicated and send them to your 30 largest market stations for airing the second week of September.  After the stations run them, they send the tapes on to the next 30 stations, who then air the shows the third week of September.  Then the next 30 get them for the following week, and so on, and so on.  At the end of the line sometime in October, the smallest market stations send the tapes back to the duplication house, who then puts them back in distribution if any stations pick up the show to start airing in November, January, March or what have you--new stations always started their runs of B&E shows with either the first show of the current season or the first show of the previous season.

Now, of course, thanks to satellite distribution all stations get the same show to air on the same day.

[tommycharles]

[quote name=\'uncamark\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 02:26 PM\'] [quote name=\'PeterMarshallFan\' date=\'Dec 9 2003, 08:35 PM\']Was TJW bicycled like the G-T panel shows and MG?[/quote]
Not exactly like the other game shows, but similar.  The bicycling pattern was similar to how talk shows like Mike Douglas and Phil Donahue were distributed.  To explain:

Let's say your show is on in 150 markets.  You have 30 tapes duplicated and send them to your 30 largest market stations for airing the second week of September.  After the stations run them, they send the tapes on to the next 30 stations, who then air the shows the third week of September.  Then the next 30 get them for the following week, and so on, and so on.  At the end of the line sometime in October, the smallest market stations send the tapes back to the duplication house, who then puts them back in distribution if any stations pick up the show to start airing in November, January, March or what have you--new stations always started their runs of B&E shows with either the first show of the current season or the first show of the previous season.

Now, of course, thanks to satellite distribution all stations get the same show to air on the same day. [/quote]
 So then the smallest markets (assuming that this is the premire season) wouldn't actually get any shows until October sometime? That would screw with season premiers pretty badly.

[Jimmy Owen]

The local station in my area that picked up the last couple years of the Dawson Feud used really bad tape to record off the bird.  Glitches, dropouts and rolling were commonplace.  At least with bicycling, there was a nice tape to run.

[uncamark]

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 03:23 PM\']The local station in my area that picked up the last couple years of the Dawson Feud used really bad tape to record off the bird.  Glitches, dropouts and rolling were commonplace.  At least with bicycling, there was a nice tape to run.[/quote]
Unless, of course, the station was at the end of the chain and the tape hadn't already suffered as it made the rounds of the other stations ("Feud" was bicycled in the make-a-bunch of shows and divide them onto different lists fahsion).

And if the station engineer forgets to tape the feed, unless there are emergency shows on file, the syndicator today is SOL.  But the guarantee that the show will air everywhere in the country on the same day trumps any possible quality control issues.

[ilb4ever2000]

I thought it only lasted 13 weeks. Anyone who was brave enough to tape any episodes could tell if there were new episodes aired beyond December(thus having a 1991 copyright)

The ol' EOTVGS says it was on from September until March. I didn't actually count, but that's gotta be more than 13 weeks.

[gameshowguy2000]

I think MG '90 did Christmas shows, just like the 70's version.

The set was decorated with the usual, but I assume CNR didn't dress up like Santa on the 90's version, did he?

I know he dressed up as Santa on all the versions of Classic MG's.

[ChuckNet]

I thought it only lasted 13 weeks. Anyone who was brave enough to tape any episodes could tell if there were new episodes aired beyond December(thus having a 1991 copyright)

Never saw a Wayne TTD ep on USA w/a copyright date other than 1990, so I'd say it was canned by year's end.

Chuck Donegan (The Illustrious "Chuckie Baby")

[zachhoran]

[quote name=\'ilb4ever2000\' date=\'Dec 10 2003, 03:47 PM\']

The ol' EOTVGS says it was on from September until March. I didn't actually count, but that's gotta be more than 13 weeks. [/quote]
 They say it lasted 26 weeks, but they didn't say it was 13 weeks of first run followed by 13 weeks of reruns(WNBC pulled the plug after December 28th, 1990). USA cycled through the whole run five times in 15 months they aired it.

[Ian Wallis]

Another thing I noticed about game shows that aired on Christmas Day is that sometimes they'd use a Christmas song as their closing theme.  I remember "Wheel of Fortune" using Leroy Anderson's version of "Sleigh Ride" as their close for a couple of Christmas shows in the late '70s.  

I think "Price is Right" might have used that at least once as well.  I'm sure there are others.