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Author Topic: Nipsey Russell Pilots  (Read 1872 times)

whizofthequiz

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Nipsey Russell Pilots
« on: November 29, 2012, 07:52:05 PM »
Does anyone attend either of the three pilots Bob Stewart did with Nipsey Russell in New York back in the 70s?

The first, taped at NBC, but meant for syndication (I believe for Viacom,) was a "hidden camera" show where audience members were picked and asked to guess the outcome of a situation. No bonus game - just lots of Nipsey and audience fun.

The second, done for ABC at the Elysee Theater, was called "That's Life." It was a redo of the first pilot but I don't remember the game. The game was announced in Jet Magazine on February 28, 1980. You can find it here.

He also did a second pilot at ABC called "The Ratings Game" which was a "Hot Potato"-like elimination game. The bonus game was "Pass The Buck"-like where the contestants had 3 categories and had to identify three pre-selected items in each category. (For example: New York:  Statue of Liberty, The Big Apple and Radio City Music Hall.) Dick Heatherton was the announcer.

Any memories?

JasonA1

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Nipsey Russell Pilots
« Reply #1 on: November 29, 2012, 08:44:03 PM »
The second, done for ABC at the Elysee Theater, was called "That's Life." It was a redo of the first pilot but I don't remember the game. The game was announced in Jet Magazine on February 28, 1980. You can find it here.

I obviously didn't attend, but I have seen this one. It felt inspired by "Family Feud," and I wonder given your mini-timeline if that was network influenced, or a choice by Bob Stewart.

Two teams of three tried to predict which were the top responses to survey questions. As they were posed, we were taken to the street for a montage of Nipsey's interviews on the subject. A question might be something like "the most important thing to a relationship is.... A) love, B) sex, C) money." One member of each team came center stage to play (sound familiar?), with the team in control trying to guess number one, and the second team then trying to guess number two afterward.

Players who failed at their task were eliminated (IIRC), and the winning team played an end game where they saw three subjects and four words under each. They had to guess, one at a time, which words were among the top 3 said by the public to describe that subject (for example, under Jane Fonda it might say 'feminist' or 'actress' or some such). The answers not among the top three had "That's Life" behind them. The Dragon was surely shaking in his boots.

The Frank Sinatra song of the same name was the theme music. I gathered that the questions were asked to the public with the choices, as some of the offbeat comedy choices ranked higher than they otherwise should have.

-Jason
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whizofthequiz

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Nipsey Russell Pilots
« Reply #2 on: November 29, 2012, 09:06:35 PM »
That's it! Thank you, Jason!