Two Sale of the Century inquiries

[Ian Wallis]

1.  I've been watching a lot of the show lately.  This is something I've noticed in the past but have wondered about.

In the shopping era of the show, contestants could take the prize they were eligible for, or put their winnings from the game "in the bank".  If they won again, the new winnings were added to what's in the bank and they could be eligible for a higher-level prize.

When a contestant lost, they kept any money won in the game.  Jim always said "you've got the cash in front of you", or "you've got the $70 in front of you", or something like that.  When a multiple-time champion lost, Jim would still list the prizes they won (fame games and such) and "the cash in front of you", with no mention of the previous bank.  I always thought they'd be entitled to it.  When something's "in the bank" was that at risk for forfeit - or maybe it was awarded to them and just not mentioned on the air?

2.  I know this has been discussed previously, but I honestly can't recall if we ever reached a consensus on it.

Whenever the show's been repeated (USA, GSN, BUZZR, or GameTV in Canada), it's always been the 1985-86 syndicated version, or the 1988-89 NBC episodes.  Are the others actually gone?  I know that it was speculated that Reg Grundy has them all in his vault in Australia (but not Scrabble, which was on at the same time), but I don't know how accurate this is.  It just seems kind of odd for a show that ran so far into the '80s to have so many episodes "missing".

Does anyone know for sure what the story is with those?

[SuperMatch93]

I remember reading years ago that they were in fact entitled to the money saved up in their bank, but this was on someone's fan page as opposed to an official rule sheet. It wouldn't be too hard to confirm either way though, if you just checked the value of the prizes and other cash won against a defeated champion's total.

Regarding your second point, I was actually the source for this. In 2007 or so I asked the late Mitt Dawson on YouTube whether the episodes still existed. He explained that they kept only the syndicated series and the last six months, and AFAIK this is all that aired on USA. When he left Grundy in 1997, he said that they still had all the episodes archived on Betacam but he said that he highly doubted they were kept for much longer.

In addition, Vahan Nisanian messaged me with this a few years back:

I have some information about the status of the NBC episodes that I wanna share with you:

A fellow named Jason Cranmer contacted the director of sales from Fremantle, Alexandra Hedgewood, in the hopes of finding out if the daytime episodes were saved or not. According to the director, they have 883 episodes. This figure may or may not include the syndicated run. She further mentioned that no episodes prior to 1985 are in Fremantle's archives.

If you remember, the late Mitt Dawson, who worked for Reg Grundy Productions, Inc. from 1987 to 1997, said that they only kept the last six months of NBC shows (August 1988 to March 1989). Well, this latest development refutes what he said years before; the surviving NBC shows date back at least two years prior to that. It's still disappointing that they have nothing before 1985, though. Someone, somewhere out there, SHOULD still have those episodes in particular. I can't imagine them being gone forever.

[MSTieScott]

When a multiple-time champion lost, Jim would still list the prizes they won (fame games and such) and "the cash in front of you", with no mention of the previous bank.  I always thought they'd be entitled to it.  When something's "in the bank" was that at risk for forfeit - or maybe it was awarded to them and just not mentioned on the air?

I'm curious about this as well. Buzzr is currently airing episodes from the Winner's Big Money Game era. What I've cross-checked and discovered is that at the end of the speed round, the two losing contestants do indeed receive the money on the scoreboard, but the winner of the game does not receive the cash in front of them. It's never included as part of the grand total announced at the end of the show -- it just disappears into the ether.

So I wonder whether the same was true of unredeemed money during the shopping era. I suspect it'll be tougher to confirm than it seems, because Jim didn't usually give a running total of the champion's winnings from episode to episode. And once a contestant lost, Jim would usually just announce their total as something like "over $4,400" with the Chyron settling for the round number. If a contestant won one Fame Game prize that Jim didn't reveal the price of, then it becomes really difficult to break down their winnings dollar by dollar.

[TLEberle]

I resolved it as the champion buying the prize of the day or winners board opportunity with the main game total.

[aaron sica]

In addition, Vahan Nisanian messaged me with this a few years back:

No need to continue after saying his name - I don't trust his word farther than I can throw him.

[Sodboy13]

Oh, you shouldn't be throwing anybody with your bad back, Ed.

[clemon79]

Oh, you shouldn't be throwing anybody with your bad back, Ed.

/bravo

[SuperMatch93]

In addition, Vahan Nisanian messaged me with this a few years back:

No need to continue after saying his name - I don't trust his word farther than I can throw him.

Had he been the one who reached out to Fremantle I'd have doubted it, but since he was referring to someone else who contacted them I took it as reliable. It'd be an odd thing to lie about, anyway.

[Bryce L.]

In addition, Vahan Nisanian messaged me with this a few years back:

No need to continue after saying his name - I don't trust his word farther than I can throw him.

Had he been the one who reached out to Fremantle I'd have doubted it, but since he was referring to someone else who contacted them I took it as reliable. It'd be an odd thing to lie about, anyway.

But when has "being an odd thing to lie about" ever mattered to Vahan, anyway?

[Chelsea Thrasher]

Mitt was as reliable a direct source as any, and his recounting of Sale's existence tracks exactly with what USA, GSN, and Buzzr (who owns the show) have all done when broadcasting the series. USA/Buzzr in particular, as GSN also skipped Summer/Fall '88 I believe.

At no point have any of these three networks aired a daytime show prior to July 1988, and USA and Buzzr's daytime Sale runs started at almost the exact same point despite a 25 year gap between them. Whatever exists in Fremantle's holdings of the daytime show prior to July 1988, if anything, is sufficiently incomplete or otherwise unsuitable for broadcast that they've never been rerun (nor has clips or episodes turned up on Buzzr's social, which at times makes a point of posting things specifically not airing on the main channel).  If they're sitting around in some vault somewhere, not even Fremantle themselves have gone to the effort of turning them up (in spite of the posted rumor in an earlier post it's Grundy's vault, which they'd have rights to clear out.

As far as I'm concerned, daytime run prior to July '88 is gone except for home recordings, until evidence proves otherwise.

[Bryce L.]

As far as I'm concerned, daytime run prior to July '88 is gone except for home recordings, until evidence proves otherwise.

Which begs the question of "why wasn't NBC or Grundy saving their tapes?"

[SuperMatch93]

I remember finding it odd that Sale was missing in large part but Scrabble wasn't, although Selchow and Righter's part ownership may have had something to do with that.

A clip of Mort Kamins' lot win is in the 15th anniversary Australian Sale episode, which aired in 1995; that tracks with what Mitt stated about Grundy's USA office still maintaining an archive. My only guess is that perhaps the masters were disposed of after the American branch of the company shut down. I was digging around some of his YT uploads to see if he said anything more specific than what I posted, but it appears all the comments he had posted have been deleted.

[aaron sica]

Had he been the one who reached out to Fremantle I'd have doubted it, but since he was referring to someone else who contacted them I took it as reliable. It'd be an odd thing to lie about, anyway.

Let me clarify a bit - Mitt Dawson is reliable. Absolutely. I'd take his word. This Jason Cranmer? Never heard of him. Not to mention Vahan tends to believe nearly anything people tell him when it comes to the whereabouts of episodes.

[SuperMatch93]

Had he been the one who reached out to Fremantle I'd have doubted it, but since he was referring to someone else who contacted them I took it as reliable. It'd be an odd thing to lie about, anyway.

Let me clarify a bit - Mitt Dawson is reliable. Absolutely. I'd take his word. This Jason Cranmer? Never heard of him. Not to mention Vahan tends to believe nearly anything people tell him when it comes to the whereabouts of episodes.

That's fair. Plus, if Fremantle does indeed have 800+ episodes, you'd think they'd have aired in reruns by now instead of the same package being broadcast on three separate networks (which Chelsea pointed out yesterday). Not only that, but it doesn't really give a satisfactory explanation of why certain episodes exist and others don't. Why would Grundy dispose of the first 2-3 years specifically? By the time they pulled out of the American market it was clear that they had rerun potential.

[jage]

Rerun potential, sure, but perhaps, and this is total speculation, they felt that 2 years of content was plenty for reruns without burnout. Also, the NBC shows had more questions about current events that would become dated. Didn't stop other shows, but could have been part of the thought process here. It's just too bad if true, since I feel 85-87 was when the show really hit its stride.