I wrote GameTV and here's what Maria Donatelli, Director of Programming, wrote back:
With most old game shows, like Break the Bank, we are limited to what episodes are available. We try to air the episodes in order however this series has quite a few episodes missing or simply no longer exist. Out of the 100 episodes originally produced, GameTV is currently airing 64 of these episodes. We will be airing this series all summer and you will have the opportunity to watch the entire library that is available for broadcast.
It's good you got a response. I've written them a couple of times over the years and never heard anything back. It's interesting wording that only 64 episodes are "available for broadcast". GSN did run 5 nighttime episodes in the '90s. If Barry's episodes were in broadcast quality back then, I wonder what happened to them. I wonder if 64 is all that's been converted for today's formats. Maybe GSN just converted the handful of nighttime episodes they needed at the time(?)
I didn't think a show with fewer than 100 episodes was too big an ask, but since GSN only aired 27 Kennedy episodes, if we get 64 from GameTV that's still a pretty good deal! Maybe if we're lucky, another Barry episode or two may pop up on youtube eventually.
Having said that, GameTV is now on their fourth run-thru of the same 65 episodes of
Beat the Clock and has just re-started their portion of
Tattletales for the fourth time. It's probably time for that part of the schedule to be refreshed. Wasn't it said that only 65 episodes of
Beat the Clock were converted for airing on BUZZR? If that's the case, maybe it's a similar situation for
Break the Bank.
I haven't had a chance to watch BtB since its original run, when I was 14 and mesmerized by the board and gameplay! It just goes to show: wait about 50 years and something good may come your way.
I was kind of mesmerized by it too and wondered how it actually worked. Presumably there were stage hands underneath turning and re-arranging the boxes, but when you look at where it is on the stage, there doesn't appear to be much room underneath the boxes on the bottom row. It seems like they'd almost have to be kneeling or lying down to reach those ones.