TV Guide hated, hated, hated this game show

[zachhoran]

[quote name=\'SamJ93\' date=\'Mar 6 2005, 12:21 AM\']

Maybe I'm being obtuse here, but...how does "Monroe" lead one to "shape?"

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The player put together the two clues given at that point, figure and Monroe

[Robair]

[quote name=\'SamJ93\' date=\'Mar 6 2005, 12:21 AM\']Maybe I'm being obtuse here, but...how does "Monroe" lead one to "shape?"

Oh...just figured it out.  Still, seems like a rather odd clue to give instead of "triangle," "square," etc.

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This was "Password" year one. There were no real strategies set up yet, so people (especially the males) tried to throw some connotation in with Hollywood starlets for words like "shape", "figure" and "form" rather than going for the more earthly term like "circle" or "hexagon". I've even heard "Lolobrigida" being used for "figure".

The clue Jim E. refused to give gave it pretty much away as an older show, since it predated Cleveland Amory as TV Guide's critic. But gee, it's heartening to think that TV Guide was as clueless about some TV shows forty-five years ago as they are today. Consider this: Allen Ludden never made the cover of TV Guide while other prime time hosts like Bill Cullen and Garry Moore were regular fixtures on the mag's frontis.

[Jimmy Owen]

James Monroe had a great figure.  On the topic of TV Guide reviewers and game shows, I was horrified that Cleveland Amory was booked on the same Blyden WML? as the Russian dancing bear trainer.  Was Cleve's reputation as an animal rights activist yet to come?

[ChuckNet]

I thought it was Password...Jeff Graham put that "the whole thing is so dull..." line into a write-up of the all time greatest game shows that closed his 1988 GS book, Come on Down.

Chuck Donegan (The Illustrious "Chuckie Baby")

[Mike Tennant]

[quote name=\'trainman\' date=\'Mar 6 2005, 12:06 AM\']An announcement informs you that the contestants on Password have been talked to in advance.  That's to head off any suspicions you may have about the absolute honesty of the proceedings.

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What exactly did this announcement mean?  I haven't seen more than one or two eps of the original show, and then they were the later eps.

[DrBear]

[quote name=\'Mike Tennant\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 10:39 AM\'][quote name=\'trainman\' date=\'Mar 6 2005, 12:06 AM\']An announcement informs you that the contestants on Password have been talked to in advance.  That's to head off any suspicions you may have about the absolute honesty of the proceedings.

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What exactly did this announcement mean?  I haven't seen more than one or two eps of the original show, and then they were the later eps.

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It's your basic statement that the contestants were interviewed before the selection, just as they are on every other game show. In those days, there were more shows picking their contestants out of the audience; that clearly wasn't the case with Password, which requires at least half a brain. (Of course, even TPIR interviews today; I can't think of any show where you could be pulled out of the audience to participate. I'm not even sure about "Whose Line?")

[Don Howard]

[quote name=\'Mike Tennant\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 11:39 AM\'][quote name=\'trainman\' date=\'Mar 6 2005, 12:06 AM\']An announcement informs you that the contestants on Password have been talked to in advance.  That's to head off any suspicions you may have about the absolute honesty of the proceedings.

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What exactly did this announcement mean?

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It means they weren't snatched from a bus stop and thrown onto a set next to Peter Lawford.

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'DrBear\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 01:01 PM\']Does anybody have a clear copy of the theme from "60 Minutes?" Not the current one, the original with the different stopwatch.[/quote]
I.  Love.  This.

[Mike Tennant]

[quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 12:31 PM\'][quote name=\'Mike Tennant\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 11:39 AM\']What exactly did this announcement mean?

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It means they weren't snatched from a bus stop and thrown onto a set next to Peter Lawford.

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Thank goodness.  I can't think of a worse fate to befall anyone.

[SplitSecond]

Being put on camera next to Bob Crane, perhaps?

[Don Howard]

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 12:51 PM\'][quote name=\'DrBear\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 01:01 PM\']Does anybody have a clear copy of the theme from "60 Minutes?" Not the current one, the original with the different stopwatch.[/quote]
I.  Love.  This.

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I'll trade him if he has the typewriter SFX used in 1978 on The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. I already have the Smith-Corona version from '77.

[Jimmy Owen]

[quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 01:45 PM\'][quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 12:51 PM\'][quote name=\'DrBear\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 01:01 PM\']Does anybody have a clear copy of the theme from "60 Minutes?" Not the current one, the original with the different stopwatch.[/quote]
I.  Love.  This.

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I'll trade him if he has the typewriter SFX used in 1978 on The CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. I already have the Smith-Corona version from '77.

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I have a MIDI recreation of that theme on an MP3, will that suffice?

[JakeT]

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 11:51 AM\'][quote name=\'DrBear\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 01:01 PM\']Does anybody have a clear copy of the theme from "60 Minutes?" Not the current one, the original with the different stopwatch.[/quote]
I.  Love.  This.

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To this day, I still worry about the number of brain cells I lost when I first tried to understand why CBS found it necessary to release an "official" theme from "60 Minutes", it being nothing more than the longest, most mind-numbing 30 seconds of "tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick" ever created.  

And we sometimes wonder why game show themes (or TV themes in general) get so little respect by most people...sighhhhhhhhh...

Jake

[uncamark]

The review is interesting, in that Seldes, who is considered one of the first intellectual types, if not *the* first intellectual type to treat pop culture as worthy of being taken seriously, doesn't care for the show most often used in the post-quiz scandal era as an example of a more intellectual game show than most of its daytime company of the time.  (In his stint as a TV Guide critic, he gave a favorable review to "The Beverly Hillbillies," undoubtedly one of the few critics at that time to do so.)

Here's a link to a review of a 1996 book on his life:

http://www.popcultures.com/reviews/rev_0025.htm

[joshg]

[quote name=\'SplitSecond\' date=\'Mar 7 2005, 10:39 AM\']Being put on camera next to Bob Crane, perhaps?

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or under Bob Crane?