GSF 50 Greatest List - RESULTS THREAD

[wheelloon]

Well, 3 of these 5 are pretty comparable with where I had them in my list, the exceptions being BB and HR. Those two ended up being in the 30's for me. Nonetheless, I felt both had great formats, and weren't on the air as long as they should have been. HR I think would be an especially great candidate for a present-day revival, with the whole Las Vegas rush still going strong, and an easy to follow format supporting that thought...

As for the 7 remaining Cullen shows? Hmm, Pyramid, TPIR, TJW, Password (Plus that is, if you're counting when he subbed), TTTT (subbed again), Hot Potato, and Eye Guess, I guess??

[Dbacksfan12]

[quote name=\'wheelloon\' post=\'130447\' date=\'Sep 5 2006, 10:43 PM\']
As for the 7 remaining Cullen shows?
[/quote]
I somehow doubt Hot Potato even made the top 75.

[Chuck Sutton]

[quote name=\'cweaver\' post=\'130442\' date=\'Sep 5 2006, 11:07 PM\']
[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'130437\' date=\'Sep 5 2006, 09:33 PM\']
The first of eight in the Top-25 that were hosted at one time or another by Bill Cullen.
[/quote]

If Blockbuster is the first Cullen show in the top 25, is I've Got a Secret the second?
[/quote]

Yes he hosted the CBS summer 1976 prime time run. I remeber watching it.

[Chuck Sutton]

[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'129596\' date=\'Aug 29 2006, 10:20 AM\']

A sampling of hosts and the number of their shows included in the top 50:

Bill Cullen: 9

Wink Martindale: 2
[/quote]


Hmmm Gambit, the 1987-1988 run of High Rollers.

Did Matt forget Martindale hosted High Rollers or did we leave off  Tic Tac Dough?

[WilliamPorygon]

[quote name=\'Chuck Sutton\' post=\'130456\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 03:04 AM\']Did Matt forget Martindale hosted High Rollers or did we leave off  Tic Tac Dough?
[/quote]
Nah, he listed it as
[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'129596\' date=\'Aug 29 2006, 10:20 AM\']Patrick Wayne: 1
[/quote]
(I somehow doubt that version, ranked separately, would have even made the top 200.)

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'Chuck Sutton\' post=\'130456\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 03:04 AM\']Did Matt forget Martindale hosted High Rollers or did we leave off  Tic Tac Dough?[/quote]
The former, but I claim extenuating circumstances.  I wasn't doing those counts from memory, I used the Encyclopedia of TV Game Shows.  Strangely, High Rollers isn't listed among Wink's credits in the Name Index (see for yourself, page 367).  It's listed everywhere else, including the Game Show Personalities Index, and of course I know that he hosted the syndicated revivial, but in my haste I just assumed the EOTVGS index would be complete.

[Ian Wallis]

23 High Rollers (1974-76, 1978-80, 1987-88)
(1602 68/80)(TVG: 39)

Hardly anybody had this dice game in their top twenty, but so many people had it somewhere on their list that it almost made it to Top-20 status anyway. As some of you guessed, our highest-ranked show that didn't make the GSN list at all.

Count me among the few that had it in the top 20.  Unless I've missed something somewhere along the way, that means Celebrity Sweepstakes didn't make it into our top 50.  Since this show has never been repeated or revived, and there could be only two episodes that exist, I guess I can understand how this one missed.  But it did have a three-year run in the mid '70s and seems to be fondly remembered by a lot of us.  I always considered it an under-rated gem.

I also thought Battlestars and Bullseye might have outside shots of maybe the lower part of our list, but partly because of the great sets and effects maybe more than the game play.  That always drew me in!

[Dbacksfan12]

[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'130463\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 07:54 AM\']
Unless I've missed something somewhere along the way, that means Celebrity Sweepstakes didn't make it into our top 50. [/quote]
Darn.
I've only seen one or two episodes, but it seems like a neat game...much better then some of the other trash that has appeared on the list already.

[cweaver]

[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'130463\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 07:54 AM\']
Count me among the few that had it in the top 20. [/quote]

Me too, I had High Rollers at #14.  I knew when Matt mentioned one show on everyone's list (up to that point anyway) wouldn't make GSN's list that it was HR.

Unless I've missed something somewhere along the way, that means Celebrity Sweepstakes didn't make it into our top 50.  Since this show has never been repeated or revived, and there could be only two episodes that exist, I guess I can understand how this one missed.  But it did have a three-year run in the mid '70s and seems to be fondly remembered by a lot of us.  I always considered it an under-rated gem.

Me too, I sure wish someone had collected "zingers" from the show while it was still on.  It was every bit as "zinger" worthy as The Hollywood Squares and Break the Bank.  Here's one I remember from the NBC run.

Jim McKrell: According to Billy Graham, what's the only place that's bigger than Hell?
while celebrities are writing their answers
Buddy Hackett: Totie Fields' (expletive deleted)!

Quite possibly one of daytime TV's longest laughs, McKrell had difficulty prompting the contestants to hold up their guesses.

[BobbyLankford_83]

[quote name=\'Modor\' post=\'130467\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 09:31 AM\']
[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'130463\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 07:54 AM\']
Unless I've missed something somewhere along the way, that means Celebrity Sweepstakes didn't make it into our top 50. [/quote]
Darn.
I've only seen one or two episodes, but it seems like a neat game...much better then some of the other trash that has appeared on the list already.
[/quote]

Mark, Celebrity Sweepstakes was a neat show, and the set was cool. Carol Wayne who was also "The Tea Time Movie Lady" on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, and did guest roles on shows like I Dream of Jeannie, as Bootsie Nightingale a movie star , and on Bewitched as a Playboy bunny that Uncle Arthur accidentally conjured up for Tabitha's birthday.

Wayne was married to Burt Sugarman (he's now Married to Mary Hart of Entertainment Tonight), who produced Celebrity Sweepstakes and later Whew! with Tom Kennedy. After her divorce and Carson shrunk his show to an hour,reducing her airtime, she appeared less often on TV except for a week on Battlestars, and later posed for Playboy in February 1984.

Sadly, her last years were nothing but a life of booze and cocaine, which wiped out her funds. Richard Pryor offered to help her out with a role in the then upcoming filem Brewster's Millions with him and John Candy,but unfortunately, she drowned in January 1985 off Manzanillo,Mexico at the age of 42.

[JasonA1]

So far from this list, I completely forgot "Gong Show," "You Bet Your Life," and "Remote Control" (not sure if they would've made my list anyway), never saw "College Bowl" or "Truth or Consequences" (though I don't feel it'd change my opinion of them too terribly much), and deliberately did not include "Weakest Link," "Deal or No Deal," "Dating Game" and the 50s big money quizzes.

I had "Sweepstakes" somewhere in the 40s, and it's a shame it didn't make it. Another show it seems we won't get is "Big Showdown" which falls into the same category as "Sweepstakes" as having very little exposure or surviving episodes to go on. Maybe not every show was as competitive and as fun a game as the existing show, but looking at that I saw it being a very entertaining and engaging fast quiz in the same vein as "Sale of the Century."

-Jason

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'JasonA1\' post=\'130472\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 10:05 AM\']I had "Sweepstakes" somewhere in the 40s, and it's a shame it didn't make it. Another show it seems we won't get is "Big Showdown" which falls into the same category as "Sweepstakes" as having very little exposure or surviving episodes to go on. Maybe not every show was as competitive and as fun a game as the existing show, but looking at that I saw it being a very entertaining and engaging fast quiz in the same vein as "Sale of the Century."[/quote]
Without giving too terribly much away (though there really aren't surprises from this point on), you've really hit on what I said at the top about our age bias.  Some very-good-but-not-classic shows from the 80s made our list (some quite high) while some very-good-but-not-classic shows from the seventies didn't.  And certainly part of that is exposure, both in terms of age and in terms of what has survived to be seen.  Of course, having said that, I'm one of the oldest ones here, I remember both shows vividly and neither one made my personal Top 50.

[Neumms]

[quote name=\'cweaver\' post=\'130469\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 08:54 AM\']
Jim McKrell: According to Billy Graham, what's the only place that's bigger than Hell?
while celebrities are writing their answers
Buddy Hackett: Totie Fields' (expletive deleted)!
[/quote]

Thank you, thank you for the Totie Fields reference! I did have "Celebrity Sweepstakes" on my list, partly because I was running short of ideas, but it was a unique game, and it did have a distinctive panel, what with Alan Sues and Carol Wayne.

It came down to that and "High Rollers." I kind of thought "High Rollers" was flawed because they seldom (at least as I remember) risked rolling if there were any bad rolls. What good is a gambling game if they never gamble. I never liked the three columns because that didn't seem to help, and it seemed like it mucked up the game. It was aesthetically purer with a prize (or 1/2 car) for each digit.

[uncamark]

[quote name=\'Neumms\' post=\'130484\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 11:10 AM\']
[quote name=\'cweaver\' post=\'130469\' date=\'Sep 6 2006, 08:54 AM\']
Jim McKrell: According to Billy Graham, what's the only place that's bigger than Hell?
while celebrities are writing their answers
Buddy Hackett: Totie Fields' (expletive deleted)!
[/quote]

Thank you, thank you for the Totie Fields reference! I did have "Celebrity Sweepstakes" on my list, partly because I was running short of ideas, but it was a unique game, and it did have a distinctive panel, what with Alan Sues and Carol Wayne.

It came down to that and "High Rollers." I kind of thought "High Rollers" was flawed because they seldom (at least as I remember) risked rolling if there were any bad rolls. What good is a gambling game if they never gamble. I never liked the three columns because that didn't seem to help, and it seemed like it mucked up the game. It was aesthetically purer with a prize (or 1/2 car) for each digit.
[/quote]

I always liked the columns, because it allowed for a different strategy than "knock off as many numbers as you can" in the front game--instead, you were trying to knock off the numbers to either clear a column or loosen up a column.

Of course, in the end it was still take the roll at the start, pass it when there's more than one bad number, but that's an inherent flaw that couldn't be corrected.  Yeah, you could've had some big gamblers, but if you lucked into both halves of the big prize on the first version or clearing a column with a nice trip on the second version, I wouldn't want to be the big gambler and risk losing them.

[Chuck Sutton]

With only the top 20 to go,  I want to thank Matt for coming up with the idea and doing all the work in compiling the lists.  Must have been a lot of work but worth it.

Any list that includes Jackpot, Now You See It, High Rollers, and Gambit (and Whew! even though in the end I could not find a spot for it) is worth it in my book.

I know he was somewhat disappointed by the response.   But 80 is a good number, and as I pointed out using my own choices there were many places where every vote counted. (I only used my own because that is all I had)

In the end I had 41 out of 50 on my list.  Celebrity Sweepstakes and Battlestars were on mine.  I loved Battlestars especially.   The one I wish had ecked in was Liar's Club, which I had at 20, even though I had it below TTTT and Line, it was my favorite of the panel shows.   I loved the descriptions of the various objects, and somehow the lies were even fun when you knew what the item was.

BTW the Matt I don't think you are that much older than me, although since I watched your early cable show when was I in undergrad you are probably are older.