Author Topic: $25,000 Pyramid question (Read 14452 times)

Vahan_Nisanian · « **on:** March 16, 2009, 06:13:06 PM »

Kris Lane's episode guide for the show mentions that there was no Monday show, during the Rita Moreno & Richard Dean Anderson week (which originally aired during the week of January 2, 1984). How can this be true, if the guide also says that the show's 1,000th episode aired on August 1, 1986?

I hope someone like Brendan can please help me out here.

dale_grass · « **Reply #1 on:** March 16, 2009, 10:38:09 PM »

[quote name=\'gameshowlover87\' post=\'210532\' date=\'Mar 16 2009, 05:13 PM\']
Kris Lane's episode guide for the show mentions that there was no Monday show, during the Rita Moreno & Richard Dean Anderson week (which originally aired during the week of January 2, 1984). How can this be true, if the guide also says that the show's 1,000th episode aired on August 1, 1986?

I hope someone like Brendan can please help me out here.
[/quote]
I, too, hope someone can help you.

That Don Guy · « **Reply #2 on:** March 19, 2009, 10:18:25 PM »

[quote name=\'gameshowlover87\' post=\'210532\' date=\'Mar 16 2009, 03:13 PM\']
Kris Lane's episode guide for the show mentions that there was no Monday show, during the Rita Moreno & Richard Dean Anderson week (which originally aired during the week of January 2, 1984).[/quote]
This makes sense - CBS would have been airing the Tournament of Roses Parade and the Cotton Bowl on Monday, January 2 (the parade organizers have a tradition of not holding it on a Sunday, and bowl games were not played on New Year's Day if it was a Sunday because of NFL playoff games that day).

-- Don

snowpeck · « **Reply #3 on:** March 19, 2009, 10:20:44 PM »

And that's exactly what the New York Times TV listings say for that day (as well as the Cotton Bowl Parade.)

Greg

Steve Gavazzi · « **Reply #4 on:** March 23, 2009, 12:38:18 PM »

The way I'm reading this, I think he's more confused about how the 1,000th show could have been on a Friday if they'd skipped a day at some point.

Of course, I have no idea if any other shows were skipped, nor have I gone to look at Kris Lane's episode guide, so that could be totally off-base.

Ian Wallis · « **Reply #5 on:** March 23, 2009, 07:43:52 PM »

Quote

Of course, I have no idea if any other shows were skipped, nor have I gone to look at Kris Lane's episode guide, so that could be totally off-base.

Without looking at the guide, I'd guess there were pre-emptions on Thanksgiving in '82 and '83 (and likely the day after), which would account for the rest. New Year's Day in 1983 was a Saturday, so the parades would have gone ahead as scheduled.

TimK2003 · « **Reply #6 on:** March 23, 2009, 08:37:30 PM »

[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'211074\' date=\'Mar 23 2009, 07:43 PM\']
Without looking at the guide, I'd guess there were pre-emptions on Thanksgiving in '82 and '83 (and likely the day after), which would account for the rest.
[/quote]

ISTR there was at least one or two years in the 80s when CBS aired a "bonus day" of Saturday Morning cartoons on the day after Thanksgiving/Friday.

pyrfan · « **Reply #7 on:** March 24, 2009, 01:30:51 AM »

Between the show's premiere in 1982 and the end of July 1986, the following weeks had fewer than five days:

11/22/82: Vicki Lawrence, Richard Kline - 2 missed days due to Thanksgiving
11/21/83: Didi Conn, Richard Gilliland - at least one missed day due to Thanksgiving
1/2/84: Rita Moreno, Richard Dean Anderson - 1 missed day due to New Year's Eve
11/19/84: Florence Henderson, Robert Mandan - 2 missed days due to Thanksgiving
12/31/84: Shelley Smith, Richard Kline - 1 missed day due to New Year's Eve
11/25/85: Abby Dalton, Ken Kercheval - 1 missed day due to Thanksgiving
12/30/85: Anita Gillette, Dick Cavett - 1 missed day due to New Year's Eve
6/30/86: Jo Anne Worley, Nipsey Russell - 1 missed day due to July 4th programming

The Vicki Lawrence/Henry Polic II session was week 202. Multiply that by 5 days a week, and that's 1,010 episodes. If we're going by the premise that the Conn/Gilliland week had four days, taking it with the other nine skipped episodes above, then we subtract 10 from the 1,010 and end up with the Friday show of the Lawrence/Polic week being #1,000. If the Conn/Gilliland week had only three days, though, we now subtract 11 from 1010, which leaves us with 999.

USA skipped the Conn/Gilliland week of reruns in the spring of 1992, so I don't know for sure how many episodes there were that week. (Sometime early in the '90s, USA had a change of policy regarding "Pyramid": If that week of reruns didn't have five full days, they just skipped it, whereas earlier in the run, they showed the partial week and filled the gaps with episodes from another week.) I don't have the TV Guide from this week, but I could check the microfilm the next time I'm visiting my alma mater. That might solve this mathematical puzzle.

Hope to have an answer for you (and myself) soon!

Brendan

snowpeck · « **Reply #8 on:** March 24, 2009, 02:44:44 AM »

Just throwing out the fact that the Bob Stewart folks carried over the ABC Network policy (ask any hardcore Dark Shadows fan) of assigning each production week 5 production numbers whether or not 5 shows were produced. Thus the anomaly of the final episode being show #1420, even though only 1404 were produced.

Greg

Steve Gavazzi · « **Reply #9 on:** March 24, 2009, 03:34:58 AM »

[quote name=\'TimK2003\' post=\'211084\' date=\'Mar 23 2009, 08:37 PM\']ISTR there was at least one or two years in the 80s when CBS aired a "bonus day" of Saturday Morning cartoons on the day after Thanksgiving/Friday.[/quote]
I definitely remember that, and it brings to mind something else, too -- I'd swear I remember someone telling me that in '94 or '95, there was a holiday where CBS aired an episode of The $25,000 Pyramid.

aaron sica · « **Reply #10 on:** March 24, 2009, 07:14:38 AM »

[quote name=\'Steve Gavazzi\' post=\'211110\' date=\'Mar 24 2009, 03:34 AM\']
[quote name=\'TimK2003\' post=\'211084\' date=\'Mar 23 2009, 08:37 PM\']ISTR there was at least one or two years in the 80s when CBS aired a "bonus day" of Saturday Morning cartoons on the day after Thanksgiving/Friday.[/quote]
I definitely remember that, and it brings to mind something else, too -- I'd swear I remember someone telling me that in '94 or '95, there was a holiday where CBS aired an episode of The $25,000 Pyramid.
[/quote]

There was - I believe on Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve of '93 (at least New Year's Eve), before the Sun Bowl, an episode of the $25,000 Pyramid (from 1982, IIRC) aired at 2pm.

BrandonFG · « **Reply #11 on:** March 24, 2009, 09:25:07 AM »

[quote name=\'aaron sica\' post=\'211111\' date=\'Mar 24 2009, 07:14 AM\']
There was - I believe on Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve of '93 (at least New Year's Eve), before the Sun Bowl, an episode of the $25,000 Pyramid (from 1982, IIRC) aired at 2pm.
[/quote]
Christmas Eve...the "Naughts and Crosses" episode from 1982, featuring Lynn Redgrave vs. Billy Crystal.

Not really a spectacular episode, except Dick is quite confused when Lynn uses "naughts and crosses" to describe the phrase "tic-tac-toe".

Vahan_Nisanian · « **Reply #12 on:** March 24, 2009, 12:43:44 PM »

Regarding Thanksgiving week 1983, does anyone what was scheduled for Thursday and Friday?

snowpeck · « **Reply #13 on:** March 24, 2009, 12:45:46 PM »

According to the New York Times, there was an episode on both Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve in 1992.

As far as the Conn/Gilliland week, NYT says only 2 episodes aired that week. Tuesday was preempted for The John F. Kennedy Memorial Mass (half an hour, aired on all 3 networks), Thursday for the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, and Friday for The Price is Right (children's programming aired from 11AM on.)

Greg

aaron sica · « **Reply #14 on:** March 24, 2009, 02:13:28 PM »

Additionally, for "Black Friday" 1986 and 1987, CBS also scheduled cartoons for those two Fridays as well.