EW's Top 19 Game Shows

[dale_grass]

[quote name=\'jmangin\' post=\'244246\' date=\'Jul 15 2010, 09:32 PM\'][quote name=\'MikeK\' post=\'244245\' date=\'Jul 15 2010, 10:06 PM\']Maybe he's a little long-winded since that was from James' 6th episode.  As time went on, did he get better?  I was in diapers when Barker replaced him on the nighttime show.[/quote]
Yes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDHeRezSgOw...feature=related
[/quote]
And he even hugs the contestants.  Barker was a pompous ass compared to James.

Fixed that for myself.

[calliaume]

I think Chris passed along some information long ago that Dennis had problems memorizing the various games on TPiR, which caused no end of frustration for the production staff.  He may have gotten better as they went along, but it's also likely all of Dennis' shows each season were taped over a couple of weeks, which probably didn't help.

I actually saw Dennis more often than Barker the first few years (since CBS's TPiR aired in time slots that prevented me from watching the show except during vacations -- WNBC aired James' TPiR Saturday evenings at 7:30), and I preferred him to Bob.  I've said here before I always thought Barker was condescending with the contestants (admittedly, with some reason), and while Dennis James occasionally had to spell things out for a clueless contestant, I never felt as if he thought they were stupid.

Didn't the 1977 NBC daytime version of Name That Tune have returning champions?

[golden-road]

[quote name=\'calliaume\' post=\'244264\' date=\'Jul 16 2010, 09:33 AM\']I think Chris passed along some information long ago that Dennis had problems memorizing the various games on TPiR, which caused no end of frustration for the production staff.  He may have gotten better as they went along, but it's also likely all of Dennis' shows each season were taped over a couple of weeks, which probably didn't help.

I actually saw Dennis more often than Barker the first few years (since CBS's TPiR aired in time slots that prevented me from watching the show except during vacations -- WNBC aired James' TPiR Saturday evenings at 7:30), and I preferred him to Bob.  I've said here before I always thought Barker was condescending with the contestants (admittedly, with some reason), and while Dennis James occasionally had to spell things out for a clueless contestant, I never felt as if he thought they were stupid.

Didn't the 1977 NBC daytime version of Name That Tune have returning champions?[/quote]

As on the nighttime version, only if they win the Golden Medley. The James version had them return win or lose; and winning a certain number of days won a car.

[calliaume]

[quote name=\'golden-road\' post=\'244269\' date=\'Jul 16 2010, 09:29 AM\'][quote name=\'calliaume\' post=\'244264\' date=\'Jul 16 2010, 09:33 AM\']Didn't the 1977 NBC daytime version of Name That Tune have returning champions?[/quote]

As on the nighttime version, only if they win the Golden Medley. The James version had them return win or lose; and winning a certain number of days won a car.
[/quote]
Come to think of it, I think the 1974 NBC edition had some ridiculously low prize for winning the Golden Medley ($2,000?), so returning champions wasn't a big deal.

I wonder if Lin Bolen ever took a serious look at the prize budgets on her shows around that era.  High Rollers and Celebrity Sweepstakes were giving away piles of money, but the other shows (Name That Tune, Winning Streak, Hollywood Squares, Jackpot, Jeopardy) could probably get by on $15,000/week.

[chris319]

He seemed much more genuine and human on TPIR than Barkertron in the same era.

Well put. I once put this to Roger the D. and he was taken aback by it. He asked why I felt that way and "human" was one of the words I used in my answer.

Dennis knew the games but sometimes tripped up, nearly revealing a One Bid price after an overbid or turning over the wrong price in Grocery Game. I'm told Frank Wayne used to scream at him and clearly he and Goodson didn't feel he was as capable as they had hoped. Barker was stiff and mechanical but didn't make mistakes so he got the nighttime show.

[golden-road]

[quote name=\'calliaume\' post=\'244270\' date=\'Jul 16 2010, 11:55 AM\']Come to think of it, I think the 1974 NBC edition had some ridiculously low prize for winning the Golden Medley ($2000?), so returning champions wasn't a big deal.

I wonder if Lin Bolen ever took a serious look at the prize budgets on her shows around that era.  High Rollers and Celebrity Sweepstakes were giving away piles of money, but the other shows (Name That Tune, Winning Streak, Hollywood Squares, Jackpot, Jeopardy) could probably get by on $15,000/week.[/quote]

$200 a song, $2000 for a win. But the $2000 was actual cash, whereas the nighttime show's top prize was $15,000 in prizes, so there's taxes to think about. Also, as per Wiki, by the end of the run, the GR was five songs, and a car was won for four wins, but like the nightshift, you had to win the GR to return.

[TLEberle]

[quote name=\'clemon79\' post=\'244236\' date=\'Jul 15 2010, 05:13 PM\'][quote name=\'alfonzos\' post=\'244232\' date=\'Jul 15 2010, 04:42 PM\']I have always found Dennis James's attitude professional and spirited.[/quote]I found his explanation of the Grocery Game painful.[/quote]This reminds me of the crew of guys that I'd hang out with during high school. After lunch, we'd go to the library and play a board or card game until the end of the period. And one of our number would do that sort of out loud walkthrough of the rules, to make sure that he knew what he was doing. Almost every turn it was like that.

It felt like Dennis was trying to make sure that HE knew the rules, instead of explaining them to the contestant.

"Your goal is to 'buy' between $6.75 and seven dollars worth of the groceries here. Choose a product and however many of it you want. You can continue doing that until you run out of stuff, go over $7, or reach the goal. If you reach the goal, you win."

It should be that simple. Instead, it was a verbal enema.