How revolutionary was 9/4/72?

[Neumms]

I was 5 years old for the big premieres of Joker's Wild, TNPIR and Gambit so my notes aren't that good, but looking back, those three shows looked brighter and a lot more modern than NBC's games. (I believe their slate was Concentration, $OTC, the Squares, Jeopardy and WW&W.)

Were the CBS efforts considered trailblazing back then? (At least as far as design goes?) Did any other shoes have chaser lights and eggcrate displays before those three? Who was behind it all, the network guys?

[chris319]

Were the CBS efforts considered trailblazing back then? (At least as far as design goes?) Did any other shoes have chaser lights and eggcrate displays before those three? Who was behind it all, the network guys?

TPIR was done with more style than any other game show before it (though other shows had previously used eggcrate readouts). CBS had very little to do with it, other than suggesting Bob Barker for the daytime show. The TPIR style can be attributed to these people (several of whom I have worked with in a previous life):

1. Frank Wayne -- came up with the format for the present-day version of TPIR;

2. Ted Cooper -- G-T production designer who conceived the physical staging of the show, among other things;

3. Edd (and Beverly?) Kalehoff and Mike Malone -- gave the show a bright, contemporary musical sound which holds up to this day;

4. Johnny Olson -- TPIR is heavily laden with prize copy -- John brought the otherwise drab and dreary copy to life with his delivery;

5. Marc Breslow -- an innovative, imaginative director with a keen sense of visual aesthetics;

6. Mark Goodson -- owned the show and gave the production elements his imprimatur.

These were the wizards behind the present-day verison of TPIR.

[Jimmy Owen]

Matt Ottinger would be quick to point out that there was an NBC game not mentioned in the first post.

[NickintheATL]

[quote name=\'chris319\' date=\'Sep 5 2005, 11:50 PM\']1. Frank Wayne -- came up with the format for the present-day version of TPIR;

2. Ted Cooper -- G-T production designer who conceived the physical staging of the show, among other things;

3. Edd (and Beverly?) Kalehoff and Mike Malone -- gave the show a bright, contemporary musical sound which holds up to this day;

4. Johnny Olson -- TPIR is heavily laden with prize copy -- John brought the otherwise drab and dreary copy to life with his delivery;

5. Marc Breslow -- an innovative, imaginative director with a keen sense of visual aesthetics;

6. Mark Goodson -- owned the show and gave the production elements his imprimatur.

These were the wizards behind the present-day verison of TPIR.
[/quote]

And it needs to go on the record that none of these people are still working on the show... and I think the show has suffered in recent years because of creative turnover. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy the show, but not as much as it's earlier years, it was truly a beauty to watch back in the day.

(And before I get flamed, yes, I know some of them are dead. Go away Zach.)

[chris319]

Am I the only one who thinks the explanatory language of the pricing games has become almost incomprehensible? I saw Let 'Em Roll for the first time a few weeks ago (proof that I seldom watch the show any more) and Barker did not make it at all clear how the game is played (it was either that or the fact that I was half asleep at the time). Speaking of Let 'Em Roll, how many times has a contestant walked away with the money and given up winning the car?

[Steve Gavazzi]

[quote name=\'chris319\' date=\'Sep 6 2005, 01:26 AM\']Speaking of Let 'Em Roll, how many times has a contestant walked away with the money and given up winning the car?

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Excluding Season 28, 15 times.

(Seriously, that's a pretty easy stat to find if you know which site to look on.

[Jimmy Owen]

To paraphrase Henry Ford, "I don't know everything but I surround myself with people who do"

[chris319]

15 times

Out of ... ?

[clemon79]

[quote name=\'Steve Gavazzi\' date=\'Sep 5 2005, 10:30 PM\'](Seriously, that's a pretty easy stat to find if you know which site to look on.
[/quote]
I'm not sure why that's such an easy stat to find on the cited page without wading through several not-remotely-intuitively-located-or-laid-out stat pages, which I'm guessing Chris has neither the time or interest to do.

[Robair]

The real impact of 9/4/72 was the fact that CBS was back as a major player in the daytime (non-soap) wars for the first time in nearly 10 years. With the March 72 premiere of "The Amateur's Guide to Love", CBS went nearly ten years without scheduling a new daytime game show since the 1962 premiere of "To Tell the Truth", and for years only had the two games "TTTT" and "Password". CBS probably figured that it was just easier to slot repeats of "The Lucy Show" and "My Three Sons" than to try to get anything close to the twin acme of "TTTT" and "Password". But for CBS to turn around and get three new games on the schedule in one day -- each wilh innovative, exciting elements and enhanced production values -- it was nothing short of exciting to see three new games in one day.

And Lord, did we need the new blood to provide us with the diversion. Not long after these shows premiered, we had the extremely tragic news of the slayings of Israeli athletes in Munich. As ABC's Jim McKay held court on ABC, there were the new shows on CBS, diversions from the tragedy, as game shows seem to be sometimes.

"Price" in particular, since it's still on the air, holds a special place. It's been the only game show ever to continually run for over thirty years. Over dinner Sunday night post-"TPIR Live", a bunch of us (including the evening's host Todd Newton and announcer Randy West) were marvelling over the durability of the show, and how it's galvanized families where, in some cases, you have three generations watching the show together. It's how CBS has been able to keep "Guiding Light" and "As the World Turns" on lo these many years, and the same phenomenon has occurred with "Price".

[MTCesquire]

[quote name=\'NicholasM79\' date=\'Sep 5 2005, 11:21 PM\']And it needs to go on the record that none of these people are still working on the show... and I think the show has suffered in recent years because of creative turnover. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy the show, but not as much as it's earlier years, it was truly a beauty to watch back in the day.
[/quote]

*Hops out of the lurking shadows to make a quick statement*

I agree 100% with you there, but I have noticed that they're starting to make the Showcases a bit more creative.  It's not just "your showcase contains prizes revealed as we examine the word (insert word that barely links the three/four prizes together)" anymore.  Now it's stuff like "(Model of the day) visit a psycharist", "(Model of the day) goes on vacation", things like that.

Now, by no means am I saying the quality of this Showcase "skits" are on the level of what we were shown decades ago w/ Johnny Olsen around, but at least they're a step up from what we've seen in the past couple years.

*Crawls back into lurking hole*

[Matt Ottinger]

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' date=\'Sep 6 2005, 12:17 AM\']Matt Ottinger would be quick to point out that there was an NBC game not mentioned in the first post.[/quote]
Yes, another one that makes the original poster's point.  One of the reasons that NBC's game shows looked old at that point was that, basically, they WERE old, and even though Three on a Match had a little color to it, it had the same late-sixties look as all the others.

Any effort to date key moments for a genre is going to be somewhat arbitrary, but as arbitrary dates go, 9/4/72 was certainly a major moment in our history.

[TimK2003]

[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' date=\'Sep 6 2005, 12:17 AM\']Matt Ottinger would be quick to point out that there was an NBC game not mentioned in the first post.[/quote]
Yes, another one that makes the original poster's point.  One of the reasons that NBC's game shows looked old at that point was that, basically, they WERE old, and even though Three on a Match had a little color to it, it had the same late-sixties look as all the others.

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Would it also be safe to assume that at that time, most of the NBC shows were out of 30 Rock in smaller studios where set creativity was kind of limited??

The new CBS Big 3 all originated from CBS TV City, where at least Studio 33 for Joker and Price at least was considerably larger than a studio 8A or a 6B and thus the sets could be bigger

[SRIV94]

[quote name=\'TimK2003\' date=\'Sep 6 2005, 11:30 AM\']Would it also be safe to assume that at that time, most of the NBC shows were out of 30 Rock in smaller studios where set creativity was kind of limited??

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Good assumption--of those shows only HSq was taped in Burbank.

Unfortunately, I'm not familiar enough with the NY studios to know dimensions.  Is/was 8H the largest (sure looks it from all these years of watching SNL, but I don't know for sure)?

Doug

[Neumms]

[quote name=\'TimK2003\' date=\'Sep 6 2005, 11:30 AM\']Would it also be safe to assume that at that time, most of the NBC shows were out of 30 Rock in smaller studios where set creativity was kind of limited??

The new CBS Big 3 all originated from CBS TV City, where at least Studio 33 for Joker and Price at least was considerably larger than a studio 8A or a 6B and thus the sets could be bigger

[snapback]95932[/snapback]

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Good point. The more I think about it, though, Gambit seems like the third wheel. Good game, cool name, fresh graphic design on the cards, and the music was sort of electronic, but the set was lousy--the wood grain and curtains, the toy car on the phonograph turntable. It seems odd considering Heatter and Quigley had probably the best set on NBC with the Squares. Was Gambit in a smaller studio? Is that why they didn't typically if ever have a wide shot of the whole set?