The Game Show Forum
The Game Show Forum => The Big Board => Topic started by: Bill Neuweiler on February 11, 2010, 02:13:48 PM
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Since there is only about a two mintue clip of the show floating about on youtube I am turning to the group to better understand the game. What are some of your anecdotes from the show's original run?
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The pilot and last episode are also available in the general trade circuit.
I can remember watching it a lot when it was on, but since I was only 5-6 at the time much of the game play I know was going over my head and only the set, theme and the celebs stick out in memory. But I do have a strong recollection of Celebrity Sweepstakes as the "anchor" show if you will for the big "NBC Shamrock Sweepstakes" gimmick of March 1976 as I recall involving champs from all of the NBC daytime shows playing Celebrity Sweepstakes ultimately for a chance at the biggest game show jackpot since the 50s. It's unfortunate that all the NBC daytime shows of that period are lost and in the process not allowed this event to be rediscovered by game show fans of the modern era.
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The pilot and NBC finale also exist.
It was one of my favorite shows from the '70s - too bad more of it wasn't avaiable.
It premiered Apr 1, 1974 at 12:30 and only ran until 12:55 because of the five-minute NBC news they had at the time. Joey Bishop and Carol Wayne didn't become regulars until several weeks into the show's run.
When it first started, they had three contestants, and each 3 days you remained champion you won a car. A guy named Stan Olson was on for 11 straight days in fall '74 and won 3 cars.
The show expanded to 30 min. when it moved to 10 AM in Jan 1975. Joey and Carol remained regulars, but Joey left during the last year of the show.
Sometime in '75 they reduced it to two contestants and you need five wins to get the car.
When it first started, they gave you $20 at the start of the game, and you could be $2, $5 or $10 on each celebrity. After a while, once you dropped below $10 you could only be $2 until you built it all back up again. Also, for a period of time they gave you $50 to start the game - I think this was around the time they reduced it to two contestants.
Joey even made a joke about it - he was away for a week at one point and said something like "the last time I was here you had 3 people sitting there, now you've only got 2" upon his return.
In summer 1976 they changed the format, in a week where Carol wasn't there - Bobby Troup and Julie London were two of the panelists that week.
The new format wasn't as good as the original format.
I remember pretending I was sick so I could stay home and watch the finale on 10/1/76. I was sorry to see the show go...the syndicated version wasn't seen in my area :(
I'm sure I'll think of more, but that's it for now.
Oh well...you asked!! :)
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[quote name=\'Eric Paddon\' post=\'235700\' date=\'Feb 11 2010, 03:02 PM\']The pilot and last episode are also available in the general trade circuit.
I can remember watching it a lot when it was on, but since I was only 5-6 at the time much of the game play I know was going over my head and only the set, theme and the celebs stick out in memory. But I do have a strong recollection of Celebrity Sweepstakes as the "anchor" show if you will for the big "NBC Shamrock Sweepstakes" gimmick of March 1976 as I recall involving champs from all of the NBC daytime shows playing Celebrity Sweepstakes ultimately for a chance at the biggest game show jackpot since the 50s. It's unfortunate that all the NBC daytime shows of that period are lost and in the process not allowed this event to be rediscovered by game show fans of the modern era.[/quote]
I have an audio cassette of the 1975 Shamrock Sweepstakes. Since I was in high school at the time, my mom was kind enough to tape it for me. I'll have to see if I can find it.
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They added the rule about betting $2 when your bank dropped below $10 because losing all one's money didn't eliminate a player from the game. They just gave both players $20 again! An alternate solution would have been to star the players with an odd number such as $19.
I remember the syndicated version and the only difference in the production I can recall is that the celebrities started the show seated off stage. When the show began the celebrities' desks would slide on down stage from behind the back drop. The doors would close behind them. The Celebrity Sweepstakes sign would drop into place and the show would go on.
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[quote name=\'alfonzos\' post=\'235719\' date=\'Feb 11 2010, 03:24 PM\']They just gave both players $20 again! An alternate solution would have been to star the players with an odd number such as $19.[/quote]
An alternate one. Certainly not a good one, but an alternate one.
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[quote name=\'alfonzos\' post=\'235719\' date=\'Feb 11 2010, 06:24 PM\']An alternate solution would have been to star the players with an odd number such as $19.[/quote]
I don't get what that would do for the show. If you go under, you still go under.
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[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' post=\'235718\' date=\'Feb 11 2010, 06:05 PM\']I have an audio cassette of the 1975 Shamrock Sweepstakes. Since I was in high school at the time, my mom was kind enough to tape it for me. I'll have to see if I can find it.[/quote]
I'm going to try to avoid spoiling the outcome, in case you do find the tape, Jimmy, but I recall the special broadcast was similar to "$64,000 Question," complete with an isolation booth.
Six contestants (one from each of the NBC game shows airing at that time) qualified to try to win $100,000! Carol Wayne would randomly draw the name of one of the contestants. That contestant and the host of the show he/she qualified on remained on stage, while all others were isolated off-stage. The host would read a multi-part question, and the contestant would later be asked to give his/her answers. The first to have all the right answers would win the money! If the contestant failed to answer all the parts right, a new name was drawn, and the host of that show he/she qualified on, read the question. Because of the show being 30 minutes long, it would (if necessary) carry over to the next day, in place of a regular Celebrity Sweepstakes episode.
It would've been nice to see all six hosts have the opportunity to read the question, but I won't say how many were involved, or which ones.
BTW, the multi-part question appeared in Maxene Fabe's book "TV Game Shows."
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Would certainly love to hear that! Hope the tape can be found since format wise we really wouldn't lose too much in an audio only format.
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[quote name=\'alfonzos\' post=\'235719\' date=\'Feb 11 2010, 06:24 PM\']They added the rule about betting $2 when your bank dropped below $10 because losing all one's money didn't eliminate a player from the game. They just gave both players $20 again![/quote]
Are you sure they both got $20? My memory has them both only receiving $2.
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Don's right...they only received $2.
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Speaking of the Shamrock Sweepstakes, this vendor is selling what purports to be Peter Marshall's "shooting script and operations schedule" copy of the Celebrity Sweeptakes broadcast of the finals.
http://www.jamespepperbooks.com/?page=shop...ategory_id=8714 (http://\"http://www.jamespepperbooks.com/?page=shop/browse&category_id=8714\")
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[quote name=\'Eric Paddon\' post=\'235790\' date=\'Feb 12 2010, 03:51 PM\']Speaking of the Shamrock Sweepstakes, this vendor is selling what purports to be Peter Marshall's "shooting script and operations schedule" copy of the Celebrity Sweeptakes broadcast of the finals.
http://www.jamespepperbooks.com/?page=shop...ategory_id=8714 (http://\"http://www.jamespepperbooks.com/?page=shop/browse&category_id=8714\")[/quote]
Forty-five bucks for a 21-page shooting script. Is it at least autographed?
If I win the $44M in tonight's Mega Millions, I might go for it. Nope, not even then.
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'235704\' date=\'Feb 11 2010, 03:18 PM\']When it first started, they gave you $20 at the start of the game, and you could bet $2, $5 or $10 on each celebrity.[/quote]
The contestants actually only picked one celebrity who they thought would know the answer. The audience decided the wagering odds by voting for which celebrity they thought knew it. As a result, each celebrity's odds could be anywhere from even money 1:1 all the way up to 99:1. The lower the odds, the more likely the audience thought the celeb knew the answer.
A correct pick earned the contestant the amount of his/her wager multiplied by the odds, so it was possible to win as much as $990 on one question ($10 wager on 99:1). As mentioned, a wrong pick and you only lost the wager amount.
A note about Carol Wayne. While both she and her sister Nina were famous for playing ditzy blondes (for example, Johnny Carson's assistant on "Rex Fern's Tea Time Movie"), they were actually quite intelligent. Because of her public persona, she quite often found herself being touted with 99:1 odds. Many times though, she was picked and got it right -- a windfall for the contestant.
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[quote name=\'Mr. Bill\' post=\'235945\' date=\'Feb 15 2010, 08:42 PM\']A note about Carol Wayne. While both she and her sister Nina were famous for playing ditzy blondes (for example, Johnny Carson's assistant on "Rex Fern's Tea Time Movie"), they were actually quite intelligent. Because of her public persona, she quite often found herself being touted with 99:1 odds. Many times though, she was picked and got it right -- a windfall for the contestant.[/quote]
Carol Wayne actually turned out to be one of those who would be trusted to come up with the correct answer; she actually had a brain inside that impossibly buxom body of hers. Carol would always call Jim McKrell "Sweet Jim".
There was some sort of legal disagreement in the early days of the show over its ownership, but I think it was settled by making it a co-production of Ralph Andrews and Burt Sugarman. They occasionally had some guests you wouldn't normally think of being game show celebrities, possibly from Sugarman's involvement with "The Midnight Special" - I remember an up and coming young singer from Australia named Olivia Newton-John playing the game once.
Finally, Shecky Greene once claimed on "Celebrity Sweepstakes" that Carol Wayne would never drown. How wrong he was.
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[quote name=\'davemackey\' post=\'235973\' date=\'Feb 15 2010, 11:41 PM\']Carol Wayne actually turned out to be one of those who would be trusted to come up with the correct answer; she actually had a brain inside that impossibly buxom body of hers.[/quote]
I'm sorry, I enjoyed Carol Wayne as much as any sixteen-year-old boy watching Celebrity Sweepstakes or the Tea Time Movie, and you can make all the noise you want to about Mr. Standards and Mr. Practices, but I refuse to believe that somebody with her image and something to prove, and whose husband was the producer, wasn't getting help.
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[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'235974\' date=\'Feb 15 2010, 08:58 PM\']and you can make all the noise you want to about Mr. Standards and Mr. Practices, but I refuse to believe that somebody with her image and something to prove, and whose husband was the producer, wasn't getting help.[/quote]At some point, if Carol is right every time, the contestants would start betting on her, the crowd would pick her, and it would all level out, right?
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If the wagering perameters were $2, $5 & $10, wasn't there a special wager that allowed players to "wager the favorittes" if they had at least $100(or was it $50)? I thought I remembered hearing something like that at some point in the run.
I DO remember that if no celebrity got the question right, a raspy sounding horn goes off & the question's been "scratched". That usually happens about once or twice per show. Also, if only one celebrity got it right, a triangle-like sound was heard/ Was there a bonus prize attatched to whoever picked that lone celeb?
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I remember an up and coming young singer from Australia named Olivia Newton-John playing the game once.
You're right. I was actually going over some old TVGuides from 1974 this past weekend and noticed that she played the game within a few weeks of its premiere.
At some point, if Carol is right every time, the contestants would start betting on her, the crowd would pick her, and it would all level out, right?
FWIW, the final question odds were based on how many questions celebrities missed during the show. For example, if someone missed 2 questions, they were 2:1 on the final question. Carol always seemed to have rather low odds at the end - meaning she usually only missed 1 or 2 questions the whole show.
I guess what I'm trying to point out is that contestants could make a lot of money on Carol during the regular game play, but on the final question where the champion was usually decided, they'd usually have to go elsewhere to make really big bucks.
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[quote name=\'Craig Karlberg\' post=\'235981\' date=\'Feb 16 2010, 04:33 AM\']If the wagering perameters were $2, $5 & $10, wasn't there a special wager that allowed players to "wager the favorittes" if they had at least $100(or was it $50)? I thought I remembered hearing something like that at some point in the run.
I DO remember that if no celebrity got the question right, a raspy sounding horn goes off & the question's been "scratched". That usually happens about once or twice per show. Also, if only one celebrity got it right, a triangle-like sound was heard/ Was there a bonus prize attatched to whoever picked that lone celeb?[/quote]
IIRC, if only one celeb had the right answer, the contestant could bet up to $100 (If they had that much). This happened once when Bill Cullen was on, and he was the only one with the right answer.
Carol Wayne was nice to look at, and smart as a whip to boot. I don't think she was "helped" in any way with the answers since that would be considered "rigging" which would not make S&P happy.
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Apparently some celebrities did get briefed with questions and answers because Gil Fates in his book on WML when talking about Standards and Practices, reprints in full the disclaimer from "Celebrity Sweeptakes".
"Some of the questions were based on general and specific knowledge and information furnished by the celebrities to the production company prior to the show. Celebrities have been furnished with joke answers AS WELL AS WITH SOME OF THE QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS." (emphasis added).
This wasn't too dissimilar from the disclaimer that ran over the end of HSQ which Fates also quotes. "The areas of questioning designed for each celebrity and possible bluff answers are discussed with each celebrity in advance. In the course of their briefing, ACTUAL QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS MAY BE GIVEN OR DISCERNED BY THE CELEBRITIES." (emphasis added)
If there was any thought that some celebs on Sweepstakes might get some questions ahead of time, apparently the disclaimer was enough to satisfy Standards and Practices.
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[quote name=\'BillCullen1\' post=\'236023\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 03:04 AM\']I don't think she was "helped" in any way with the answers since that would be considered "rigging" which would not make S&P happy.[/quote]Why? Its still the contestant choice to wager and bet, is it not?
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[quote name=\'Modor\' post=\'236037\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 12:44 PM\'][quote name=\'BillCullen1\' post=\'236023\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 03:04 AM\']I don't think she was "helped" in any way with the answers since that would be considered "rigging" which would not make S&P happy.[/quote]Why? Its still the contestant choice to wager and bet, is it not?[/quote]
I can see a theoretical difference, though. On Hollywood Squares, it doesn't much matter whether the celebrity was given the correct answer or not, since the responsibility of knowing is up to the contestant by agreeing or disagreeing with whatever was provided. On Celebrity Sweepstakes, the game as presented is different. A contestant is supposed to guess whether or not a given celebrity is smart enough to know the answer to a trivia question. If certain celebrities were given answers that they wouldn't otherwise know, it changes the entire complexion of the game since the contestants have no way of knowing which celebrities were being fed answers.
Doesn't make the game "rigged" since the contestants are all equally in the dark, but it does make the central conceit of the show less relevant.
Also, turns out we once had a member here who claimed to have been told that celebrities were fed answers (http://\"http://gameshow.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=13363&st=0&p=159542&#entry159542\"), but that the process eventually stopped. On the other hand, Curt Alliaume spoke to both Jim MacKrell and producer Ralph Andrews (http://\"http://www.curtalliaume.com/celebswe.html\") who insisted that celebs weren't getting help. Still (on the other other hand), if the first story is to be believed, it sounds like Ralph Andrews ran the show on the up-and-up and that Sugarman was the one feeding answers. MacKrell wouldn't really have been in a position to know for sure one way or the other.
I remain convinced that Mrs. Sugarman wanted to show she was more than a dumb blonde, whether that was actually true or not, and hubby helped make that happen.
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[quote name=\'davemackey\' post=\'235973\' date=\'Feb 15 2010, 11:41 PM\']There was some sort of legal disagreement in the early days of the show over its ownership, but I think it was settled by making it a co-production of Ralph Andrews and Burt Sugarman.[/quote]
Yes, and the revised format of the show, used during the show's last few months, was billed solely as a Ralph Andrews Production (Executive Producer was Larry Hovis, of "Hogan's Heroes.")
Incidently, during the time that Burt Sugarman's name was billed for the show, the Alan Thicke theme music was used. The original theme music, by Stan Worth, returned when the new format, mentioned above, was used.
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[quote name=\'Eric Paddon\' post=\'236035\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 12:26 PM\']Apparently some celebrities did get briefed with questions and answers because Gil Fates in his book on WML when talking about Standards and Practices, reprints in full the disclaimer from "Celebrity Sweeptakes".
"Some of the questions were based on general and specific knowledge and information furnished by the celebrities to the production company prior to the show. Celebrities have been furnished with joke answers AS WELL AS WITH SOME OF THE QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS." (emphasis added).
This wasn't too dissimilar from the disclaimer that ran over the end of HSQ which Fates also quotes. "The areas of questioning designed for each celebrity and possible bluff answers are discussed with each celebrity in advance. In the course of their briefing, ACTUAL QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS MAY BE GIVEN OR DISCERNED BY THE CELEBRITIES." (emphasis added)
If there was any thought that some celebs on Sweepstakes might get some questions ahead of time, apparently the disclaimer was enough to satisfy Standards and Practices.[/quote]
I'll expand on what Matt wrote above.
I put this disclaimer on my web site when it first started, pulling it straight from the Fates book. A couple of years later, I got an urgent note from Jim MacKrell (which led to an hour-and-a-half phone conversation -- he's a heck of a nice guy). Stars were *not* given the answers in advance, according to Jim (and Ralph Andrews, who wrote me later on). I don't know how they got so many correct answers -- perhaps the questions were easier as the show rolled along.
Other tidbits:
- Carol Wayne may have been as smart as most of us think; MacKrell said when they weren't taping, she always had her nose in a book.
- MacKrell, by the way, is the correct spelling of his last name; some productions used an alternate spelling to keep people from pronouncing it "mackerel" (like the fish).
- MacKrell is a staunch defender of Lin Bolen, who gave him valuable advice on hosting (i.e. the stars and the contestants are the focus, not you).
- He knew the show was coming to an end when he was offered a pilot for another production company while Sweepstakes was still running. However, this was not good news for him; he and his wife had just bought a new house based on the assumption it would be around awhile longer.
- There was a brief flurry of interest in reviving the show around 2000 or so, in the wake of the success of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire and the Hollywood Squares revival. (At one point Burt Sugarman's office contacted me to ask how they could find Ralph Andrews.)
- Bill Armstrong was one of the funniest people ever, according to MacKrell -- much more so off camera than on.
I'll dig up my notes on the MacKrell conversation sometime.
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- Bill Armstrong was one of the funniest people ever, according to MacKrell -- much more so off camera than on.
Usually the show had four male celebrities and two females. One taping day, one of the female celebrities couldn't make it on time, and Bill sat in for the first three shows, meaning there were five men on the panel, and Carol. The female celebrity (don't remember who it was) did show up for the last two shows.
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'236058\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 05:08 PM\']
- Bill Armstrong was one of the funniest people ever, according to MacKrell -- much more so off camera than on.
Usually the show had four male celebrities and two females. One taping day, one of the female celebrities couldn't make it on time, and Bill sat in for the first three shows, meaning there were five men on the panel, and Carol. The female celebrity (don't remember who it was) did show up for the last two shows.
[/quote]
Well, who did the announcing that day? I think the alternate announcers were Joe Seiter and John Harlan.
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[quote name=\'davemackey\' post=\'236072\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 09:54 PM\'][quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'236058\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 05:08 PM\']
- Bill Armstrong was one of the funniest people ever, according to MacKrell -- much more so off camera than on.
Usually the show had four male celebrities and two females. One taping day, one of the female celebrities couldn't make it on time, and Bill sat in for the first three shows, meaning there were five men on the panel, and Carol. The female celebrity (don't remember who it was) did show up for the last two shows.
[/quote]
Well, who did the announcing that day? I think the alternate announcers were Joe Seiter and John Harlan.
[/quote]
Ian can confirm, but I think Bill multi-tasked that day as panelist and announcer. I remember Dick Tufeld announcing the second syndie run.
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[quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'236038\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 01:16 PM\']but it does make the central conceit of the show less relevant.[/quote]
Surely you don't mean this, Matt! :)
The "P" key is two doors over to the right.
/Mr. Sugar Daddy hasn't had any problems finding women -- remember who he's married to now...
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[quote name=\'Mr. Bill\' post=\'236089\' date=\'Feb 18 2010, 07:52 AM\']Surely you don't mean this, Matt! :)
The "P" key is two doors over to the right.[/quote]
Please to be looking up "conceit (http://\"http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/conceit\")."
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[quote name=\'Mr. Bill\' post=\'236089\' date=\'Feb 18 2010, 10:52 AM\'][quote name=\'Matt Ottinger\' post=\'236038\' date=\'Feb 17 2010, 01:16 PM\']but it does make the central conceit of the show less relevant.[/quote]
Surely you don't mean this, Matt! :)
The "P" key is two doors over to the right.
/Mr. Sugar Daddy hasn't had any problems finding women -- remember who he's married to now...
[/quote]
He went from boobs to legs. He's moving down in the world.
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After going to Warner Brothers about five times in 1976 to try out as a contestant on You Don't Say!, a contestant coordinator read off the names of those who were to stay. It turns out he read every name except mine and one other guy's. I drove home feeling pretty low. However, about a month later I got a phone call from Ralph Andrews Productions saying that they had bought back Celebrity Sweepstakes from Burt Sugarman, and NBC wanted to revive the ratings, and could I go right to the NBC studios in Burbank day-after-tomorrow? You bet!
Each member of the studio audience had a box with six buttons so they could vote on the celebrities' abilities to answer the questions. This supposedly determined the odds that appeared. Ralph Andrews himself "instructed" the audience about voting, and this education resulted in the odds going much higher, the contestants winning more money, and the ratings climbing. That was the official story, but I would bet some software "adjustments" were involved, also.
The contestant coordinators told us that Carol Wayne had been "prompted" so as to gain a persona of a "dumb blonde" who is "actually smart." Ralph Andrews made a huge point that under his new management, there would be no more prompting. So, the CC told us, Carol Wayne was going back to being "dumb" again—except for show biz questions, where she wasn't bad.
I went on for the second show of the week. The celebrities were Bill Cullen, Elaine Joyce, Carol Wayne, Alan Sues, Norm Crosby and Pat Carroll. I lost on Elaine not being able to spell "mayonnaise" and Pat Carroll not knowing that a humming bird is the only bird that can fly backwards, but for the most part I called on Bill Cullen, and he didn't let me down! For the final "bet," you could either bet "none," or bet it all. During the commercial break, Ralph Andrews would come up on the set and take a peek at how we bet. I bet it all twice on Bill Cullen and ended up with $25,000. A year later I was a contestant on Ralph Edwards' Knockout, created by Mark Maxwell-Smith and hosted by Arte Johnson. Won $10,000 on this one, for $35,000 in two years total. To put this in perspective, a few years earlier we bought our house for $42,500—worth about 20 times that now.
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Thank you Clanky! Great story.
Just out of curiosity, would you happen to remember approx when your show aired? Brendan was kind enough to send me some celebrity information (thanks Brendan) and it might help us fill in some of the missing dates. It sounds like you were on towards the end of the run after they changed the format. I'm pretty sure it was sometime in July or early August when that occurred. If Carol was on the panel, it must have been at least the second week of the format change because she wasn't there for the first week.
It's interesting that they changed the format and less than three months later were cancelled. Obviously it didn't boost ratings enough!
Ian can confirm, but I think Bill multi-tasked that day as panelist and announcer. I remember Dick Tufeld announcing the second syndie run.
I think Bill probably did double-duty, but that's just an educated guess based on 35-year-old memories of watching it.
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Well, it just so happens that I have a copy of the NBC Contestant Prize Form, and the air dates are August 24-26. Here's another interesting side-bar: besides the cash, I "won" a bunch of sponsor goodies, one of which was Liv-a-snaps dog food coupons, worth $25.00. They came by registered mail. So if they would go to this trouble for dog food, think of what they will do for a check for $25,000! Well, it came by regular mail in an windowed check envelope! Another good thing was that they had income averaging back then.
I got a call inviting me to be in the audience for the last show. There weren't two vacant seats together so my wife and I didn't sit together. Apparently, this last show is the only one preserved on video. Early on during a scan of the audience, the camera pauses on my (then) wife Debbie. Another thing I noticed was during the final "all or nothing at all" bet, they placed plywood blinders in front of the celebrities so you couldn't watch them write their answer. When I was a contestant, I could watch them write, and that was very helpful!
Alan Sues would verbally wander off with his answers, causing everyone to laugh with references to "whips and chains," for example. Everyone would laugh except Jim McKrell, that is.
On another show the final question was "Which president introduced bathtubs to the White House?" Only Alan Sues knew it was Millard Fillmore. That sure looked suspicious to me. But actually, this information was based on a 1917 satirical piece written by H. L. Mencken, and so wasn't true at all! A hoax that lived on, even without the Internet!
This reminds me of another contemporary Ralph Andrews show 50 Grand Slam with Tom Kennedy as host. A question in the "Musicals" category was who wrote the music for Silk Stockings? The contestant answered "Cole Porter," and Tom said no, it was George Gershwin! After a commercial break they acknowledged that Cole Porter was indeed right, and to compensate for the contestant's "loss of concentration," they made some concession or other. I did a statistical analysis on the probability of a contestant making it all the way to $50,000 with their rules, and found it to be very low. They went to two general knowledge games a day, but still the $50,000 was never won.
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One more thing—when you are a contestant, you have tons of "waiting time" to kill. The producers tend to select "nice people," and it becomes very easy to "bond" with the other contestants. During my time on Knockout, I talked quite a bit with Janet, NBC's S&P representative who was "babysitting" us. She said that the nicest people, the ones that being with was the most pleasurable, were those on Name That Tune. At the other end of the spectrum were the 50 Grand Slam contestants.
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[quote name=\'clanky06\' post=\'236120\' date=\'Feb 18 2010, 09:22 PM\']Alan Sues would verbally wander off with his answers, causing everyone to laugh with references to "whips and chains," for example. Everyone would laugh except Jim McKrell, that is.[/quote]
Hopefully, he helped the contestants there. Unlike that one time on "Cross-Wits"...
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[quote name=\'clanky06\' post=\'236120\' date=\'Feb 18 2010, 09:22 PM\']I got a call inviting me to be in the audience for the last show. There weren't two vacant seats together so my wife and I didn't sit together. Apparently, this last show is the only one preserved on video. Early on during a scan of the audience, the camera pauses on my (then) wife Debbie. Another thing I noticed was during the final "all or nothing at all" bet, they placed plywood blinders in front of the celebrities so you couldn't watch them write their answer. When I was a contestant, I could watch them write, and that was very helpful![/quote]
I've mentioned this before here, but on Match Game's Super Match, even though the contestant's back was turned, a very aware contestant could hear Richard Dawson's Magic Marker strokes on the card as he wrote his answer, possibly discerning the number of letters in his response.. I wonder if that was ever beneficial in any way.
Alan Sues would verbally wander off with his answers, causing everyone to laugh with references to "whips and chains," for example. Everyone would laugh except Jim McKrell, that is.
Which is probably why McKrell told Sues to shut up -- his words -- during the final good-bye speech.
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[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' post=\'236108\' date=\'Feb 18 2010, 05:22 PM\']
Ian can confirm, but I think Bill multi-tasked that day as panelist and announcer. I remember Dick Tufeld announcing the second syndie run.
I think Bill probably did double-duty, but that's just an educated guess based on 35-year-old memories of watching it.
[/quote]
He did. I saw one of those three shows and he announced from his celebrity contestant position on the set.
[quote name=\'calliaume\' post=\'236167\' date=\'Feb 19 2010, 09:44 AM\']Alan Sues would verbally wander off with his answers, causing everyone to laugh with references to "whips and chains," for example. Everyone would laugh except Jim McKrell, that is.
Which is probably why McKrell told Sues to shut up -- his words -- during the final good-bye speech.
[/quote]
Not as harsh as "shut up". What he said was "...and you try to be quiet". Shut up (or even STFU) may have been what Jim was thinking, however.