The most miscast hosts

[TLEberle]

8Doing something closer to what "The Rich/Money List" may have worked better, i.e. Of these 7 movies released in the 1960s, which 4 won Best Picture?

To their (eventual) credit, later in the run Greed did do "Which 4 of these X things fall under category Y?" and the upper shelf questions became playable and enjoyable. You still have the problems of one person dictating terms for everyone else and forcing players to play the game blind, which means teams quit out before the money reaches those last two levels.

[Jeremy Nelson]

Ricki Lake for Game Show Marathon...

She might have been alright on a relationship show, but she did not host any of the GSM episodes past competence. I don't know if CBS was going after a "name", but to have her as host and stick Todd Newton in the prize van was a bit baffling.

Bill Cullen on P+. He had the format down slick but was just too slow. Apologies to fans of Bill Cullen.

Same could be said for him on a few other shows. I, for the most part, like Bill, but he could bring shows to a halt.

[GrandGame1440]

Drew Carey. He's not the right guy to be hosting TPIR.

If I've offended any of Drew's fans, so be it.

Not me, I agree with you.  I enjoyed his sitcom, and I enjoyed him on "Whose Line?".  But do I enjoy him on TPiR?  Umm, no is an understatement.

[Jimmy Owen]

Admittedly, by definition. a Chris is right here.

I meant you, for the record.

/Disturbed by Owen's knowledge of tampons.

Well, when you have women in your life, it's something that goes with the territory.

[Twentington]

Agreed. Chuck injected the appropriate level of humor during the early questions. Once they got past the Terminator and got into the bigger money, he made things a little more serious.

Even if Chuck did tone himself down a bit for Greed, I'm used to him being the more off-the-cuff, informal type. So seeing him play Greed more seriously was just jarring to me. A formal hosting style makes sense Greed, but IMO it doesn't fit Chuck.

[Chief-O]

Bill Cullen on P+. He had the format down slick but was just too slow. Apologies to fans of Bill Cullen.

I remember reading the same criticism of him with regards to "Joker". It was years ago, and I don't remember who said it/where it was, but I believe it mentioned that Bill was just better suited to slower formats.

[clemon79]

Doing something closer to what "The Rich/Money List" may have worked better, i.e. Of these 7 movies released in the 1960s, which 4 won Best Picture?

And that's completely reasonable, because it is hard knowledge which you can reasonably expect a trivia buff to have come across at some point in their life, because it is available through a number of varied and discrete sources. Eamonn Holmes' Unfinished Business sucked for a lot of other reasons, but the material was at least fair.

As opposed to the poll questions, where we have no proof in a lot of cases if the poll results were even published in a format visible to the typical American, ever. (I'm guessing Gallup had or has a publication of some kind beyond their website. but how many people know that, much less subscribed to it?) And even if they were, it is unfair to ask a question based on an infographic that was only ever publicly published in the June 2, 1998 issue of the McPaper. Hot Potato got away with it because it was Hot Potato, didn't try to be anything else, and wasn't being played for Two Million Damn Dollars.

[J.R.]

She might have been alright on a relationship show, but she did not host any of the GSM episodes past competence. I don't know if CBS was going after a "name", but to have her as host and stick Todd Newton in the prize van was a bit baffling.

That whole thing was a misfire. Seemed they wanted to take a snarky/sarcastic approach to the whole genre, turning it into some sort of parody vehicle.

Not saying the shows had to be straight tributes or revered like something religious, but the whole "LOL Aren't old game shows really cheesy?!" tone wasn't the best approach.

Shame, really. Great concept though.

[Vahan_Nisanian]

How about Paul Reubens on You Don't Know Jack? Most people were so used to seeing him as Pee-Wee, that they just couldn't imagine him as someone else. Doesn't help that it the same year he was charged for a crime he didn't even think about committing (but that's for another time).

[TLEberle]

Doesn't help that it the same year he was charged for a crime he didn't even think about committing.

So you know what Paul thinks about?

[MikeK]

How about Paul Reubens on You Don't Know Jack? Most people were so used to seeing him as Pee-Wee, that they just couldn't imagine him as someone else. Doesn't help that it the same year he was charged for a crime he didn't even think about committing (but that's for another time).

I'm playing the Proof or Not Real card on the second sentence.  That sentence has zero merit.  YDKJ happened a decade after his arrest and Pee Wee's Playhouse was pulled (excuse the punnage) off the air.  And the last sentence...  You Don't Know Jack was recorded in 2000/2001, and aired in the summer of 2001.  If you're referring to his pornography arrest, Wiki says it happened in 2002.

No balls, two strikes.

[TLEberle]

And actually, I don't think Paul was miscast on YDKJ anyhow. He played the part of Douche Host Nonpareil to the hilt, and it worked. Which was about the only thing that worked.

[Vahan_Nisanian]

How about Paul Reubens on You Don't Know Jack? Most people were so used to seeing him as Pee-Wee, that they just couldn't imagine him as someone else. Doesn't help that it the same year he was charged for a crime he didn't even think about committing (but that's for another time).

I'm playing the Proof or Not Real card on the second sentence.  That sentence has zero merit.  YDKJ happened a decade after his arrest and Pee Wee's Playhouse was pulled (excuse the punnage) off the air.  And the last sentence...  You Don't Know Jack was recorded in 2000/2001, and aired in the summer of 2001.  If you're referring to his pornography arrest, Wiki says it happened in 2002.

No balls, two strikes.

But I thought his home was raided in 2001. And I know about his 1991 arrest. You don't have to remind me of that.

[BillCullen1]

Bill Cullen on P+. He had the format down slick but was just too slow. Apologies to fans of Bill Cullen.

Bill was brought in on PP to fill in for Allen Ludden who had surgery. I believe I read that Ludden requested him. Because he walked with a limp from childhood Polio, they had work around him there, going to commercials when they otherwise would not, etc. Clearly the PP set was not built with Cullen in mind, but he and everyone else knew it was only a temporary thing.

Now to address the original question. I've got quite a few names here. We've already mentioned Davidson and Anderson. Here's a few others - remember these guys?:

Mike Darrow - The $128,000 Question and Jackpot (revival) - replaced on both shows by Alex Trebek and Geoff Edwards, respectively
Dick Martin - Mindreaders - great on "the Cheap Show" - a bit awkward on this GT show
Jon Bauman - Hollywood Squares portion of MGHS Hour - the less said the better
Bill Cullen - The Love Experts - a Bob Stewart show and it was a paycheck for him
Rolf Benershke (sp?) - Wheel of Fortune - what did Merv see in this guy?
Patrick Wayne - Tic Tac Dough '90 - weeee looooooose
Pat Finn - Jokers Wild - better on Shop Till You Drop
Lynn Swann - TTTT '90 - brought in to replace Gordon Elliott, who had his own contractual problems
Chris Wylde - Taboo - I still have nightmares from what I saw on YouTube

[Mr. Armadillo]

Doesn't help that it the same year he was charged for a crime he didn't even think about committing.

So you know what Paul thinks about?

In his defense, it was You Don't Know Jack, not You Don't Know Paul.