The Game Show Forum
The Game Show Forum => The Big Board => Topic started by: Jim on October 09, 2003, 11:18:47 PM
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1.) Another BTB post reminded me of a question - how did those lips and moustaches get affixed to the boxes. Was it electronic or was a person under the game board? Those bottom rows seemed like a tight fit.
2.) Wasn't Mark Goodson a bit ticked off seeing people like Bob Barker and Bill Cullen on a competitor's game show? Weren't these guys risking the goodwill of the hand which fed them?
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I don't think Mark Goodson cared about that stuff, besides, Bill worked a lot for Bob Stewart around the same time and Bob Barker hosted TorC for Ralph Edwards concurrent with TPIR for a couple years, not to mention the beauty pageants.
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[quote name=\'Jimmy Owen\' date=\'Oct 9 2003, 11:44 PM\'] I don't think Mark Goodson cared about that stuff, besides, Bill worked a lot for Bob Stewart around the same time and Bob Barker hosted TorC for Ralph Edwards concurrent with TPIR for a couple years, not to mention the beauty pageants. [/quote]
My suspicion is that, like networks whose stars appeared on competitors' shows, they were glad for the publicity they got for their own shows.
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[quote name=\'Jim\' date=\'Oct 9 2003, 10:18 PM\']1.) Another BTB post reminded me of a question - how did those lips and moustaches get affixed to the boxes. Was it electronic or was a person under the game board? Those bottom rows seemed like a tight fit.[/quote]
It was undoubtedly a stage hand crawling underneath.
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Episode 68 (Peter vs. Virginia day 1) has a great shot of a stagehand turning box 18 about 25 minutes into the show!
Photo: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u5kS64Hb--eotDBosubeufBWMQvA84zv/view?usp=drive_link (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u5kS64Hb--eotDBosubeufBWMQvA84zv/view?usp=drive_link)
Video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IkLLDKJY1N7JBhJw5thfe21wldfDdJhl/view?usp=drive_link (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IkLLDKJY1N7JBhJw5thfe21wldfDdJhl/view?usp=drive_link)
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Episode 68 (Peter vs. Virginia day 1) has a great shot of a stagehand turning box 18 about 25 minutes into the show!
Photo: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u5kS64Hb--eotDBosubeufBWMQvA84zv/view?usp=drive_link (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1u5kS64Hb--eotDBosubeufBWMQvA84zv/view?usp=drive_link)
Video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IkLLDKJY1N7JBhJw5thfe21wldfDdJhl/view?usp=drive_link (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IkLLDKJY1N7JBhJw5thfe21wldfDdJhl/view?usp=drive_link)
Access denied. :'(
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Goodson may have felt it was good publicity for TPIR if Barker appeared on BTB, MG, etc.
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Access issues for my trilon stagehand image and video have been corrected. Sorry about that.
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2.) Wasn't Mark Goodson a bit ticked off seeing people like Bob Barker and Bill Cullen on a competitor's game show? Weren't these guys risking the goodwill of the hand which fed them?
So...there's two sides to this. Mark Goodson WAS very territorial about the celebrities who did his game shows. Pardon the namedrop, but Orson Bean told me that he wanted to do Hollywood Squares and opted not to because Mark Goodson didn't like to book celebrities who appeared on Hollywood Squares, and since Mark Goodson was the guy cranking out the most game shows, Orson stayed loyal to Goodson.
BUT...there was an elite level of game show talent where not even Mark Goodson would be willing to burn a bridge. Betty White did Hollywood Squares and Pyramid all those years because Mark Goodson was not about to ban Betty White from his game shows, and I would wager that deep down, Betty knew that.
I think it's safe to assume that Bill Cullen and Bob Barker, likewise, had "I'll do whatever the hell I want" privileges with Mark Goodson.
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In the early days of P+ Howard wanted to book Richard Dawson. A letter was sent to a VP at ABC asking permission to book Richard. ABC nixed the idea.
Betty, Cullen and Dick Martin were in a special category of celebs who could fill in on short notice if a previously-booked celeb became "unavailable".
We had once booked CNR for P+ and were all set to go. Allen came to the studio on tape day, learned of Charles's booking and threw a hissy fit, calling Charles a "creep". Charles was summarily unbooked and another celeb called in at the last minute, either BC or Dick Martin.
Close the closet door behind you, Allen.
Barker, Dawson, Rayburn, Convy, CNR, Brett and the other emcees were under contract so the chances of their appearing on non-GT shows were slim, but there were exceptions. Orson was probably under contract for TTTT but I'm guessing that ended when the show ended.
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BUT...there was an elite level of game show talent where not even Mark Goodson would be willing to burn a bridge. Betty White did Hollywood Squares and Pyramid all those years because Mark Goodson was not about to ban Betty White from his game shows, and I would wager that deep down, Betty knew that.
I note Betty did not do any of the New York-based Pyramids from 1973 to 1981, at least according to the episode guides. I don't know whether that was because of the travel involved or because she was being loyal to Allen's Password (even if it wasn't on the air at the time). In any case, that rule was broken a few weeks after the 1982-1988 version started.
Related: I think I remember somebody mentioning on the old board that, after Fannie Flagg appeared for a week on The Gong Show, that MG-BT told her to stop that if she wanted to continue being booked on Match Game.
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Betty, Cullen and Dick Martin were in a special category of celebs who could fill in on short notice if a previously-booked celeb became "unavailable".
We had once booked CNR for P+ and were all set to go. Allen came to the studio on tape day, learned of Charles's booking and threw a hissy fit, calling Charles a "creep". Charles was summarily unbooked and another celeb called in at the last minute, either BC or Dick Martin.
I remember seeing that. Allen mentioned CNR but Bill Cullen showed up on the next show. Considering he did Match Game, I didn't think that Allen had problems with CNR. Just goes to show you.
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BUT...there was an elite level of game show talent where not even Mark Goodson would be willing to burn a bridge. Betty White did Hollywood Squares and Pyramid all those years because Mark Goodson was not about to ban Betty White from his game shows, and I would wager that deep down, Betty knew that.
I note Betty did not do any of the New York-based Pyramids from 1973 to 1981, at least according to the episode guides. I don't know whether that was because of the travel involved or because she was being loyal to Allen's Password (even if it wasn't on the air at the time). In any case, that rule was broken a few weeks after the 1982-1988 version started.
Related: I think I remember somhe hosted a non G/Tebody mentioning on the old board that, after Fannie Flagg appeared for a week on The Gong Show, that MG-BT told her to stop that if she wanted to continue being booked on Match Game.
Betty likely had free rein on the shows she went on as her husband worked for Goodson and he hosted other producers for a spell as well (Liars Club/Stumpers).
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I remember seeing that. Allen mentioned CNR but Bill Cullen showed up on the next show. Considering he did Match Game, I didn't think that Allen had problems with CNR.
ISTR Karen Morrow was involved in that incident. I see Karen appeared with BC in October, 1980, shortly before Allen became ill. Does that sound about right? I kind of remember it being earlier than that but I could be off.
Fannie was not under contract so Goodson had no sway over whether she appeared on Gong. Sounds like more Internet rubbish to me.
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I remember seeing that. Allen mentioned CNR but Bill Cullen showed up on the next show. Considering he did Match Game, I didn't think that Allen had problems with CNR.
ISTR Karen Morrow was involved in that incident. I see Karen appeared with BC in October, 1980, shortly before Allen became ill. Does that sound about right? I kind of remember it being earlier than that but I could be off.
Sorry, this I don't remember.
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Close the closet door behind you, Allen.
Hah! Well that makes this exchange on Betty's hosted Password a bit more amusing after Allen tried to sit on the wrong side of the desk:
Allen: "I need to figure out what side I'm on."
Betty: "I know, we've had that trouble since for 4 years."
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Joyce DeWitt of Three's Company is another person that Allen had said was going to appear on Password Plus (he mentions it on the 2/5/79 episode with Betty White and Dick Martin but he doesn't mention if it's happening the very next week, just lists her along with other notables like Mary Tyler Moore and Elizabeth Montgomery as "friends who will be playing soon") who then seemingly last minute cancelled. Did you ever hear any reason for why that occurred, Chris? That name always stuck with me because she is someone that I have never seen do a game show before, and her and Charles are the only two celebrities I recall Allen mentioning would do the show that later didn't.
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Re: Betty White, I don’t think any specific loyalty to “Password” stopped her from doing “Pyramid” in the 70s — on her first 1982 appearance, she said “I couldn’t quite schedule it” before.
Actually, she appeared on “You Don’t Say!” four times in 1966 and 1967 while “Password” was still airing, and she and Allen then appeared together the week of October 30. G-T were unhappy with that show’s format and (early on) visual similarities to “Password” — Variety’s June 12, 1963 profile of Ralph Andrews and Bill Yagemann said that YDS! “is a program which Goodson and Todman are known to feel is a carbon of their own ‘Password’” — and the desk on YDS! was reconfigured by early 1964. But yeah, regardless of how G-T might have felt about her appearing on YDS!, they couldn’t exactly ban her from “Password” if they wanted to keep Allen happy.
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I think Betty not appearing on Pyramid or any other Stewart show in the 70s would have been a simple case of not having the time to travel to New York for taping. And once she started doing the MTM Show, she would have had even less time to travel across the country to do a NY based game show. I don't believe she was ever a panelist on the syndicated WML or TTTT even though she had done both shows in their network runs. Allen did do WML and TTTT in the 70s but he obviously had more free time on his hand to do that than Betty did with her acting obligations.
I think the CNR no-show on Password Plus was in 79, not in 80. There was one time on the CBS Password when Allen plugged Peter O'Toole and his wife Sian Phillips as the guests for the following week's nighttime show but they ended up not appearing.
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Access issues for my trilon stagehand image and video have been corrected. Sorry about that.
Thanks!
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I don't believe she was ever a panelist on the syndicated WML or TTTT even though she had done both shows in their network runs. Allen did do WML and TTTT in the 70s but he obviously had more free time on his hand to do that than Betty did with her acting obligations.
Betty did both shows but not often. Buzzr recently ran a week of TTTT from 1974 with both Betty and Allen on the panel.
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Don't know about Joyce DeWitt, sorry.