The Game Show Forum
The Game Show Forum => The Big Board => Topic started by: vexer6 on June 30, 2011, 10:18:45 PM
-
Anyone besides me watch this short-lived game show on Fox? I know most people thought it was boring, I thought it was pretty exciting, I saw the episode where Dr. Tim Hser(or whatever the heck his last name is) won over a million dollars. How come Fox never picked this show up as a regular series? It could've done well enough.
-
I didn't think the format was particularly strong or original. But more importantly, this was in a time where ABC's competitors wanted a Millionaire killer, which this show certainly was not. Quite the opposite -- it floundered so badly, that it would not shock me if its failure contributed to the cancellation of Greed a month later.
-
Hmmm... I'll stick to the one that uses a giant Computer and uses word puzzles. this version was kinda like an overblown "you bet your life" I'm sorry I guess you're the only one on liking this..
-
this version was kinda like an overblown "you bet your life" I'm sorry I guess you're the only one on liking this..
Beg pardon? How's this?
I thought it was OK because it was a game show, and other than the standard ones you could see every day. It wasn't ever going to catch and pass Millionaire, and I was OK with that. I was less OK with Greed being cancelled afterward.
-
Wouldn't surprise me, considering that i'm one of the few people who didn't totally hate "Set For Life" I wouldn't call it "good" by any means, but it's far from the worst thing i've seen on TV(the worst, apart from DOND would be "Temptation" now THAT show sucked hardcore! It had the cheapest and ugliest sets known to man and the most boring host imagineable, it's no wonder the producers of the show actually had to pay for airtime) Yeah the kids were annoying and the qualifying rounds definitely should've been televised(the filler could've been trimmed from the main game, then there'd be enough time to fit in the qualifying round) but otherwise it was tolerable enough, on a sidenote: it was hard to tell if Kimmel was just bored, if he's really like that all the time.
Anyways, "Chance Of A Lifetime" might not have had the most original format, but it somehow managed to make it work(mostly because of Elliott, i'd really like to see him host another game show like that) I liked that the contestants could wager money on the questions, I can't think of too many other game shows that did something like that. At the very least, you have to admit this show is better then Million Dollar Money Drop, the "all or nothing" format was what ultimately killed that show, would it have killed them to have a consolation prize or something?
-
this version was kinda like an overblown "you bet your life" I'm sorry I guess you're the only one on liking this..
Beg pardon? How's this?
I thought it was OK because it was a game show, and other than the standard ones you could see every day. It wasn't ever going to catch and pass Millionaire, and I was OK with that. I was less OK with Greed being cancelled afterward.
I heard somewhere that Greed was actually supposed to have a second season, but it got cancelled because the network president hated game shows, that also would explain why "Chance Of A Lifetime" didn't get picked up as a regular series like originally planned.
-
I heard somewhere that Greed was actually supposed to have a second season, but it got cancelled because the network president hated game shows, that also would explain why "Chance Of A Lifetime" didn't get picked up as a regular series like originally planned.
Yes, I understand that, I wasn't asking that. And hey, while we're at it, you can learn about the Proof or Not Real meme, since I don't recall Chance being considered for seriesdom. My question to that guy was how Chance resembles YBYL.
-
I don't recall Chance being considered for seriesdom.
Wiki reports it, but if you doubt that, ATGS posts confirm that it was announced (at some point) for a weekly time slot that never materialized. In fact, there's a "save this show" type website (http://"http://www.fortunecity.com/business/shares/1385/index.htm") still up on FortuneCity.
-Jason
-
Advertising was in place in multiple media for the continuation of the show as a weekly series. In print, on TV, and on the show's website. It looks horrible, but someone actually archived portions of the show's web page here: http://www.fortunecity.com/business/shares/1385/id20.htm
-
Guess I missed that. I sit stunned and corrected.
-
I knew I wasn't crazy! BTW I don't see how "Chance" resembles YBYL either.
-
S'all good. You should know by now that if there's one group that remembers horribly useless and obscure factoids, it's game show fans.
-
I don't recall Chance being considered for seriesdom.
Wiki reports it, but if you doubt that, ATGS posts confirm that it was announced (at some point) for a weekly time slot that never materialized. In fact, there's a "save this show" type website (http://"http://www.fortunecity.com/business/shares/1385/index.htm") still up on FortuneCity.
Thanks for that link. I look forward to seeing the continuing adventures of Demetrious Polychron this weekend when I check out Transformers: Dark of the Moon.
-M
-
Anyone besides me watch this short-lived game show on Fox? I know most people thought it was boring, I thought it was pretty exciting, I saw the episode where Dr. Tim Hser(or whatever the heck his last name is) won over a million dollars. How come Fox never picked this show up as a regular series? It could've done well enough.
That's "Hsieh". H-S-I-E-H.
I thought it was pretty exciting as well. :)
-
Anyone besides me watch this short-lived game show on Fox? I know most people thought it was boring, I thought it was pretty exciting, I saw the episode where Dr. Tim Hser(or whatever the heck his last name is) won over a million dollars. How come Fox never picked this show up as a regular series? It could've done well enough.
That's "Hsieh". H-S-I-E-H.
I thought it was pretty exciting as well. :)
Thanks! Nice to see another "Lifetime" fan. I wonder what game show Fox will do next, now that MDMD is officially cancelled.
-
That's "Hsieh". H-S-I-E-H.
I thought it was pretty exciting as well. :)
Thanks! Nice to see another "Lifetime" fan.
Aaannndddd...we officially have a WHOOSH!
-
Thanks! Nice to see another "Lifetime" fan.
Yeah, I imagine Tim is quite a big fan.
(I think you're missing it: THAT'S TIM HSIEH.)
-
Nice to meet you Tim! I have to ask, what was it like being on the show? Were you nervous?
-
Anyone besides me watch this short-lived game show on Fox? I know most people thought it was boring, I thought it was pretty exciting, I saw the episode where Dr. Tim Hser(or whatever the heck his last name is) won over a million dollars. How come Fox never picked this show up as a regular series? It could've done well enough.
I remember the contestant llamaing out on the credit card question (which was worth $10K):
Gordon (paraphrased): "According to the saying, a rolling stone gathers no what?"
Contestant: "Dust."
Brian
-
this show fared much better in Italy with two seasons, a primetime run and a PC game. here's the theme from the PC game and a winner from the primetime edition.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJzg82gxIhs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6zfwvwIaS8
-
Nice to meet you Tim! I have to ask, what was it like being on the show? Were you nervous?
It's been quite a while since I've told my story, but here goes. I'm telling the long version, so I have to break it into parts.
Part 1
It all really starts with the onset of WWTBAM in August 1999. Just like every other game show geek I was fascinated with the possibility of getting on and making a strong run. I had lost my one game of "Jeopardy!" in 1997, and had not thought that I would have another shot at significant money for knowing trivia. However, I don't have as much flexibility in my schedule to be able to take off to NYC at a moment's notice, so I did not try the phone game that month. Knowing that great ratings would bring the show back, I scheduled some vacation time for the middle of November, the next ratings "sweeps" period.
When the phone game was announced again for 11/99's shows, I planned my strategy for the phone game. As you may recall, passers of Round 1 would select ANY of the future tape dates and be placed into a pool of passers on that day selecting that particular future date. Then 30 people would be picked at random and called to set up the Round 2 phone game (which would occur 2 days before the tape date). I decided to enhance my chances of a Round 2 call by picking the latest possible tape date, figuring that Round 1 passers early in the month would dilute themselves out among all the earlier tape dates, It worked, and I got the Round 2 call at work one day (also a lucky break, since much of the day I'm not at my office desk, but with patients instead).
Round 2 consisted of five FF questions, and I think I got only 3 of 5 correct in my hurry to be as fast as possible (part of the process of determining the top 10 for the ROF at that time). I didn't think it was good enough, but it was enough to squeak by as the first alternate for a free trip to NYC. Having no one to accompany me at short notice, I made the flight across country from LA by myself. The driver who picked me up at Newark told me that someone had won the $1M the night before, and I watched John Carpenter's show in my room at the Empire Hotel.
All of the other contestants showed up as well the next day, so I sat on the sidelines with the 2nd alternate for the long day of taping. It was a Saturday, so Regis bantered with the audience about college football. In my tape group, Jane Oviatt from Minnesota won $250K, and everyone had a good time with the experience. I definitely wanted to come back.
Back in LA, the other networks were putting on their game shows to counter ABC's juggernaut. I saw "Greed", but did not want to risk my outcome to be affected so much by my teammates. Then NBC brought out "21", which was more my style. It would tape in Burbank on Saturdays to fit Maury Povich's schedule, also perfect for me. I called the phone line, went to take the written test, passed it, then played a mock game. A few weeks later I got a call to meet with the Exec. Producers Phil Guerin and Fred Silverman for another interview. Fighting LA traffic one Friday afternoon, I barely made it in time to sit down with them. The contestant coordinators told me that I would likely be called for a tape date depending on how many more shows they would be making.
(cont)
- Tim H.
-
Nice to meet you Tim! I have to ask, what was it like being on the show? Were you nervous?
Part 2
But I was not needed before "21" was canned by NBC. In the meantime, FOX had obtained the rights for an Australian game show called "It's Your Chance of a Lifetime", a blatant WWTBAM clone but with the interesting modifications of setting your own safety net (max of 50% of your bank) but not being able to walk away after you decide to see the next question
Since this show also taped in LA, it was also easy for me to try out for this one as well. I called in to schedule a testing/audition session (after answering about 10 trivia questions from the coordinator), and showed up at a high school auditorium in Burbank one evening. I was pleasantly surprised to see the staff from "21" running the audition! A written test of fill-in-the-blank questions was no problem again, and I had my second meeting with these same coordinators. Having known me from "21", they were already looking at me quite favorably. I think the clincher may have been my response to the standard "Why do you want to be on this show?" question. I compared the new game shows to "Antiques Roadshow", where someone finds an object which has been sitting up in the attic is actually worth a huge amount of money. I wanted to find out if any of the facts in my mental attic might be just as valuable. They really liked my answer, and gave me all the good vibes indicating that I would get a call soon.
The call did come, and I started making plans to play the game. First, I planned on making my own money tree to give myself a shot at the $1M prize. Then I thought about the initial "credit card" question rules: getting that first question right would give you the money listed on the balance of any credit card statement from the past 12 months up to $10K. I asked them if a downloaded statement from the American Express website would be satisfactory, and they said that was fine. So I went to Good Guys electronics store (who had a 30-day return policy while they still were in business, no questions asked) and bought a DVD player and a ReplayTV system with the extended warranties. I also went to Costco and picked up a few items I needed anyway, but didn't go hog wild. The balance remained under $2.5K.
Three consecutive days were scheduled to tape the initial 5 shows. FOX planned to air these shows on 5 consecutive nights, then make it a weekly show on Wednesday nights for the rest of the summer of 2000. They invited 10 contestants for the first tape day, planning to shoot one show (an hour long). Anyone not playing in the first show could come back for the next tape day. When we arrived at the studio, some of the rules were clarified by the producer and the game creator. With proper betting, we were not limited by a $1M ceiling. Also, we could "double-dip" and use two (or even three) "Second Chances" on a single question. These would be definite factors during my opportunity.
The order of contestants was announced to us. I was #5 in our group of 10. This was a good position for me, since I was able to observe the level of difficulty of the questions. On the first day, they only made it through 3 contestants, so I had to come back the next day. My audience guest, a friend of mine from residency, unfortunately would not be able to get off work that following afternoon. Having played Trivial Pursuit with me in the past, he said "Tim, you can totally do this!" He knew I had a good shot at running the table. But I had to bring in another friend, who had been a fraternity brother of my older brother (does that make him my fraternity brother-in-law?) for the next tape day.
(cont.)
- Tim H.
-
Nice to meet you Tim! I have to ask, what was it like being on the show? Were you nervous?
Part 3
That night I was so hyped with anticipation that I slept about 2 hours. I had scheduled the afternoon off, but still had appointments to see in the morning. I managed to make it through that day before heading to Hollywood in the afternoon. Contestant #4 made it part way through her stack before walking away, and then I took my turn. You can view my stack at this link (http://"http://www.fortunecity.com/business/shares/1385/id18.htm").
Since things were going without a hitch, I made a little change from my original wagering plan while sitting in the chair. On Question 8 I decided to wager $270K instead of $250K so that I would be in the position to win even more than the usual folks on WWTBAM. Being able to keep my Second Chances through to the end allowed me to remain aggressive in my betting to the end, and I had my confetti shower. After answering the last question, we did a re-shoot of Gordon Elliot asking me of my guess on the "switched" question, since he had forgotten to do that at the time. I then went back to the Green Room, where I received a lot of huzzahs from the waiting contestants. I left with my friend to join his wife for dinner, then I went home and called my family.
The thing which I didn't know was the airdate of the show! Each contestant played only against the stack, and Gordon Elliot was dressed in the same black suit and Regis-esque silver tie for all five shows, so show's producers could broadcast us in any order they wanted. The shows were scheduled to air the following Monday-Friday, and we taped my show on Wednesday. All I could do was contact friends and family and tell them to watch every night of the week. I figured I wouldn't be on Monday, because they wouldn't have a chance to run any spoilerish promos. I thought Tuesday would be ideal, because the buzz from my win would help for the next 3 episodes. But all I could do was let them decide, and wait to hear from them. ABC decided to drop in an extra episode of WWTBAM on Wednesday of that week to counter the effect of upstart Survivor (which had premiered a couple of weeks earlier), so FOX pushed back the 3rd-5th shows of IYCOAL to Thur-Sat, and they placed my show on Thursday. They also wanted me to do an online chat along with Gordon immediately after the show aired in the East. I told the producers that people in the West (including many of my friends) will not have seen the show before signing in for the chat session, but they said that 70% of the US will have had their chance to watch the show, so I made myself available at 6 PM PDT Thursday. I made it home from work early that evening, and called the phone # FOX provided so that I could talk to a transcriber who would do all the typing of my responses. You can read the chat transcript at this link (http://"http://web.archive.org/web/20010309220824/http://www.fox.com/community/chat/transcripts/chance_gelliott.htm").
(cont.)
- Tim H.
-
Nice to meet you Tim! I have to ask, what was it like being on the show? Were you nervous?
Part 4
My success on the show did not help the dismal ratings. Taping for additional shows were cancelled, as the time slot initially allocated for the weekly shows would have been suicidal versus Survivor. I started house-hunting that summer, knowing that my first check for $200K would come in October. FOX mailed it to me as scheduled, but it was delayed in a bizarre post office shuffle which sent it to 3 different mail facilities even though I lived within a couple miles of FOX's Beverly Hills offices. When I reported that it was over a week late, they actually sent me a second replacement check! When the initial check finally appeared in my mailbox, they instructed me to send it back to them.
I bought my house in West LA that winter with a down payment from my winnings, and I finished receiving the last of my 10 annual payments of $84K last September.
A couple of post-scripts. In 2004 at the Game Show Congress, I was able to talk with a couple of game show enthusiasts who were involved in IYCOAL's question-writing: Ben Tritle and Jerome Vered. I thanked from for giving me such a softball question worth $470K to me.
Secondly, I have had the same contestant coordinator from "21" and IYCOAL deal with my auditions for "On The Cover" and "ESPN Trivial Pursuit". They haven't sought me out, but they have no problem with me showing up for open castings. I kept ending up in their contestant pool, but only got to play "On The Cover" for them in 2005.
As far as the future, all I can say is stay tuned for more information.
Tim H.
-
this show fared much better in Italy with two seasons, a primetime run and a PC game. here's the theme from the PC game and a winner from the primetime edition.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJzg82gxIhs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6zfwvwIaS8
Where was my bikini babe??
- Tim H.
-
Wow, that's quite a story! Thanks for your time.