The Game Show Forum
The Game Show Forum => The Big Board => Topic started by: chris319 on August 06, 2025, 12:42:52 AM
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Going back to 1980, is it connect to say that Card Sharks replaced 1/2 hour of the Letterman morning show when Letterman was cancelled, or is it correct to say that the Letterman half hour was replaced by Las Vegas Gambit?
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Well...Neither. August 4 is the day that Dave was scaled back to 60 minutes. October 27 is the first day after he was cancelled altogether:
https://daytimetvarchive.com/grids/1980.html
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According to the chart, one hour of Letterman was replaced by L.V. Gambit and Blockbusters at 10:00 am on Monday, October 27. So it is not accurate to say Letterman was replaced by Card Sharks.
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https://daytimetvarchive.com/grids/1980.html
Thanks for this link - that was a dive down a rabbit hole as I was reminiscing my youth and my knowlege of game show listing times !
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https://daytimetvarchive.com/grids/1980.html
Thanks for this link - that was a dive down a rabbit hole as I was reminiscing my youth and my knowlege of game show listing times !
In seeing that laid out in such stark and consistent grid terms, it's clearer than ever why those that I knew who were at NBC at that point never quite fully recovered from the experience. That's a dizzying number of moves even under ideal circumstances--certainly exacerbated by the fact it was a solid third in prime time and lost the Olympics that year to boot. Oh, and this was also the dawn of the Jean Doumanian era at SNL.
I had almost completely forgotten about the launch of TEXAS in the midst of all of this--and if you think Letterman underwhelmed, you should have heard what the general managers of their Dallas and Houston stations said about an effort that not only couldn't hold a candle to the prime time hit it hoped to be confused with, it even was far weaker than the remaining cast in Bay City--and ultimately help accelerate the complete AW franchise demise.
Had Hill Street Blues and at least the breadcrumbs of something respectable not happened, it's my belief, based both on hindsight and the reflections of some I came to know personally, we might have seen an outright mutiny from NBC in short order. Talk about desperation.
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I've always wanted a complete history of Wheel of Fortune especially 1980 to 1982. This was when Wheel was getting roundly beaten by The Price Is Right, Family Feud, or reruns of The Love Boat. In my opinion, the two things that saved daytime Wheel were the low ratings expectations NBC was getting at the time and moving it to 10:30 AM Eastern in 1982 when it's only network competition were reruns of Alice. What I also found interesting in looking at the ratings books was Daytime Wheel was matching or beating the first half of The Price Is Right starting in April or May of 1983. Before the premiere of the syndicated version.
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I've always wanted a complete history of Wheel of Fortune especially 1980 to 1982. This was when Wheel was getting roundly beaten by The Price Is Right, Family Feud, or reruns of The Love Boat. In my opinion, the two things that saved daytime Wheel were the low ratings expectations NBC was getting at the time and moving it to 10:30 AM Eastern in 1982 when it's only network competition were reruns of Alice. What I also found interesting in looking at the ratings books was Daytime Wheel was matching or beating the first half of The Price Is Right starting in April or May of 1983. Before the premiere of the syndicated version.
https://www.amazon.com/Id-Like-Buy-Vowel-Spinning/dp/B0DC6PWBL8
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The David Letterman Show and Another World each went from 90 to 60 minutes to free up an hour for the debut of Texas.
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https://www.amazon.com/Id-Like-Buy-Vowel-Spinning/dp/B0DC6PWBL8
Legit question - I like Wesley Hyatt's contributions to social media, and happy to support, but for those who have read it - worth $32?
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Legit question - I like Wesley Hyatt's contributions to social media, and happy to support, but for those who have read it - worth $32?
Yes! I very much enjoyed it.
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https://www.amazon.com/Id-Like-Buy-Vowel-Spinning/dp/B0DC6PWBL8
Legit question - I like Wesley Hyatt's contributions to social media, and happy to support, but for those who have read it - worth $32?
Of the surprising number of pop culture authors I know personally, Wes is second to me behind our boy Adam. I always buy their new works as soon as they're released. Like Adam, he is an exceptionally thorough researcher. However, his real strength is as a reference book author, so his prose histories (like this one) can bury you in detail. I'm not sure I needed to know the exact birthdate of every daytime executive who ever came into Wheel's orbit. I also got a little bored near the end with what seemed like an endless and somewhat repetitive parade of contestants and their experiences. With those caveats, it is a definitive history of the show (to the point of publication) and well worth it, especially with a "happy to support" nudge.
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With the cancellation of High Rollers and HS it was a big blow to HQ. Maybe a little over a year later, H and Q broke up and Merrill went solo with Battlestars, using Jay Redack and many of the HS crew. Battlestars was later cancelled and then brought back to life.
One day Fred Silverman himself came to the G-T offices to watch a run-thru of Blockbusters. I have never seen so much worry written all over one person's face.
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It's still a little frustrating looking back and finding out ratings in those slots were noticeably lower for quite a while after the cancellation of a game show in favor of some other genre (soap opera, etc.) Quite a few of those shows probably deserved longer runs than they got.
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It's still a little frustrating looking back and finding out ratings in those slots were noticeably lower for quite a while after the cancellation of a game show in favor of some other genre (soap opera, etc.) Quite a few of those shows probably deserved longer runs than they got.
Indeed. Networks always seemed to treat game shows as disposable, yet would give a soap opera several reprieves before they would cancel one. For reference, NBC wanted to give Search For Tomorrow a 13 week renewal to Spring 1987, even though it had been DOA for years, but Proctor and Gamble insisted that it be gone by the end of 1986. Hence why Wordplay and Blockbusters premiered on consecutive weeks.
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Indeed. Networks always seemed to treat game shows as disposable, yet would give a soap opera several reprieves before they would cancel one. For reference, NBC wanted to give Search For Tomorrow a 13 week renewal to Spring 1987, even though it had been DOA for years, but Proctor and Gamble insisted that it be gone by the end of 1986. Hence why Wordplay and Blockbusters premiered on consecutive weeks.
Years ago I remember stumbling across a Broadcasting magazine article (https://www.worldradiohistory.com/hd2/IDX-Business/Magazines/Archive-BC-IDX/86-OCR/BC-1986-11-10-OCR-Page-0076.pdf#search=%22blockbusters%20texas%22) mentioning NBC's plans for the Blockbusters reboot. The article mentioned the original show getting decent ratings, but IIRC NBC wanted the time slot to accommodate Texas moving to 11 am (Wheel replaced Blockbusters). Meanwhile, Texas tanked and was gone at the end of 1982.
In hindsight, said (NBC daytime VP Brian) Frons, Blockbusters "probably should have never been taken off."
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No mention of demos in the Broadcasting article.
The networks' chief complaint against game shows was that the demos were too old. We were always told only to look at the share numbers (usually in the teens in those days).
What share was Letterman getting when he was cancelled? I still have all that ratings data but would have to turn my apartment upside down to find it.