-
Today marks the 30th anniversary that NBC had good news & bad news for game show fans.
GOOD NEWS
Art James would host his first California show doing Blank Check, Barry-Enright's NBC entry since Tic Tac Dough back in 1956. Alan Thicke composed the Chump Change clone tune. And when somebody won big, dixieland jazz music fanfare played which was later used on The Joker's Wild in 1977.
Merv Griffin had Wheel of Fortune. This would go on to tie Concentration & Hollywood Squares as the longest running NBC daytime game. Chuck Woolery & Susan Stafford hosted. The top dollar; $500 (round 1)/$1,000 (Rounds 2-up). Contestants would go shopping & would put the remaining winnings on a gift certificate. Very few placed it ON ACCOUNT (just like giving the clues on Pyramid), though once I did witness one gentleman who won $200, didn't like the cheapest prize & quickly said On Account.
The show had a short lived hour long expansion. The Bonus Round came in 1981, Chuck exited & Pat entered, then Susan left & out came Vanna! Wheel made NBC appearances on Santa Barbara, The A-Team, 227 & Gimme A Break (LA Law was when the show was on CBS & Bob Goen hosted).
BAD NEWS
NBC decides to expand Another World to an hour. This would start the domino theory & would ruin afternoon game shows for good. Here's the order of how it fell (like 10 pins in a bowling alley)...
Days of Our Lives
As The World Turns
One Life To Live
General Hospital
All My Children
Guiding Light
Young & The Restless
The last afternoon games the networks had...
ABC: The $20,000 Pyramid (1978)
CBS: Press Your Luck (1986)
NBC: The Match Game/Hollywood Squares Hour (1984)
-
[quote name=\'GSWitch\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 06:25 AM\']The last afternoon games the networks had...
ABC: The $20,000 Pyramid (1978)
[snapback]70186[/snapback]
[/quote]
That was odd scheduling ABC had during that show's final months at 2PM.
Ninety minutes of soap operas (Ryan's Hope and All My Children) from 12:30-2:00 and two hours of soap operas (One Live To Live, General Hospital and The Edge Of Night) from 2:30-4:30 with The $20,000 Pyramid in the middle of the big soap block from 2-2:30.
-
Art had been west before. "Temptation" on ABC was also a California origination back in 67. As Zach might tell you, Art is probably the only host to have national game shows originating from Cleveland, Cincinnati and Atlanta as well as the usual Montreal, NYC and LA.
-
Contestants would go shopping & would put the remaining winnings on a gift certificate. Very few placed it ON ACCOUNT (just like giving the clues on Pyramid), though once I did witness one gentleman who won $200, didn't like the cheapest prize & quickly said On Account.
In the beginning, the remaining money automatically went On Account. They didn't add the gift certificate option until sometime well into their first year. I remember another contestant who won something like $700 in round one and elected to put the whole thing On Account because he was eying a bigger prize in round two. Chuck warned him he could lose it all with a bankrupt. He won the next round and was able to get the prize he wanted. I didn't see that happen very often though.
Also, on the same date, "Celebrity Sweepstakes" moved from 12:30 p.m. to 10 a.m., meaning I could no longer watch it at lunch!
-
[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 09:00 AM\']Also, on the same date, "Celebrity Sweepstakes" moved from 12:30 p.m. to 10 a.m., meaning I could no longer watch it at lunch!
[snapback]70199[/snapback]
[/quote]
You could've watched it at brunch. That move to 10:00 was what drove the nail into the coffin of the CBS run of The Joker's Wild, wasn't it?
-
[quote name=\'GSWitch\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 05:25 AM\']The last afternoon games the networks had...
NBC: The Match Game/Hollywood Squares Hour (1984)
[snapback]70186[/snapback]
[/quote]
Didn't SCRABBLE/SCATTERGORIES air in many markets in SANTA BARBARA's 3PM ET slot?
At least if this September 2004 thread (http://\"http://gameshow.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5552&view=findpost&p=57637\") is any indication.
Doug
-
[quote name=\'SRIV94\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 09:44 AM\'][quote name=\'GSWitch\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 05:25 AM\']The last afternoon games the networks had...
NBC: The Match Game/Hollywood Squares Hour (1984)
[snapback]70186[/snapback]
[/quote]
Didn't SCRABBLE/SCATTERGORIES air in many markets in SANTA BARBARA's 3PM ET slot?
At least if this September 2004 thread (http://\"http://gameshow.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=5552&view=findpost&p=57637\") is any indication.
Doug
[snapback]70205[/snapback]
[/quote]
They did air from 3PM-4PM in a lot of areas, but the network's official time slot for Scrabble and Scattergories was 11AM for Scrabble and IIRC Noon for Scattergories. By 1993, a lot of NBC stations didn't air NBC shows at the network-sanctioned time slot. That is, if they aired the shows at all.
-
Just a few minutes ago, Christian music station K-Love mentioned that today is Wheel's 30th anniversary (and they even played Changing Keys!)
Brian
The Jehovah's Witnesses distribute Mad magazine?
-
[quote name=\'zachhoran\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 09:01 AM\']They did air from 3PM-4PM in a lot of areas, but the network's official time slot for Scrabble and Scattergories was 11AM for Scrabble and IIRC Noon for Scattergories. By 1993, a lot of NBC stations didn't air NBC shows at the network-sanctioned time slot. That is, if they aired the shows at all.
[snapback]70210[/snapback]
[/quote]
I think I brought up this question once and don't recall if I ever got an answer (and the "Search" function here didn't help on this one). Did any affiliate show one of the two shows in the SCRABBLE93/SCATTERGORIES hour but not the other (and/or did any affiliate show both shows but not back-to-back)? I find it strange that the network-mandated time for the two shows had a half hour separation in there.
Doug
-
Interesting thing (to me) about the 1993 run of Scrabble and Scattergories is they ran seamlessly back-to-back. In my city, where the hour of games began at 11am, Scrabble ended at 11:30 (and I do mean 11:30--not 11:28) followed immediately--without even a station ID slide--into Scattergories. There was also no network announcer talking over the end credits.
Sure, they were done on the cheap, but they were still entertaining and was I sorry to see them go.
-
[quote name=\'GSWitch\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 06:25 AM\']
The last afternoon games the networks had...
ABC: The $20,000 Pyramid (1978)
[snapback]70186[/snapback]
[/quote]
I consider anything starting at 12:00pm to be an "Afternoon" game, so the show that would qualify for this on ABC would be MG90, at least on the Eastern Time Zone, as it aired at noon.
-
[quote name=\'SRIV94\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 10:31 AM\'][quote name=\'zachhoran\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 09:01 AM\']They did air from 3PM-4PM in a lot of areas, but the network's official time slot for Scrabble and Scattergories was 11AM for Scrabble and IIRC Noon for Scattergories. By 1993, a lot of NBC stations didn't air NBC shows at the network-sanctioned time slot. That is, if they aired the shows at all.
[snapback]70210[/snapback]
[/quote]
I think I brought up this question once and don't recall if I ever got an answer (and the "Search" function here didn't help on this one). Did any affiliate show one of the two shows in the SCRABBLE93/SCATTERGORIES hour but not the other (and/or did any affiliate show both shows but not back-to-back)? I find it strange that the network-mandated time for the two shows had a half hour separation in there.
Doug
[snapback]70218[/snapback]
[/quote]
Channel 5 in Saginaw showed "Scrabble" at 12:30pm but didn't clear "Scattergories." The Lansing station showed the hour at 3pm.
-
[quote name=\'aaron sica\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 10:40 AM\'][quote name=\'GSWitch\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 06:25 AM\']
The last afternoon games the networks had...
ABC: The $20,000 Pyramid (1978)
[snapback]70186[/snapback]
[/quote]
I consider anything starting at 12:00pm to be an "Afternoon" game, so the show that would qualify for this on ABC would be MG90, at least on the Eastern Time Zone, as it aired at noon.
[snapback]70221[/snapback]
[/quote]
Hmmmmm. Yes, but I can see letting this one slide since the Central, Mountain and Pacific time zones would've presented the show at eleven in the morning and our witch does reside in one of those time zones.
-
[quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 09:38 AM\']Interesting thing (to me) about the 1993 run of Scrabble and Scattergories is they ran seamlessly back-to-back. In my city, where the hour of games began at 11am, Scrabble ended at 11:30 (and I do mean 11:30--not 11:28) followed immediately--without even a station ID slide--into Scattergories. There was also no network announcer talking over the end credits.
Sure, they were done on the cheap, but they were still entertaining and was I sorry to see them go.
[snapback]70219[/snapback]
[/quote]
KPRC in Houston also had those shows on @ the 11:00 am hour.
-
[quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 10:38 AM\']Interesting thing (to me) about the 1993 run of Scrabble and Scattergories is they ran seamlessly back-to-back. In my city, where the hour of games began at 11am, Scrabble ended at 11:30 (and I do mean 11:30--not 11:28) followed immediately--without even a station ID slide--into Scattergories. There was also no network announcer talking over the end credits.
Sure, they were done on the cheap, but they were still entertaining and was I sorry to see them go.
[snapback]70219[/snapback]
[/quote]
It surprised me when they went straight to Scattergories as well, without even so much as an NBC peacock. In Norfolk, the two aired from 10-11 am, so no flipping back and forth between that and TPiR. I really did enjoy both shows, even with the "Less Money Syndrome," and always looked forward to my days off from school. I too was sorry to see them both go, esp. since Norfolk never picked up another daytime game after those two (we never got Caesar's Challenge--at least not until the USA reruns in summer 94).
Has it really been 12 years? Zach, that was a rhetorical question, I know 1993+12=2005, and that it'll be 12 years on the 18th.
-
[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 01:08 PM\'] I really did enjoy both shows, even with the "Less Money Syndrome," and always looked forward to my days off from school.[/quote]
Ahh yes. I was fortunate enough to have chicken pox the day these two shows premiered. I saw it once; was shocked that it wasn't just like the USA reruns on at the time; and I went back to Price.
-
[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 01:08 PM\'][quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 10:38 AM\']Interesting thing (to me) about the 1993 run of Scrabble and Scattergories is they ran seamlessly back-to-back. In my city, where the hour of games began at 11am, Scrabble ended at 11:30 (and I do mean 11:30--not 11:28) followed immediately--without even a station ID slide--into Scattergories. There was also no network announcer talking over the end credits.
Sure, they were done on the cheap, but they were still entertaining and was I sorry to see them go.
[snapback]70219[/snapback]
[/quote]
It surprised me when they went straight to Scattergories as well, without even so much as an NBC peacock.
[snapback]70246[/snapback]
[/quote]
It seems to me that the original announced plan was to make the hour "The Scrabble/Scattergories Hour," basically do both shows on the same set and have Chuck toss to Dick at the bottom of the hour. (You will remember that the two themes for the shows were similar-sounding.) Most likely, someone said that there would be a better chance for clearance if they made officially made the one show two shows and not demand that the affiliates clear the entire hour. However, they still ran seamless between the two shows (and made up for it by placing the station break in the last break of "Scrabble").
-
[quote name=\'Don Howard\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 08:35 AM\']That was odd scheduling ABC had during that show's final months at 2PM.
Ninety minutes of soap operas (Ryan's Hope and All My Children) from 12:30-2:00 and two hours of soap operas (One Live To Live, General Hospital and The Edge Of Night) from 2:30-4:30 with The $20,000 Pyramid in the middle of the big soap block from 2-2:30.
[snapback]70195[/snapback]
[/quote]
CBS also did some scheduling like that in the '70s, too, don't forget...
From 11/7/77 to 2/1/80 - From 11:30am (11/7/77 to 4/23/79) to 4:00pm, virtually wall to wall soaps (save for a half hour at either 12:00 or 1:00, depending on when Y&R did not air) until 3:30pm, when it was a sitcom rerun, whether it be AITF (until 9/78), M*A*S*H (9/78 to 9/79), or One Day at a Time (9/79 to 2/80).
-
And NBC got into the act, as well, for a time in 1982 when WoF was the only GS on their daytime lineup (excluding semi-game Fantasy)...it was surrounded by sitcom reruns (Diff'rent Strokes, The Facts of Life) and soaps (Texas, Search For Tomorrow, The Doctors).
Chuck Donegan (The Illustrious "Chuckie Baby")
-
Regarding the sitcoms: nowadays, most sitcoms hit syndication after 4 seasons and/or 100 episodes. In the case of a midseason replacement, it's 5 seasons. However, in reading old "Broadcasting" magazines, I noticed many sitcoms didn't hit syndication until years later. For example, Facts of Life came out in 1986 or so. Was this to keep the networks from competing with their daytime reruns?
-
[quote name=\'fostergray82\' date=\'Jan 6 2005, 10:26 PM\']Regarding the sitcoms: nowadays, most sitcoms hit syndication after 4 seasons and/or 100 episodes. In the case of a midseason replacement, it's 5 seasons. However, in reading old "Broadcasting" magazines, I noticed many sitcoms didn't hit syndication until years later. For example, Facts of Life came out in 1986 or so. Was this to keep the networks from competing with their daytime reruns?
[snapback]70334[/snapback]
[/quote]
Actually (and I think someone said this in another thread...apologies for repeating myself)...a lot of sitcoms didn't hit syndication until their NETWORK (prime-time) run was over...And if they did, sometimes their titles were different, to avoid confusion with the first-run shows. "Marcus Welby, MD" became "Robert Young, Family Doctor". "Happy Days" got "Again" tacked on to the title. "Laverne & Shirley" got "& Company" tacked on to the title.
And I know I've said THIS before, but I miss the daytime reruns. I fell in love with a lot of sitcoms that way!
-
And IIRC, Emergency! did the same thing when the syndie version added the "One" at the end of the tittle.
As far as the Scrabble/Scattegories hour goes, I only remember the 1993 version of Scrabbke though I think I saw Scattegories at least once(perhaps it was on satellite).
Seemless TV is nothing new but it sure has its roots way back in 1977 to a certain extent.
-
...a lot of sitcoms didn't hit syndication until their NETWORK (prime-time) run was over...And if they did, sometimes their titles were different, to avoid confusion with the first-run shows. "Marcus Welby, MD" became "Robert Young, Family Doctor". "Happy Days" got "Again" tacked on to the title. "Laverne & Shirley" got "& Company" tacked on to the title.
In the 60s and early 70s, when daytime sitcom reruns were very popular on daytime lineups, most shows wouldn't hit syndication until well after their primetime runs had ended. This was because the network was still running the show in daytime. Cases in point: "Bewitched" ended primetime in '72, but didn't hit syndication until '73 because it was still on in daytime; "Brady Bunch" ended in primetime in '74 but didn't hit syndication until '75; and "I Love Lucy" stayed on CBS daytime for years, so it didn't hit syndication until well after it's primetime run had finished. In the late '70s, producers realized what a goldmine syndication could be, and that's when the shows hit syndication while still on the network.
After a while the daytime repeats must have grown stale, witness CBS's Labor Day 1972 decision to drop the repeats and add three game shows.
-
[quote name=\'Ian Wallis\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 09:06 AM\']
After a while the daytime repeats must have grown stale, witness CBS's Labor Day 1972 decision to drop the repeats and add three game shows.
[snapback]70388[/snapback]
[/quote]
It still continued to some degree after 1972. CBS still had as many as three sitcom reruns in the daily schedule back in the early 80s, and NBC had Facts of Life reruns for three-plus years at 10AM in the 80s, and a spell of Sanford and Son reruns in the mid-late 70s. ABC had a lot of sitcom reruns on the schedule in the 80s, particularly when the game shows they introduced crashed and burned quickly. NBC stopped airing sitcom reruns in daytime for good after the Summer of 1990; 227 and the Golden Girls aired in reruns in 1989-90. CBS stopped after Designing Women reruns ended in mid-1992(DW was their first sitcom rerun in daytime since September 1982). ABC stopped airing reruns of sitcoms when MG90 premiered.
-
[quote name=\'zachhoran\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 08:44 AM\']NBC stopped airing sitcom reruns in daytime for good after the Summer of 1990; 227 and the Golden Girls aired in reruns in 1989-90.
[snapback]70393[/snapback]
[/quote]
You are incorrect, sir. I do believe FULL HOUSE reruns displaced TTTT9x (which wrapped up in May 1991).
Doug
-
[quote name=\'SRIV94\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 08:08 AM\']You are incorrect, sir. I do believe FULL HOUSE reruns displaced TTTT9x (which wrapped up in May 1991).
[/quote]
If that is so, it's because your local affiliate did it, because I can't see any reason why NBC would run reruns nationally of what was an ABC show.
-
[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 11:42 AM\'][quote name=\'SRIV94\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 08:08 AM\']You are incorrect, sir. I do believe FULL HOUSE reruns displaced TTTT9x (which wrapped up in May 1991).
[/quote]
If that is so, it's because your local affiliate did it, because I can't see any reason why NBC would run reruns nationally of what was an ABC show.
[snapback]70422[/snapback]
[/quote]
SRIV is right. TTTT9x was replaced by Full House reruns, and they did air across the board for a few months on NBC. NBC must have somehow picked up the rights to air this from Telepictures or WB or whomever.
-
[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 10:42 AM\'][quote name=\'SRIV94\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 08:08 AM\']You are incorrect, sir. I do believe FULL HOUSE reruns displaced TTTT9x (which wrapped up in May 1991).
[/quote]
If that is so, it's because your local affiliate did it, because I can't see any reason why NBC would run reruns nationally of what was an ABC show.
[snapback]70422[/snapback]
[/quote]
He's telling the truth. NBC did have reruns of an ABC show.
It was also done back in the 1960's when Make Room For Daddy reruns aired on NBC instead of ABC since they had it in prime time. So it's been done twice.
-
[quote name=\'zachhoran\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 10:48 AM\'][quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 11:42 AM\']If that is so, it's because your local affiliate did it, because I can't see any reason why NBC would run reruns nationally of what was an ABC show.
[snapback]70422[/snapback]
[/quote]
SRIV is right. TTTT9x was replaced by Full House reruns, and they did air across the board for a few months on NBC. NBC must have somehow picked up the rights to air this from Telepictures or WB or whomever.
[snapback]70424[/snapback]
[/quote]
That's MISTER SRIV to you, buster! :) (Like Mark O., I'd actually prefer people using my name rather than my alias--not to be confused with Jennifer Garner's ;-) ).
I found it a bit strange as well when I first saw that NBC was picking up FH reruns, given that it had run on ABC for all those years (and a little perturbed--I liked TTTT9x and was sorry to see it go). This was right before NBC did a total revamp of getting more daytime talk programs on the air (my guess is that the reruns were an economical pick up).
Doug
-
I found it a bit strange as well when I first saw that NBC was picking up FH reruns, given that it had run on ABC for all those years (and a little perturbed--I liked TTTT9x and was sorry to see it go). This was right before NBC did a total revamp of getting more daytime talk programs on the air (my guess is that the reruns were an economical pick up).
I think it's because in most cases daytime reruns are sold to the networks just like they'd be sold into syndication. There was a 1968 TVGuide article that stated ABC paid $9 million for the rights to daytime "Bewitched" reruns. I suppose they could have wound up on another network during the day if ABC hadn't been prepared to pay that high a price. Most of the time a network will air daytime repeats of a show they air in primetime likely because they don't want another network to be associated with their hit show - but in "Full House's" case, I guess NBC paid more.
Re. "To Tell the Truth", I'd like to have seen the '90s version last longer as well.
-
[quote name=\'GSWitch\' date=\'Jan 7 2005, 10:03 AM\']He's telling the truth. NBC did have reruns of an ABC show.
[/quote]
Huh. Kooky.