Reminder: “Millionaire” You’re In The Hot Seat Contest Begins Monday
As an aside before we begin, did anyone else get a brutal snow storm like I did? I’ve got at least 15, possibly 16, inches right now. I won’t be bothering leaving the house or doing anything beyond watching TV and eating, which sounds great to me. If you’re in the same situation, you may need more to take your mind off the situation. How about a chance to win up to $100,000? Who Wants to be a Millionaire begins the You’re In The Hot Seat home game this week, February 8th. All you need to do is look for your Millionaire-branded Valpak or request one at the show’s website.
The show will distribute 30 million scratch-off cards inside Millionaire-branded Valpak envelopes. From February 8th through May 28th Meredith Vieira will announce a new “winning answer” during the show. All home viewers who have scratch off cards have to do is hope the answer matches, and if it does they win whatever cash value the card is worth. Home players can win anywhere from $1,000 to a giant $100,000. It’s the biggest contest the show has done yet. Good luck!
In addition, this week’s Millionaire features TV personality Donny Deutsch as the Expert for the lifeline Ask the Expert. Donny’s specialties are pop culture, politics, sports, music, TV, movies and food and his weaknesses are history, science, literature and geography. It sounds like he’ll have trouble with the bigger money questions, but you never know. We’ll find out as he helps contestants via Skype this week.
US “The Cube”, At a Glance
We didn’t plan on it, but we had a small army arrive at The Cube’s studio yesterday for the pilot shot for CBS and hosted by actor Neil Patrick Harris. First off, we were apparently name-dropped by some audience members at the taping so now that we’re internationally famous as of this moment, I thank you greatly. But here are a few notes from the emails and Facebook and Twitter comments we received. REmember, you can usually find information the quickest on there.
*They’ve got a very good money chain. It starts at $1,000; then $2,000; $10,000; $25,000; $75,000; $200,000; $500,000. It’s enough of a risk to make you wa…
Wink Martindale Hosts GSN’s “Instant Recall” Starting March 4th
Veteran game show legend Wink Martindale has been tapped to host GSN’s newest hidden camera game show Instant Recall. According to Wink (who publicly said he is hosting and posted this image) the show will debut March 4th, and we’re reaching out to GSN for official confirmation as well. But when the host of the show tells you when it’s debuting, you tend to listen. This is Wink’s first game show hosting gig since Debt on the Lifetime Network from 1996 to 1998.
As a tagline given says, Instant Recall tests your patience, and then tests your memory. Contestants are put through strange and out-of-the-ordinary situations und…
Ratings Report: The Positive Edition!
New ratings for syndicated game shows from the week ending January 24th are in and it was a good week for nearly everyone. I’m well aware that my writing isn’t the most upbeat, praise-heavy stuff. If something’s good, I’ll say it is. If something sucks or is dumb, I’ll say so. I prize this place on brutal honesty. However, and especially more recently since we’ve had more crappy news than good news, it can be a bit cynical. I also noticed that for things like the ratings report the comments seem to be more doom-and-gloom than anything, with any small tick down in the ratings equaling the end of the show. So in an…
“Price is Right” Holding Survey
Surveys are apparently all the rage these days. During today’s The Price is Right, I was told scrolling text at the bottom of the screen said they are holding a survey at the show’s CBS website which you can visit by clicking here. Taking a look at the survey, it seems like they are just trying to gauge people’s opinion of how the show is doing now. They are just about doing one of these a year it appears to see how fans are adjusting to the changes. It’s no secret the show’s been changing since Drew Carey took over three years ago, and it’s a safe idea just to check. The survey will ask you for opinions about the host, pr…
Ratings Report: “Jeopardy!” Up, Everything Else Down
I’ve got a relatively delayed ratings report, but I’ve got it now and I made an effort so give me an A for effort at least. These are for the most recent reports, the week ending January 17th. It wasn’t a good week for any game show except Jeopardy!, which doesn’t happen too often. The quizzer actually rose by 2% to a 6.3. It puts it pretty close to Wheel of Fortune which is always nice to see. As far as I’ve been reading they’ve had some exciting relatively-big-money games with some long running contestant streaks so that doesn’t hurt. It’s one of the shows that truly has no end in sight. This thing c…
New Foreign Game Shows
NATPE has died down over here in America and not a lot of big news is coming in. However, there are quite a few foreign game shows in development or casting or coming soon. Some look interesting, and I thought I’d share some in an effort to be international and friendly. America isn’t the only country that visits here, you know. Most of which is taken from Bother’s Bar.
*The one I’m probably most looking forward to for some reason is a new BBC One game show 100 Ways to Leave a Game Show. What you can imagine happens does. If you lose a round you get ejected from the show in some physical manner. It’s not just drop zones like o…
John McCain Asks Celebrity Question February 1st on “Millionaire”
Who Wants to be a Millionaire adds another big name to ask the newest Celebrity Question. John McCain will shuffle over to Millionaire and ask contestant Matt Rodrigues of New York City a $10,000 question. Take a look below. This is a bit of a spoiler so if you don’t want to know what happens be careful about watching all of it.
Neil Patrick Harris Hosts “The Cube” Pilot for CBS
Developing story and I’ll add more to it as I read more, but the always great TVMoJoe at the equally great The Wrap has confirmed that CBS is the new home for the hit UK game show The Cube which is shooting a pilot next week. To add to it, Neil Patrick Harris from How I Met Your Mother is the host. So CBS has bested NBC’s ripoff Minute To Win It in format and host. In addition to hosting, Harris will be executive producing the hit show, which says to me he’s a fan of it and helped it get to where it is.
The pilot will tape in London next week, and I know we have a few people going who will report back. For those not familiar with it, The Cube sees a contes…
WGBH Debuts “High School Quiz Show”
It’s always nice to see new local game shows. There’s a long history of the high school academic quiz programs airing around the country. Boston’s WGBH is starting a new one called High School Quiz Show. It debuts March 22nd on that channel, so be sure to check it out if you get a chance. Twenty schools have been selected to take part in this competition. “To make it fair – and fun – we wanted a complete representation of schools in Massachusetts,” said High School Quiz Show producer Hillary Wells. “The participating schools range from large to small in size, from urban to suburban, from charter schools to public. The initial match-…
Carnie Wilson: Unstapled Debut Week Ratings Comparison
SECOND EDIT: After the break we have the comparisons for Hidden Agenda, like promised. It’s more brutal than Carnie Wilson. It’s downright ugly.
Edit: Fixed dates
Thanks to the great people at PIFeedback, we’ve got a comparison between Carnie Wilson: Unstapled in each of its time slots and the show that was there on the week of January 4th, the last published. If you follow us on Facebook or Twitter you saw that Carnie Wilson debuted to a .3 rating. We had messed up ratings we previously published, and we apologize. The .3 was correct, but we just wanted verification before we publish again. Aren’t you glad GSN replaced so man…
Jane Lynch from Glee Asks Question on “Millionaire” January 29th
Edit: Made a small mistake. Jane wasn’t on the set of Glee. She was in the ABC building doing it. She even came down to the Millionaire set for a photo op with host Meredith Vieira. Check it out.
All you fans of Glee on Fox are definitely going to want to check out Who Wants to be a Millionaire this Friday, January 29th. Jane Lynch will be reading a $10,000 question to the contestant as part of the show’s new Celebrity Question gimmick. Jane will ask a question to the contestant Clyde Wheeler, and tell him if he’s right or wrong. In addition to Glee, Jane also starred the great movies Best In Show and For Your Consideration (two of my fav…
“Price is Right” Contestant Faints
Price is Right has been filled with a bunch of crazy/interesting moments recently, hasn’t it? Last week we had one of the most painful, depressing overbids in the show’s history. Then days later we had another contestant overbid for even less (though with prizes not nearly as cool). A few days ago the show had yet another one of these moments which is making the viral video rounds. Meet Nancy, who’s apparently very excited about making it to the Showcase. She goes through the usual crappy gift introduction, waiting for the reveal of the car or trip which everyone wants to see. I haven’t seen it happen before, but the car sh…
“Solitary” Begins Final Fox Reality Season January 30th
One of my favorite shows on cable, Solitary, looks to be coming to a close. With Fox Reality closing shop, the cult hit reality show wrapping up its run on the network with its fourth season. It begins Saturday, January 30th, at 10:00PM ET. If you haven’t see it yet, definitely check out Hulu to catch up. It’s fantastic. Simply put, nine people are kept in individual isolation pods, shutting them off from essentially everybody and every thing from the outside world. Players compete in challenges that test them physically, mentally, and emotionally until someone cracks and is eliminated. At the end of the series, the final survivin…
“Don’t Forget The Lyrics!” Goes Syndicated in Fall 2010
This just in: The hit Fox game show Don’t Forget The Lyrics! will be going into daily syndication in Fall 2010. It’s been cleared in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, Houston and Washington, D.C.. The singing game show will be partnered with Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? across the country. Coincidentally these shows were paired for much of their nice run on Fox, where they regularly scored good ratings. Former Sugar Ray lead singer Mark McGrath will be host. Mark was also previously the host of the entertainment news magazine show Extra.
Lyrics! will replace Deal or No Deal Tuesday nights on MyNetwork. As we reported a w…
TBI Lists Most Popular Game Shows in 2009
Don’t we all love lists? Well, not really, but this one’s pretty interesting. Television Business International recently compiled a list of the ten most popular game show formats of 2009. This wasn’t based on their personal favorites or what the few random readers chose in a poll. This is all based off of which shows got the most eyeballs around the globe last year. A lot of the choices aren’t surprises at all, but a few are really shocking.
Coming in at number one is actually Who Wants to be a Millionaire. I expected it to be Deal or No Deal after the huge few years it had across the globe, but apparently not. This year was rea…
