A Look at CBS’s “Let’s Make A Deal” Pilot
Our friends at Hollywood Junket were on the set for the pilot of Let’s Make A Deal. It looks to be pretty good. The show, from Fremantle (same people who do Family Feud and The Price is Right) is hosted by Wayne Brady. I don’t think Wayne’s the absolute best choice but it’s hard to argue that he’s popular and apparently a good host. Plus this show brings him more back to his “interacting with the audience roots” which he does excel at. Amusingly the executive producer of the show is Mike Richards, who is the executive producer for The Price is Right as well. I’m a bit stunned they aren’t being taped on the same set and just redressing the doors for each show, but there we are.
The game is the same as everyone knows, if you remember the old version. Basically people are having to make decisions between cash or a mystery prize behind a curtain or a door. People gamble tens of thousands of dollars in cash and prizes for the chance at possibly a car, but it could be a “Zonk”, or just a worthless gag prize. At the end of the show Wayne goes down the line of people who won the most during the show asking if they want to trade it all away until he finds two to go for the Big Deal, which is behind one of the doors. It’s the grand daddy to Deal or No Deal and in Let’s Make A Deal‘s defense it is much funnier, quicker, entertaining, and random.
I really don’t know if CBS is considering to fill the gap left by Guiding Light come September with two shows or one show with two episodes a day. I’ve heard that The $1,000,000 Pyramid is looking pretty good to go, and I can’t imagine a better daily game show block than Let’s Make A Deal, Pyramid, and The Price is Right. The Dating Game, another show up for the afternoon slot, still has to pilot but to be frank I’ll be stunned and a bit disappointed if that goes anywhere beyond that. Pictures are on their website, so check it out when you get a chance. What do you think? In terms of reviving shows they did as good of a job as you can. Fremantle’s been on a roll for a while now, with their shows. Let’s see if they can keep it up.
Folks, this is shaping up to be one great September. Fremantle is not on a roll, Alex (since when did "Temptation" and the first half of "Price Season 37" become critically-acclaimed?), but they *are* doing something right with the long-lasting format and host Wayne Brady…
For once. Which nearly gave me a heart attack.
Anyway, PLEASE DO NOT ADD THE SUPER DEAL. It killed the ABC run in the mid-1970s, and it'll kill this new version. I don't wish to see Monty's third revival since 1986 to go down in flames like the 1990-1991 and 2003 versions, and I really hope that your reason of bringing back various game shows is *not* to screw with them and piss off the fans.
But I'm definitely going to look into buying a Tivo or another VCR – September 21 is going to be one happy day. 8D
OK not trying to be a jerk but for every show from Fremantle that isn't on par I can count 3 or 4 that are. OK, Temptation wasn't great, that's one. If we're seriously counting a few months of Price is Right against their entire history producing the show you're being unbelievably petty. They've done Million Dollar Password, LMAD, Game Show Marathon, Family Feud, Distraction, PokerFace, their overall history of Price is Right, America's Got Talent, American Idol, etc. The list goes on.
My two cents, personally:
TPIR, MDP, and FF are good in my book, then again, TPIR and FF have been on for extended times now, so when I say recently, I moreso mean their new shows, but you can argue that those two longstanding ones make up for some of their more recent undertakings.
GSM didn't impress me so much, personally, PYL being possibly the soul exception, nor did PokerFace, and while AI is of course a cash cow and their primo show, I've never been a fan (then again, I wasn't a Star Search fan either, so that shouldn't be any surprise). The Billy Bush LMAD I'm in the middle of the road on. They were also involved in Hole in the Wall (the extent of which I'm not 100% sure) and the 2002 Beat the Clock, neither of which reached their full potential. CS 2001 left a bad taste in my mouth, along with Temptation and the late 90's Match Game, along with, I think, a great number of GS fans.
The good news is that they've gotten better over time and seem to learn from some of their mistakes, but I am still overly cautious with them. They seem to do okay with series with lonnnggg run histories, aka FF (albeit the somewhat shaky start) and TPIR (even though their influence on the show is overshadowed by CBS).
Pyramid is being worked by Embassy Row, and so far looks wonderful with only the name and basic format's licensing (as I understand, correct me if I'm wrong) provided by Fremantle. In that regard, there should be no huge complaints with the company. It just seems their in-house productions, to me, don't hit it home as well as when they license their formats outside for others to look at. Of course, there are other factors which could be contributing to all that too…
I didn't think Fremantle had anything to do with Pyramid…it's a Sony show, with all of the Bob Stewart library.
Here's a question for someone who was at the pilot – did they use the "These people, dressed as they are…" spiel at the beginning of the show?
I love the look of the set. I agree that Wayne Brady would for sure be the ideal host for this show. It would be a good lineup seeing Pyramid at 10, LMAD at 10:30, and TPIR at 11.
Presumably the same thing since the affiliates had the option of airing Guiding Light in the 9/10am slot or the 3pm slot. If they air it at 9/10am, the 3pm hour belongs to the affiliate; if they air it at 3pm, the 9/10am hour belongs to the affiliate.
Not that I'm an expert on that, but it makes sense. CBS only gets one hour – they're not picking up an additional hour by canceling Guiding Light.
Hello! I'm a guest here, and I'm willing to sign up if I want to be more frequent…
…Anyway, to be honest, I'm not a big fan of any LMAD formats, even with goodies and baddies. However, 30 minute episodes should do the work; in fact, I like the fun and direction they are putting in the past.
I don't know how long this format will last UNLESS it could work as daily primetime network or syndicated show– this method could take away pointless fictional shows ever made.
Surprised you forgot "Whammy!" for GSN. Mistake #1 was selecting Todd Newton over Peter Tomarken.
Mind you, the show got better with the second season (Big Bank, better-looking board), but still left a bad taste in my mouth with its over-reliance on prizes and lack of returning champions…not to mention some dense contestants (a Fremantle trademark?)
And don't even get me started on that "$2000 or Lose-1-Whammy" fiasco from the first season.
* As for "Feud", the first four seasons of the run had the worst format…and yet it survived long enough to make return to the classic format. "Bullseye 2.0" is not a bad idea (keeping with the O'Hurley era bringing something classic back with each season, and Bullseye being the height of the Golden Age), the main game being cut down to three rounds makes me uneasy… And so do the stupid audience signs and forced cheering of "Good answer!" to one that very clearly isn't.
* Game Show Marathon…except for the "PYL", "Match Game", and "Family Feud" episodes it was horrid. PYL's board had shrunk in the wash, MG had an unnecessary "73" on the sign (yet used the 1976-81 PM format), and FF trumped the Combs music to match the Dawson one.
* "Million-Dollar Password"…feh. Completely threw away all the format improvements that the 1979-1989 versions brought to the table, and forced each half-hour to be self-contained.
* "MG'98" was just dense, with no returning champions and a $5,000 top prize.
* "LMAD'03" was…uh………really bad.
* And so was "Card Sharks '01". Took everything that made the show popular and chucked it out the window.
* "Distraction" was good? If I wanted to see complete morons humiliating themselves on national television for tiny amounts of money and worthless prizes, I'd watch "The Crosswords-Temptation Hour"!
* "America's Got Talent", in the immortal words of Steve Beverly, is "The Gong Show on steroids". XD
* "American Idol"…is just crap. It's just a bunch of idiots singing to dramatically pan to the lowest common denominator that knows how to use a telephone. And the long, dragged-out results make me fall asleep.
====
As for "Price", I must state that Fremantle allowed Bob Barker to be a backstage tyrant. In addition, they allowed Drew Carey to write bad Showcases through firing Roger Dobkowitz (I know for certain that Roger would never retire) – they wanted to "take the show in a new direction", and the "new direction" appears to be similar-yet-worse. If you count "Price", you must count their complete tolerance of Barker's backstage idiocy and their INtolerance of competent people in the production aspect (Gas Money, Rich DiPirro, and Drew's hosting improvements are the only good things to have come out of this past Season).
And "Temptation" was just a mess. Alex, you mentioned two years ago that if people weren't expecting a continuation from where "Sale Of The Century" left off on March 24, 1989 they'd be pleased. If people hear "The New Sale Of The Century", they're going to expect a spot-on revival. NOTHING was decent about that show, especially 99% or the contestants' brainpower.
What happened was that a great Australian series based on an awesome American format was completely botched by Americanizing the Australian version (and stealing formats from other shows, notably "Wipeout '88"). If Fremantle wanted a revival of "SOTC", they should have looked at the Shopping-era 1980s episodes and went from there!
====
…Sorry for rambling there in a rant-y sort of way, but I had to get that off my chest.
It looks like it's official, Let's Make a Deal will be replacing Guiding Light on October 5th. It will be the first network daytime gameshow in16 years.
http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=200908…
It looks like it's official, Let's Make a Deal will be replacing Guiding Light on October 5th. It will be the first network daytime gameshow in16 years.
http://www.thefutoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=200908…
Looks pretty much like wayne is just a bit one sided in his picks of contestants or are you blind?