Rumor Control: US Casting for French Adventure Game Import. Could it be “Fort Boyard” or “Intervilles”?
EDIT: Bother’s Bar thinks this may be a different French format called Intervilles, which aired in England under the title It’s A Knockout, which is another stunt type show. Again, maybe someone who has seen it can explain more. Here’s the UKGameshows page on it, and below is a YouTube link.
All you who live close to New York City, are physically fit, and have a passport may want to pay attention to this one. Casting directors are looking for people with free time in the middle of July to take part in an all-expensive paid trip to France and be on a game show pilot. The game show is a long-running adventurous game show. They are basically asking for you to have a good personality, to be adventurous, and be physically fit. They describe the show as a mix between Wipeout and American Gladiators. If this sounds like something you’d be interested in, click here and get to it.
Now as to what this show could be. The only thing I can find is, like the casting notice says, a long-running adventurous French game show called Fort Boyard (EDIT: See note at top). The essential format involves a team of people completing challenges, many of them physical, to win gold from the fort. I’ve never really seen it beyond clips from the must-see website Bother’s Bar, so maybe someone from there can explain the show more. I’m a big fan of adventure shows and the physical stunt shows, so this seems pretty cool. We’ll see where it takes us after the pilot is taken around. Want to see what you’re in for? Here are a few clips.
Oh, I heard about this one. It's being put on by our friends at Embassy Row.
Should be a treat for all who try out…
The long short version:
Once upon a time there was a fort built by Napoleon that was completed after the war it was built for, ended. It sat there off the coast of France, doing nothing much, until they decided to make an adventure game show out of the place. The Brits wanted to get in on it, but scheduling problems with the negotiations delayed getting that started as soon as they'd have liked, so they decided to make their own from scratch, and that gave the world six wonderful seasons of "The Crystal Maze". Then they later did their own version of Fort Boyard anyway.
The game goes something like this: A team of six players enters the fort, looking to take away some of its gold. In the first stage, they are trying to earn keys so that they can later unlock the door to the room with the treasure (And tigers. No, really.) Boyard typically assigns someone the task of entering a room containing a key, and a fixed amount of time to retrieve it. Go to Bother's Bar's website to see the literally dozens of room challenges they've had over the years. They tend to be more physical and less cerebral than similar challenges in the Crystal Maze. If they player doesn't exit the room before the time runs out — key or no key — then that player is locked in the room, then claimed by the jailer and put into a dungeon cell. (I did mention this is a real live Napoleonic fort, right?)
In the second stage, players tend to be looking for clues to a password that will release the gold itself. While the challenges in the first stage are somewhat athletic — think Dog Eat Dog or Super Sloppy Double Dare — the challenges in round two tend to be more like Fear Factor: tightrope-walking over the tigers, close encounters with snakes, that sort of thing.
When time is up for the team, they need to try to get as much gold out of the treasure room as they can. If they lack the keys and clues needed to do this, they can sacrifice players to get them. Once in side, the remaining players stand on the letters needed to spell the word (or use cannonballs as weights if there aren't enough players left) and if they're right, gold is released. They must carry as much of it as they can out the treasure room door before it closes on them. If they're wrong, no gold is released, and they've faced snakes, flooded basements and spiders for no good reason.
Through it all, there's usually a few denizens of the fort around to terrorize players, not the least is Boyard himself. Oh, and Spandex. Lots and lots of Spandex. The rules and particulars vary from country to country, but those are the basic concepts.
Thanks for the brief history there, Darren. Sounds interesting. Probably won't be anything like Dungeons & Dragons that's for sure(I played that on the computer when I was in high school in the early 1980s).
The 20th season started on Satrday in France, and Eva Longoria and Tony Parker led the team. It's about two hours long, you can watch it online on the official site:
http://fort-boyard.france2.fr/index.php?page=vide...
In fact, all episodes this season will be avalibale for two weeks after their Saturday Night broadcast. I did wonder if getting Eva and Tony on was a sort of test run for a possible US version.
Quick explanation:
* First game this year is the water tube game – team must run round the fort trying to find a combination that will stop the flow of a tube. If they do it with enough water left to fill a cup, they're given a bonus test.
* The tests – team gets 45 minutes to try and earn as many treasure room keys as they can by playing tests of strength, agility and skill in the cells of the fort. Each game is timed, they must be out of the cell before the time runs out otherwise they will become a prisoner of the fort. Twice a contestant is sent up to the watchtower to meet Father Fouras, the Guardian of the Fort, and face his riddles for a key, and a further mental test is in Mr Tchan's chamber.
* After the 45 minutes is up, the team get their bonus test if they've earnt one. The mroe keys they have, the higher the Treasure Room gate will open at the end of the show. Higher = easier
* The room of challenges – the team gets the chance to earn bonus gold at the end and the prisoners are given a chance to get released by playing unpleasant games. Failure or refusal means the prisoner will be released but won't be allowed to collect the gold at the end of the game. There are three boxes, one will release extra gold at the end, each game won effectively loses a fake box.
* The adventures – the team need to earn clues to the codeword that will release the gold, they do this by playing these much bigger games which are tests of mental and physical strength and toughness. Father Fouras offers another riddle as well. They play for 20 minutes. The clues are kept in cannisters, when time on a game runs out they explode.
* The Council – The team play against the Masters of Darkness for bonus treasure room time in games of strategy and skill.
* The treasure room – the end bit, the team must now work out the codeword (players can be sacrificed for extra clues), and in the time they've earned they must spell it out – correctly – on the treasure room floor. If they're right, gold tumbles and they have the rest of the time to cart off with as much of it as possible. But if anyone's caught inside when the gate has dropped, the Master will save tem from the tigers at the cost of everything they've earned.
that's it really, the French version is the most advanced version of the show, so wouldn't be surprised if any US version stuck wit just the Tests, Adventures and Treasure Room that most of the rest of the versions use.
To be honest, the more I look at the advert, the more I think what they're actually making is Intervilles.
You might find this video of Intervilles a bit more indicative as it shows off the "getting chased around by a live bull" USP a bit more:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-RU1RIvIHaw
A knowledge of French isn't requisite to enjoying these shows by the way, they're both quite visual and fairly easy to follow. I've been watching Fort Boyard for 15 years now knowing barely a word, the conversations are off limit but you'll pick up the gist of the instructions and advice easily enough.
Trivialists may recognize "It's A Knockout" as it has similar tones to the old ABC summer show of the 70's:
"Almost Anything Goes"; different towns competed against each other for bragging rights