savoy032

I've been tracking the trial run of 25 Words or Less in the faux tweets. While the ratings weren't spectacular, they did improve as the three-week trial went on.  It looks like the Password knockoff might have a chance for a nationwide rollout in the fall of 2019. Frank Cicha, Fox's programming chief, says the trial went well enough that the show has a "real possibility" of a full-scale run in 2019. "The show is well done. Bringing in Meredith [Vieira] was a big get. It makes it more fun. It makes it recognizable. It makes it feel a little bigger." A little bigger is better than a little smaller, right? Cicha thinks the show could be an okay lead-in or lead-out for Family Feud on Fox stations and elsewhere. ( 25 Words or Less aired at 6:30 PM on WWOR in New York City during its trial run, leading out of Feud .) In my home DFW market the show aired in the middle of the afternoon, a not particularly favorable time slot. With some possible openings in t...

As readers of this blog probably know, I'm a baseball fan. And as most baseball fans certainly know, there are perpetual controversies over the Hall of Fame. Who should be in, who shouldn't be in, who should do the voting, etc. Mention the words "Shoeless Joe Jackson" to a bunch of fans, and you'll immediately start an HoF argument. I had no idea that's there's something called the Television Academy Hall of Fame. But it does exist, and a recent article suggested some more inductees. Among the suggestions was Alex Trebek. My first thought was, how did Alex avoid induction into the TV Hall of Fame? The guy's been around forever on television and he's a household name in just about every household, especially the Nielsen ones. Then I reviewed the list of current inductees, and I noticed that only two people mostly known for game shows are in there. Sure, there are other inductees with plenty of experience in the genre, like Betty White and Regis P...

A few posts ago I was whining for a Legends of the Hidden Temple reboot. If we can't have a reboot, there's always the original. Streaming service VRV has added Legends and a bunch of other Nick oldies in a channel called - wait for it - Nick Splat. The channel costs $5.99 a month as a stand-alone, or you can buy it as part of the service's premium bundle at $9.95 a month. The linked article zeroes in on the target demo... With NickSplat, it's now going after a slightly different demographic – kids who grew up watching Nickelodeon on linear TV and are nostalgic for those old shows. Maybe they even want to stream them for their own kids these days. A lot of those nostalgic folks write for pop culture web sites, where they pine endlessly for the Nick shows of olden times. Hey, I'm part of that demo myself, at least when it comes to Legends . By the way, I like that phrase "linear TV." I think it's a polite way of saying "old-fashioned TV in the br...

Another slow summer week saw a new season low for Jeopardy and not much cheer for other syndie game shows. At least most of them were flat. TV News Check has the lackluster household ratings for the week of August 13-19... Family Feud 6.1 - down a tick but still on top of the genre Wheel of Fortune 5.3 - flat Jeopardy 5.2 - down a couple ticks to that season low Millionaire 1.6 - flat Funny You Should Ask 0.5 - flat for the perennial cellar dweller I doubt that Steve Harvey will be too concerned about the tenth of a point. Celebrity Family Feud is still drawing over six million viewers and is heading for a sixth season next summer. A cable note: the latest run of America Says drew 440K viewers compared to 370K viewers for the latest run of Cash Cab . Trouble is, Discovery gets much better numbers overall than GSN. Not a good sign for Ben and friends. Meanwhile, GSN got 415K/272K viewers prime time/total day for the week of August 20-26. The network ranked 34th and 29th in ...

Family Feud is coming to Louisville for contestant auditions. They want to know the most popular item to put between two buns. Or at least that's what the Louisville Courier-Journal says. (By the way, the newspaper's web site has that USA Today clone look.) "Lots of energy and enthusiasm and the ability to play the game" are wanted qualities in contestants, which should not come as a surprise. That's what all the casting calls say, along with BIG personalities. Feud is also interested in "weird abilities," like yodeling or eyelid tricks. I don't have either of those attributes, but they must come in handy at game show auditions. You should also be 15 years of age or older. The mature nature of some of the questions, you know. If you don't know about that mature nature, check the nearest game show oldies board and you'll find out.

John McCain, longtime senator from Arizona and a presidential candidate in 2008, has died at age 81. Sometimes I feel a little ghoulish doing it, but whenever a well-known person dies, I generally check IMDb to see if there are any game show connections. I really wasn't expecting anything for John McCain, but I did find one credit for Millionaire . Back in 2010 on the syndie version, he presented a few questions on the show. YouTube has one of them. I try to keep this blog as nonpolitical as possible, so I'll leave the political comments on the senator to other sites. But I did have a couple of odd thoughts when I went through this Internet search. One, it seemed a little strange that a politician would have such a long IMDb page. But I guess politicos do a lot of acting of one kind or another. Second, does anybody with any kind of celebrity turn up on a game show sooner or later? Our little genre has seen a zillion famous faces over the years.

Another weekend brings another nostalgic list of Nick shows from the 1990s. The latest collection of ten golden oldies includes two game shows, and you can probably guess them. Double Dare at #10 and Legends of the Hidden Temple at #7. One of these shows has gotten a full-scale reboot. One of them hasn't, and it's the better show (in my opinion). In fact, I think Legends is the best kid game show ever on any network. The Double Dare rewind did decent business for Nick, even if the ratings trailed off some from the initial numbers. I don't know why Legends wouldn't perform at least passably for its network. Kirk Fogg would probably have to be around, even if he was paired with a co-host, as they did with Marc Summers on Double Dare . But they would have no problem finding kid contestants to face the wrath of the temple guards and the puzzle of the silver monkey. Maybe they could even get a live touring show out of the reboot, just like Double Dare . Take Olmec aroun...