The 1999 series of Play Your Cards Right: a new set was built (look, Brucie can do his Thinker pose now), fancy envelopes were made for the details of the Brucie Bonuses and the end-game questions... and then ITV didn't commission another series, which Brucie wasn't happy about (to put it mildly).
(They did commission one three years later, of course - although I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who considers that to be Mark 3 of the show, rather than a continuation of Mark 2.)
PYCR was one of the first victims of ITV's primetime game show shake-up following Millionaire's arrival - along with Strike It Rich and Gladiators, both of which also ended (and not before their time, it's fair to say), and Wheel of Fortune, which moved to daytimes. Family Fortunes and Catchphrase continued in primetime for a few more years, some might argue due to popular demand (although, of course, Catchphrase was radically revamped and Roy was let go). And Bruce's Price is Right also continued, but was shunted to Saturday teatimes when Emmerdale went five nights a week (he wasn't happy about this, either, saying that even Millionaire would have been greatly hurt by such a move).
Three curiosities about PYCR '99:
(1) The slowed-down footage of the end-game couple's immediate celebrations when they won the car.
(2) A graphic for the couple's total winnings appearing *only* when they won the car (also the case in Les Dennis's last two series of Family Fortunes).
(3) Dolly Dealer Charlie being credited mononymously (according to UKGameshows.com her surname was Maloney).
DE88 post_id=68957 time= user_id=1366 Wrote:(2) A graphic for the couple's total winnings appearing *only* when they won the car (also the case in Les Dennis's last two series of Family Fortunes).
I see that a lot in late 90s gameshows - why was it a thing? Is it just to make a point that they're splashing out now winnings restrictions have been lifted?
You have the 1989 series of Wheel of Fortune pointing out that their £4,000 jackpot was the biggest on UK TV at the time (the $64,000 question was exceeding it by the following year- but even then it was only £6,400, offered only on every second show to get around the prize limits)- it seems laughably small now (even for a daytime gameshow, let alone a major primetime one), and indeed by the last few series of Nicky Camebell's, WOF were offering 5 times that much.
(18-02-2022, 11:00 AM)James2001 Wrote: [ -> ]You have the 1989 series of Wheel of Fortune pointing out that their £4,000 jackpot was the biggest on UK TV at the time (the $64,000 question was exceeding it by the following year- but even then it was only £6,400, offered only on every second show to get around the prize limits)- it seems laughably small now (even for a daytime gameshow, let alone a major primetime one), and indeed by the last few series of Nicky Camebell's, WOF were offering 5 times that much.
Brilliantly, the '94 series of WOF (Carol's last series, as it happened) offered £10,000 *and* the car - and sometimes a second car as well.
Might this have been the biggest prize package offered on a British game show at the time (until Raise the Roof came along the following year, and not counting the Lottery)?
1988-93 series gave the option of a car, the money or a holiday, but I don't recall anyone ever choosing the holiday! Though usually when a holiday was one of the options for winning a round that's what got picked.
By the end of the Nicky Campbell run (as well as the Bradley Walsh and prime time John Leslie episodes) it was a choice between the money or the car- but in the sense you chose an envelope with one or the other, but not knowing what was in each envelope. Clearly they were determined to give away a certain number of cars, probably to cut down on costs (as I don't think the cars were worth £20,000! Even in 2022 money, let alone 1995).
Unless I'm mistaken, the cars offered on game shows from the mid '90s to the early 2000s were usually worth between £10,000 and £15,000.
The '90s version of Celebrity Squares was the first show to offer cars in this price range (indeed, it first aired on 8 January 1993, mere days after the prize limit was abolished).
There were exceptions: some of the non-showcase cars on Bruce's Price is Right were in a lower price range, but still fairly expensive (between £6,000 and £10,000), and of course, Bullseye ended in 1995 still offering Protons, Minis and Metros.
Back to PYCR '99, and the second episode this afternoon was the one with Survivor winner Charlotte Hobrough and her husband. Of course, when her 15 minutes were up she went back to being a policewoman - a move which seems quaint these days...
DE88 post_id=69031 time= user_id=1366 Wrote:Unless I'm mistaken, the cars offered on game shows from the mid '90s to the early 2000s were usually worth between £10,000 and £15,000.
PCYR in the second incarnation (from 1994) quite often offered Rover cars. Which may have been nice in their day but last time I bashed the car registration of a Rover 216 I think it was into somewhere like webuyanycar, they'd only offer you something ridiculous like £50 for it. Might have something to do with the fact MG Rover went bust.
Quote:The '90s version of Celebrity Squares was the first show to offer cars in this price range (indeed, it first aired on 8 January 1993, mere days after the prize limit was abolished).
There were exceptions: some of the non-showcase cars on Bruce's Price is Right were in a lower price range, but still fairly expensive (between £6,000 and £10,000), and of course, Bullseye ended in 1995 still offering Protons, Minis and Metros.
Well that's hardly surprising considering they were made in Birmingham at the time at Longbridge, so Central didn't have far to go to find a source of cars to parade on their shows as prizes, and it obviously continued when they moved to Nottingham. IIRC Celebrity Squares was "populated" with cars from the plant too.
Of course its an oddity now but when they pick a car to win on Squares you can see they're all just generic ("4/4 sports", saloon, coupe) without the brand names on the slates, because they couldn't say it was a Land Rover 4/4 even though you could tell it was a 4/4 from just looking at it. these days you'd almost certainly have something like "courtesy of Jaguar" somewhere.
Interesting- Challenge currently showing S1 of the Chase but without the Series 1 Cash Builder music, they’ve redubbed it with the more familiar Series 2-present music.
Gary Baldy post_id=69920 time= user_id=2113 Wrote:Interesting- Challenge currently showing S1 of the Chase but without the Series 1 Cash Builder music, they’ve redubbed it with the more familiar Series 2-present music.
Clearly not every show from Series 1 as most of them have the other version.
(18-02-2022, 08:38 PM)Neil Jones Wrote: [ -> ] (18-02-2022, 07:28 PM)DE88 Wrote: [ -> ]Unless I'm mistaken, the cars offered on game shows from the mid '90s to the early 2000s were usually worth between £10,000 and £15,000.
...
There were exceptions: some of the non-showcase cars on Bruce's Price is Right were in a lower price range, but still fairly expensive (between £6,000 and £10,000), and of course, Bullseye ended in 1995 still offering Protons, Minis and Metros.
Well that's hardly surprising considering they were made in Birmingham at the time at Longbridge, so Central didn't have far to go to find a source of cars to parade on their shows as prizes, and it obviously continued when they moved to Nottingham. IIRC Celebrity Squares was "populated" with cars from the plant too.
The point I was trying to make there was that Bullseye was still offering cheap cars in 1995 when other game shows were offering rather more expensive ones.
It's certainly true, though, that Central didn't have to search far and wide for a source of cars to offer on their shows.
(Mind you, Vauxhalls and Suzukis were also offered on Celebrity Squares - a co-production with Grundy, of course.)
On to the 2002 series of PYCR. As I've said, I'm pretty sure I'm not the only person who considers this to be its own version of the show, rather than a continuation of the '90s version - what with the "qualifying" game at the start, and the end game being played solely for cash, as well as the different title sequence and the rave remix of the theme tune. (It did use more or less the same set as the 1999 series - but then the Michael Aspel and Liza Tarbuck versions of Blockbusters were also filmed three years apart and used more or less the same set, and nobody considers the latter version to be a continuation of the former, do they? Especially as Asp's version had adults of all ages, while Liza's had sixth-formers as in Bob's day.)
I don't think it's unfair to say that PYCR 2002 was ITV making it up to Brucie after dropping Cards in the first place (and Bruce's Price is Right too). One wonders, though, just how happy he was hosting it - I wouldn't be at all surprised if he hated the "qualifying" game, with two couples ultimately only turning up to draw a card (and what would have happened if the first two couples to come on drew the ace and the king, or indeed the two and the three...). Though he spoke of the possibility of winning over £100,000 in the end game (£136,000 was the theoretical maximum), I'd like to think he knew this was virtually impossible and that even £20,000 was a tremendous amount to win. And the "qualifying" game also meant that there was less time for him to really do his thing - and less time, too, for the two couples who did play the game proper to show how entertaining *they* could be.
Two other observations:
(1) Even in 2002 "And here they are, they're so appealing; OK, dollies, do your dealing!" sounded antiquated.
(2) When a pair was turned over in the main game, the "euuuugh" sound wasn't played (though Bruce still said "You don't get anything for..." and so on). Probably not a coincidence that when a pair was turned over in the end game, the couple didn't lose any money...
PCYR followed the format of the original Card Sharks which had introduced the "qualifying" game themselves so I suspect they were compelled to follow it in the UK version in 2002. I'm not sure how closely it followed it in 2002 beyond the new opening game, though like most of these transplants they were ultimately for fun over here, and not taken deadly seriously like you see on some American gameshows, where people go OTT when they win $50.
Forsyth said many times that the gameshows he did could be knocked out quickly and paid well, and each series only took about two weeks to make a series worth so even if you had a stinker of a game in PCYR with the opening game, it was relatively minor in the grand scale of things.
Most gameshows have limits that look impossible to win, Weakest Link offered £10k, but nobody ever won anywhere near that amount, think the maximum amount won was something like £5,300 (and on one occasion the contestants were either so thick or they didn't understand the game that they got to the final round with just £800). And of course Jeff Stelling's Alphabetical gameshow had an end game that looked totally impossible to complete in the time available, and as it turned out after 30 odd episodes it was never won.
Gary Baldy post_id=69920 time= user_id=2113 Wrote:Interesting- Challenge currently showing S1 of the Chase but without the Series 1 Cash Builder music, they’ve redubbed it with the more familiar Series 2-present music.
Another episode of Series 1 is airing right now which is also redubbed
Any clips with the original music - couldn't easily find one on YouTube.
(28-02-2022, 09:07 AM)Neil Jones Wrote: [ -> ]PCYR followed the format of the original Card Sharks which had introduced the "qualifying" game themselves so I suspect they were compelled to follow it in the UK version in 2002. I'm not sure how closely it followed it in 2002 beyond the new opening game, though like most of these transplants they were ultimately for fun over here, and not taken deadly seriously like you see on some American gameshows, where people go OTT when they win $50.
The rule of having to bet at least half your money on the final card was brought over from Stateside too.
Have the Spam and Mr Green sponsorships ended? Haven't seen their bumpers at all this week.
DE88 post_id=71997 time= user_id=1366 Wrote:Neil Jones post_id=70670 time= user_id=961 Wrote:PCYR followed the format of the original Card Sharks which had introduced the "qualifying" game themselves so I suspect they were compelled to follow it in the UK version in 2002. I'm not sure how closely it followed it in 2002 beyond the new opening game, though like most of these transplants they were ultimately for fun over here, and not taken deadly seriously like you see on some American gameshows, where people go OTT when they win $50.
The rule of having to bet at least half your money on the final card was brought over from Stateside too.
Have the Spam and Mr Green sponsorships ended? Haven't seen their bumpers at all this week.
I think their sponsorship bumpers may be glitched as after the last commercial before returning there's a second or two of a commercial from the Sky channels.