The Price Is Right/Trivia: Difference between revisions

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* [[Channel Hop]]: Started on NBC, moved to ABC, reappeared on CBS and syndication seven years after ABC canned it.

** There are also the many sources that confuse the Showcase Showdown (when the Big Wheel is spun) with the Showcase (when they bid on the prize packages at the end).

** People often refer to the bidding portion as "Contestant's Row", "Item Up For Bid", or aren't even aware it has a name; the proper title for the bidding game is "One Bid".

*** Rod's increasing illness in the 2000s led to fill-ins by Richardson and Randy West between 2001 and 2003, and one week in 2002 where Paul Boland (of ''[[Match Game]]'' 1998) filled in. Besides Burton, Randy and Rich, the post-Rod auditions included comedian Daniel Rosen, voice actor/former VJ Roger Rose and regional radio hosts Art Sanders, Don Bishop and Jim Thornton (who now announces ''Wheel'').

*** Following Rich's ousting in 2010, the substitutes came again — ''[[Whose Line Is It Anyway?]]'' alumni Brad Sherwood and Jeff Davis, former ''[[Shop 'til You Drop]]'' host JD Roberto, radio host/author David H. Lawrence XVII, former ''[[The Weakest Link]]'' host George Gray, and comedian Steve White. Gray was declared the new announcer on April 18, 2011.

* [[Keep Circulating the Tapes]]:

** 67 nighttime episodes and a single daytime show of the Cullen run were aired by GSN. The daytime show (February 21, 1957; incorrectly listed in liner notes as March 10) and ABC nighttime finale (September 11, 1964; not seen on GSN and incorrectly listed as September 4) are on the DVD set. Shokus Video has five shows in their compilation volumes <ref>(NBC daytime May 31/July 5/July 12, 1957; NBC nighttime finale September 6, 1963 {aired on GSN}; ABC daytime January 4, 1965 {widely and incorrectly listed as 1964})</ref>, while nighttime shows from November 26, 1962 and August 28, 1964 are on the trading circuit along with three March 1965 episodes sub-hosted by Jack Clark (one being March 22).

** The Dennis James version, partly due to offering a ''lot'' of furs, hasn't been seen very much since 1977 minus three prominent examples <ref>(a pair of brief clips in ''Game Show Moments Gone Bananas'' {circa 1974 where Dennis trips on the Turntable; circa 1976 with a problematic Clock Game player}, a daytime episode where he subbed for Barker {December 25, 1974; aired twice by [[GSN]] in 1997}, and a Lucky Seven playing shown during the 1979 Peter Falk film ''The In-Laws'' {which leads to a discussion between the leads about ''Price''})</ref>. Only five episodes (including the pitchfilm) circulate, and approximately 30 episodes from 1973-75 were recorded onto audio cassette (heard [http://j-shea.com/TPIR/nighttime/index.html here] and [http://j-shea.com/TPIR/cues/index.html here]).

*** The last four minutes of an early-1976 show [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2j8hQRqV1_A surfaced] in July 2011, which a voiceover at the end clearly marks as being recorded from a local station...but the same episode was ''also'' used in an official '76 promo reel. '''What the hell are the odds?!'''

* [[Milestone Celebration]]: Every ''x'',000th episode features tons of big prizes and special decorations.

** The show celebrated its 25th, 30th and 35th Anniversaries with a primetime special. The first (#0001S) used the half-hour format, with the other half filled with clips; the second (#0001LV) was filmed in Las Vegas, using the regular format; the third (#023SP) also celebrated Barker's 50 years in show business, with a similar format as the 25th-Anniversary Special and a cameo by Adam Sandler.

** The original version averted any shame, and ensured it. In 1958, police arrested a viewer from New York City who tried to bribe the producers into selecting his sweepstakes entry. Later, as the quiz show scandals broke, charges were brought up that producers were instructing certain contestants to not exceed the prices of certain items. The charges were never proven.

* [[The Pete Best]]: Dennis James, to the point where '''Doug Davidson''' is better-known for hosting ''Price'' amongst those under the age of about 40 or so (excluding die-hard game show fans). There's something wrong when said under-40s will know the guy who did ''80'' episodes far more often than the guy who did ''200'', and it certainly doesn't help that about 25+ episodes of Davidson's run circulate versus exactly '''''5''''' episodes of James' tenure. <ref>(Excluding the pitchfilm {not intended to air} and the audio recordings {not "visual", and because about 5-10 or so are missing several combinations of Segments 1-3}. If they ''were'' included, it would bring the total to a more respectable 36 of 201.)</ref>

* [[Promoted Fanboy]]:

** Both Rod Roddy and Rich Fields were longtime fans of the show, and attended tapings where they asked original announcer Johnny Olson for advice on careers in announcing.

** [[Fremantle Media]] staffer Mandel Ilagan, the creator of the pricing game ½ Off, was the founder of the newsgroup alt.tv.game-shows and a contestant on ''[[Match Game]]'' in 1998 before Fremantle hired him in the early 2000s.

* [[Prop Recycling]]: ''Price'', for the most part, rarely throws their old stuff out.

** Both versions moved to ABC, but their new home couldn't afford to air the nighttime show in color as NBC had. Further, not every market had an ABC affiliate in 1963, so 48 markets got ''Price'' on their CBS station instead. Ratings dropped significantly for both versions, with the nighttime show ousted on September 11, 1964 and the daytime show gone on September 3, 1965.

* [[Shrug of God]]: Credit Card and Check Game have not been played in quite some time; while some games have been put on hiatus in the past, these games have gone so long without being played that they're essentially retired. However, the staff has been rather careful in choosing its words so as to give absolutely no clue whether either game has been permanently retired — the official explanation is that they're "being refurbished", which falls flat since Any Number and Temptation were refurbished in far less time.

* [[Throw It In]]: Many different production or prop errors get left in for the heck of it.

** Johnny Olson frequently ad-libbed over portions of the written copy, and some of his ad-libs became permanent with Rod.

** Make Your Mark's only appearance in Season 37 had its rules changed mid-taping to match Drew's incorrect explanation of them. The pricing game itself was then canned immediately afterward.

* [[Too Soon]]: The show had the misfortune to air a rerun [http://www.snopes.com/katrina/humor/priceright.asp offering a trip to New Orleans] as a prize -- a week after Hurricane Katrina. Whoops.

* [[What Could Have Been]]:

** [[Bill Cullen]] stated in a January 23, 1972 [http://userdata.acd.net/ottinger/cullen/more/article12.jpg interview] that he was in negotiations with Goodson-Todman to do the ''New'' show and "We've hit a snag ... the price, so far, hasn't been right for me." While his polio would've made it all but impossible for him to helm a show where the host is required to move around a lot, keep in mind that nothing had really been ironed-out about the format at this point. Also noted is that Bill was in New York City at the time as a regular panelist on ''[[To Tell the Truth]]'' and host of ''[[Three On a Match]]''.

** The pitchfilm, taped a month later, shows that hardly anything is certain except the core concept of winning a One-Bid to play a pricing game, the host (Dennis James), the airing schedule (weekly syndication), and the syndicator (Viacom). Almost everything else either got tweaked (the pricing games became Take Two and Ten Chances, respectively) or were dropped entirely (children bidding on prizes to win them for their parents).

** Sometime between the pitchfilm and probably early August, the idea was hatched to use '''three''' Showcases per episode, so all onstage players could have a chance at more. This was dropped by mid-August.

** Season 37 was supposed to have a new pricing game introduced every day on the first week, possibly to make up for the fact that Season 36 had no new games introduced. Thanks to the firing of Dobkowitz and numerous other [[Screwed by the Network|budget issues with CBS]], all but Gas Money got scrapped.

** After Johnny Olson's death, Bob Hilton almost got the announcing job but turned it down to host two unsold pilots. Although Hilton didn't announce any shows at all after 1991, it's entirely possible he could still be announcing the show today had he chosen it (instead of spending the next 10 years as a local TV anchor and then retiring fairly young to sell cleaning products).

{{quote|'''[http://www.golden-road.net/index.php/topic,17867.msg308020.html#msg308020 DiPirro]''': This is second hand information, but it seems the sign existed when I asked for it, but was destroyed with the knowledge I wanted to put it back on the air. ... This moment represented my very first, huge disappointment at the show in so many ways. But, as a fan, most important was that a historic prop was senselessly destroyed...}}

*** More annoying is that for Season 40, the logo-signs in the back of the audience were altered to use a ''physically-spinning'' dollar sign. Yes, let's ''add'' new physical props but ''destroy'' one that's been in storage for seven years.

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Trivia]]