Here’s something I bashed out for fun culture blog and fellow East Anglians Shouting at Cows regarding “brilliantly terrible gameshow conceits”. It wasn’t a top five in my head but has otherwise been nicely sub-edited. They are probably not the worst shows, but have been away from the public conciousness enough to make them interesting to mention.
I’d like to thank the production music conversation for highlighting the work of Simon Etchell.
I’m a bit surprised you didn’t go with the Moment of Truth clip that had the woman answer the last question to win the jackpot….most awkward $500,000 win ever…
BTW, the new Amazing Race US cast is out- the cast includes a pair of clowns…and a married pair of professional clowns who haven’t done Big Brother (and won it) like the first pair of amateur engaged clowns have…
Mmm, I couldn’t find it unfortunately.
Mr Etchell’s work takes in, of course, Carlton Era Catchphrase and Monkhouse Era Wipeout – and also the really quite good Body Heat, the somewhat under-rated Lose A Million, another Lord Bob show in Monkhouse’s Memory Masters, and the little-remembered Brain Game, Do The Right Thing and Flying Start.
Hmmm… did he actually work for Action Time?
Lose a Million is definitely in a library somewhere, although I can’t remember where or what under.
Mr. Etchell also did Paul Ross era Jeopardy!
Which was also an Action Time show… 😯 😕
The local independent radio have a Prize Pod promotion on Saturday wherein shoppers are invited to step inside the Prize Pod and catch as many golden tickets as they can, which will be exchanged for vouchers to spend at the store. They are advertising this promo using Force Field itself, to get the discussion of themes back to a great composer, and a clip of R. O’Brien Esq. politely requesting an off-screen controller to augment the air-conditioning, lest any subtlety whatsoever is lost.
Who even owns the relevant IP these days? (Is it you, David? If so, please don’t knack ’em…)
I presume that these days to all intents and purposes ‘Chatsworth Enterprises’ == ‘Malcolm Heyworth’, particularly considering the statement regarding the withdrawal of Cyberdrome’s rights to the series was in his name.
The iOS game still uses the company name as the rights holder, but is under pains to point out that “The Crystal Maze is a Chatsworth Television production based on ideas by Jacques Antoine and Co.” because of the Fort Boyard lineage.
I believe that Freemantle Media own the Chatsworth back catalogue. They certainly had the rights to Interceptor a couple of years back when I looked into it.
They might market it, but they’re probably acting as agents for Chatsworth (i.e. Malcolm, as another correspondent rightly surmises).
If anyone’s interested, tickets for Blockbusters aren’t limited to just Sky Rewards customers anymore; Applause Store are flogging some: http://www.applausestore.com/applausestore-book-show.php?id=1505&bid=1
Only one day’s worth by the looks.
I’m not sure I can be bothered to go to this but if anyone does and wants to write a report than please let me know.
On the music subject, it’s only after seeing the 1985 titles to Blockbusters (before it all went a bit Blade Runner) that the fact that Quiz Wizard includes a snatch of Beethoven makes sense – at that point in the music, he is being displayed on the hexagons (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQ7MvW5uBJM , 20 seconds in). Therefore I must pose the question – did Ed Welch write the music knowing what was in the titles, or were the titles cut to the music? Seems like a long push towards a very minor intellectual joke in either case.
Also Quiz Wizard segues perfectly into the Knightmare titles.
And vice versa.