Tutto x Tutto (2006, Rai Uno, Italy)

This is the first version of the Show Me What You’ve Got/Show Me The Money format to be broadcast in the world. Tutto x Tutto translates to Everything Times Everything.

We saw the British pilot for this being filmed some time ago, you can read our write up of that here, about two thirds of the way down (Dale Winton’s £8,160,000 Adventure). The Italian version dispenses with the questions entirely, and in honesty gets a lot more things right because of it.

The opening show and three bells ring. Tutto x Tutto is officially in session!

And it’s our favourite Italian ever, Enzo Ghinazzi aka Pupo! He’s a popular Italian singer, who appears to have got into gameshows almost by accident. He was the second host of Affari Tuoi.

CeletheRef has this to add:

“Pupo was a gambling addict but eventually turned a new leaf and the state TV gave him another opportunity. After all he became an expert in games of chance 🙂 Mostly he took the job to climb out of debt.”

They like their overhead shots.

And today’s contestant, who has just come out the tunnel behind her, is Claudia.

We have no clue as to why the inspiration for the set has come from a building site.

Commercial break, then the titles which involve lots of blocks with mathematical operations flying about. All the while, this piece of music plays.

We’ve wracked our brains, but we can’t remember who it’s by, although we do remember Channel 4 using it to promote US Big Brother when they were showing it on E4 a few years back. If you know what it is, please put us out of our misery in the comments box below.

Edit: It’s “Seven Nation Army” by The White Stripes. Thanks Billy!

And there we are.

Someone’s going to have their eye out on those dodgy looking spikes one day if they’re not careful, you know.

And here’s Round One, looking mightily Deal or No Deal-esque.

And this is what she’s facing – twelve models (males in white suits, females in black dresses), each of them standing next to a representation of a starsign, and each one carrying a scroll with one of the values you can see on the picture up there.

I gather that these folks, whilst not quite celebrities, are quite important for something in their chosen fields.

It’s all excitingly Celebrity Squares!

She’s decided to go for Taurus first.

She must decide whether to play a plus, in which case the money he’s hiding is to get added to her bank, or whether she is going to play one of her minuses, in which case it gets taken away.

To begin the game, she is given five plusses and four minuses, and the round isn’t over until she has used all of them. The odds are on her side that she’ll finish the round with money in her account, although I don’t know what will happen if she finishes in the red – the show’s half an hour, and it doesn’t look like games straddle.

She’s using a plus here, she’s pressing the plus button look.

The starsign has changed to a picture of a plus. What’s he holding?

It’s the worst start possible!

The objuect, obviously, is to put the plusses with the big figures and the minuses with the small ones.

By our reckoning, the maximum amount of cash you can finish the round with is €18,500.

As you can see, she’s recovered quite well and she’s up to €9,500. However, she’s still got three minuses to play, so in theory she could still finish in the hole yet.

And she finishes with €5,000 in the bank.

And that’s great, because that means she has a stake to play with in round two.

The plusses and minuses ae now replaced by multiplication and division.

The scrolls now show values between 1 and 5.

The computer points out to her the maximum should could win this evening – if she has the perfect round, she is going to walk away with 200 times her starting stake, a cool million!

Another shot of the set, because we quite like it.

However, just as you could multiply your starting stake by 200, if it all goes horrifically wrong, you will walk away with one two-hundredth of your stake. In this casem, the computer points out that’s €25.

That’s pretty extreme though.

The game is played as before. Again, it’s the worst possible start.

You want the multiplies to hit the big numbers and the divisions to hit the small numbers.

There’s only one one on the board, so her divisions are guaranteed to hurt.

She’s made it up to sixty grand.

Unfortunately, she can’t stop and go home. She must use all her operations to finish the round.

We like this shot because we’ve noticed on the screens for the audience they’ve left the tape counter in.

And, well, it’s not gone well for her. She finishes the round on €2,500.

But she still can’t walk away, there’s one final part, the grand finale.

There are still four numbers left on the board, she must pick one more scroll of the scrolls remainiing to determine the stakes for the final round.

And Ms Aquarius is holding a gigantic five! And doesn’t she look pleased.

And there it is on the big screen for all to see.

And here come two more people bearing cards inside of envelopes.

Inside one of them is a multiply sign, and inside the other is a division.

The computer throws up the two possible prizes avaliable to her. If she picks the right envelope, she’ll be going home with €12,500. But pick the wrong one, then it’s the decidedly non life-changing €500.

She’s chosen the male’s envelope.

Pupo has a look inside and then builds the reveal up.

For reasons best known to himself, Pupo makes the contestant pretend to give birth to the card.

And this badly timed cap suggests she’s won! Excellent.

The other model opens up her envelope to reveal the division symbol.

And it’s back down the tunnel to exit.

This article was originally written in 2006, a selection of comments from the original comment box follows:

Billy
Music is ‘Seven Nation Army’ by the White Stripes, which, ironically, reached number seven in the charts in 2003. 

Show looks good, anyway, though you can clearly see the American Deal or No Deal influences.

Travis P
Oh yes as when someone chooses a model, the camera zooms straight to that person. A’la the models on US DoND.

KP
Hah. It’s US DoND on a building site, only it’s a somewhat different game. Though just like DoND it’s luck with a small element of judgement (except here the judgement relates to deciding which operant to use). 

By the way, the maximum round 1 total is actually 18.5k. You probably thought of the UK pilot and assumed there were five minuses to use, hence subtracting the 1.5k as well. 

That means the top prize is 3.7m, which as far as I’m aware is the biggest prize ever offered on a European show that isn’t based upon either Miljoenenjacht format. 

Playing it with no trivia element whatsoever is interesting. I’m not sure whether it’s good or bad to have shows that combine luck and skill. Would this work as a luck-based endgame to a skill-based quiz, as per the original DoND?

Gizensha
Incidently – does the recent surge in luck based gameshows mean that Press Your Luck was a couple of decades ahead of its time?

CeleTheRef
yay! press your luck! That would work great nowadays. 

“”Enzo Ghinazzi aka Pupo! He’s a popular Italian singer, who appears to have got into gameshows almost by accident.””  

Pupo was a gambling addict but eventually turned a new leaf and the state TV gave him another opportunity. After all he became an expert in games of chance 🙂 Mostly he took the job to climb out of debt. 

“”Tutto x Tutto translates to All Times All.”” 

It better translates to “everything for everything” as the player bets everything on the last choice to win big money.  

“”I gather that these folks, whilst not quite celebrities, are quite important for something in their chosen fields.”” 

They say to have different jobs, but I believe they are all pro models. 

“”…although I don’t know what will happen if she finishes in the red – the show’s half an hour, and it doesn’t look like games straddle.”” 

A new game quickly begins with another contestant.

Brig Bother
> Pupo was a gambling addict but eventually turned a new leaf and the state TV gave him another opportunity. After all he became an expert in games of chance 🙂 Mostly he took the job to climb out of debt. 

Man, we just love him even more now!

Brig Bother
Would you believe, that’s the third time I’ve figured out the first round figure incorrectly in the last few days?

Brig Bother
Besides, this show has got 20 times more charm than the US DOND, in honesty.

SamB
When’s this broadcast on RAI?

Brig Bother
It was daily at 20:30 over the summer, but Affari Tuoi is in the slot at the moment.

CeleTheRef
It is on Rai 1 at 19:30 UK time (L’eredità is at 17:50) 

however don’t trust timetables too much, here channels sometimes air their programs later than declared, so people tune in too early and watch extra commercials.

Brig Bother
Mmm, ta for that. It’s just that I was looking on the Rai site and I could’t find any mention of it in the daily listings!