Wednesday, February 23, 2000
How long game shows thrive is anyone's guess
BY JOHN KIESEWETTER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
For this one, there is no Final Answer: When will the TV game show phenomenon burn out?
Nobody knows for sure.
Ratings for ABC's Who Wants To Be A Millionaire “keep going up and up. It's like a miniseries. Like Roots,” said an amazed Ted Harbert, former ABC programmer.
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ON THE AIR
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ABC: Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, 8-9 p.m. today, Channels 9, 2
NBC: Twenty One, 8-9 p.m. today, Channels 5, 22
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He made that statement a month ago, before Millionaire rocketed to the top of the Nielsen ratings. The three weekly Millionaire telecasts — Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday — now are No. 1-2-3 for the season, knocking off NBC's ER and Friends.
“The show continues to shatter all conventional wisdom,” said Stu Bloomberg, ABC Entertainment co-chairman.
Already one game, Dick Clark's Winning Lines on CBS, has been canceled. But another half-dozen game shows are being prepared by broadcast, cable and syndication producers.
Because nobody knows when the Millionaire will be tapped out.
Game show host Winston “Wink” Martindale said it may be six to eight months before TV executives know whether Millionaire will be a TV fad or a fixture.
“A (game show) cycle like this could be a couple of years,” said Fred Silverman, the former chief programmer for ABC and NBC whose company produces NBC's Twenty One. “A show like Millionaire, and I hope a show like Twenty One, can have a very, very, very long lifeline. Gunsmoke was part of the (TV) western cycle, and it was on the air for over 20 years.”
Garth Ancier, NBC Entertainment president, candidly sized up the competition this way: “I watch Millionaire. It's a fun show to watch. Will I watch it forever? I don't know ... Your guess is as good as mine.”
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Various theories
Many observers — TV executives, game show producers and TV critics — have cited various theories for the unique success of Millionaire. Among them: host Regis Philbin; the pacing; lighting; music; close-up camera angles; “lifelines” assistance for contestants; and increasing difficulty of questions as the jackpot grows.
Some said the new game shows have worked simply because of greed, which happens to be the name of Fox's game show. Everybody wants a shot at $1 million. .
“Never underestimate the value of a show that enables the common man to win $1 million,” said Peter Roth, president of Warner Bros. Television, which produces ER, The West Wing, Drew Carey and Friends.
Veteran game show creator Bob Stewart (Password, The Price Is Right, To Tell The Truth) claimed Millionaire's success was from viewers' “money interest, more than it is (from) a game show interest,” he said. “The name of the game is a million bucks, let's face it.”
Others, however, said the game was a big factor in Millionaire's success.
“I get more excited (watching) Who Wants To Be A Millionaire when someone is trying to go for the $100 question, and they have to call their lifeline,” said Fred Wostbrock, the Game Show Encyclopedia author.
“The real star of this show, frankly, is the show, and what they do here with the lights and the music and the production, and the million dollars,” Mr. Philbin told TV critics last month.
Appeals to all ages
Unlike Jeopardy!, Millionaire contestants must answer every question. There's another major difference: Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune attract an older audience, while Millionaire appeals to all ages, which also made The Cosby Show No. 1 in the 1980s. Grade-school children have become hooked on the easy (and funny) $100 and $200 questions.
“Kids 7, 8, 9 years old can play it, and then as it got progressively harder, it brought the whole family in,” said Mr. Martindale, who has hosted Tic-Tac-Dough and 18 other games.
You can't even find agreement on whether game shows were a new phenomenon. The Price Is Right, in its 28th season, is second in national daytime ratings to The Young and the Restless. Wheel and Jeopardy! have been the runaway No. 1 shows 7-8 p.m. for a decade, and drawing more Tristate viewers than NBC's Twenty One revival.
All ABC did was put a game show in prime-time, where they thrived through the 1950s and '60s. CBS' What's My Line and I've Got A Secret aired in prime-time until 1967.
“Game shows are a critical part of the television landscape, and their wide popularity on broadcast and cable is not really a new phenomenon.
Indeed, it is fundamental to television,” says Michael Fleming, president of cable's Game Show Network.
“Game shows have actually been cool for a very long time,” said Mr. Fleming, whose channel grew from 19 to 27 million households last year.
Which brings us back to our question: When will game shows burn out again?
“As long as there is a demand on the part of the audience, and as long as the shows are well-produced, entertaining, whatever, I think the shows will continue to proliferate,” Mr. Martindale said.
The veteran game show host said people stopped watching quiz shows in the 1980s because too many looked alike. Mr. Wostbrock, the historian, also blamed competition from news magazines, court and talk shows.
“The moment that (game) shows ... are no longer interesting to the audience, they won't tune in,” Mr. Martindale said. “But if they're good shows — like a sitcom, or a movie, or a drama — they'll be around, and be successful.”
John Kiesewetter is Enquirer TV/radio critic. Write: 312 Elm St., Cincinnati 45202; fax: 768-8330.
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