"Backtimed" Themes, When the music ended, so did the show... Options

[fostergray82]

I wonder who would have made the decision to do that - the music supervisor, or the producer/director? FWIW, there was an episode of Blockbusters where they didn't restart - it was part way through the 20-win streak of the mother-daughter team. I remember seeing it on GSN and was surprised that they let the whole them play through. It was long credit day that day too. If they did it once, why couldn't they have done it more often?

That was the one thing that annoyed me about the first season of 80s Pyramid. I always wanted to hear that sweet bass part towards the end, and would be disappointed when it would cut back to the beginning before hitting that part of the theme.

[Jimmy Owen]

One of the cool things about the game show checkerboards of the '70's was that since every show was once (or twice) a week, you'd usually get a full credit roll and hear more of the theme on each show. I didn't know the respective themes had an end until I saw James "Price" and Cullen "Pyramid."

Another thing I remember on "The Big Showdown" was that very occassionaly the closing theme would end and the music would segue to the slightly slower main theme. On those days, you knew you'd see the full credits (and hear an ABC announcer promoting that night's "Barney Miller.)

[ChuckNet]

I always liked it when the music supervisors cued up some of the music to different spots - sometimes you'd get to hear a different part of the theme. Even better when they forgot to recue the cart and it played through to the end - that didn't happen often enough either!

It happened once on a 1979 syndie FF...as luck would have it, there was a full credit roll that day, so the theme almost reached the end, something that hadn't happened since they started looping the first part of the theme after the first week.

Chuck Donegan (The Illustrious "Chuckie Baby")

[Mr. Bill]

Ouicksilver and Free 4 All both did this IIRC.

If Merv Griffin's Crosswords hasn't been mentioned, that's one as well.

Except for the first few weeks! The earliest shows were not backtimed nor were they restarted after the commercial plugs. As a result, we ended up hearing just last few seconds of the middle section, and the last part repeated until the show ended. On full-credit days that meant maybe 2 to 3 repeats of the last part.

Bill

[Don Howard]

USA's version of Chain Reaction had the chance to make it to the end several times but those plans went down the ewtrou as they'd start the theme somewhere in the middle, get near the end, then re-start near the middle again....multiple times. I remember thinking, "Aw! Why?"
1989-90 Jackpot! pulled that re-start jazz, too.

[aaron sica]

I never heard the entire theme for $25K/$100K Pyramid until I heard it on Davidson's version....I honestly thought it was a new part added to the theme, the first time I heard it (the section at the very end, before it starts over).

[TimK2003]

It always sounded that Marshall's Hollywood Squares theme (the one that made it to the game show cd) was backtimed so when the credit roll was over, they were always at the part of the the theme when the vocalists first started to sing the da-da-da's, even though they were never at the end.