Per David Levine of BCI at the Home Theater Forum, "Tattletales" will be the next G-T show to get some episodes released on DVD.

This could be a chance to see some episodes GSN never aired, because to my knowledge they *never* got to the end of the original CBS run at any point, and we never saw any from the night syndicated version that aired in the 70s.

I would hope that all the episodes they pick are from 74-78 since I never enjoyed the 82-84 ones much.

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htf/sd-dvd...ext-bci-13.html

In one way, this is a little surprising since Tattletales is hardly A-list Goodson-Todman product. On the other hand, BCI believes that celebrities are what sell these packages, and they ought to be able to get some decent ones out of the series. (Though they'll have to work a little harder for big names than they needed to on Password.)

As for which version they show, I doubt that will be a consideration. If they have access to the entire run, they'll just look for the biggest stars no matter what year those stars appeared.

Also, here's an early wish that an episode of He Said, She Said gets included in the mix!

If names is their first consideration, then I think at the very least we'll end up seeing these celebs:

William Shatner
Joan Collins
Zsa Zsa Gabor (with all of her marriages you CAN'T leave her out)

But if they wanted to pick episodes strictly for laughs I would start with Barbara Stuart's "Nixon" answer episode.

This must be hilarious, because I don't recall seeing it on any clip special.

Anyone care to fill in the details?

The question to the ladies was "If you could pick the centerforld for Playgirl magazine, who would you pick?"

Julie London and Rona Barrett both gave the answers their husbands predicted, Robert Redford. Then it was Dick Gautier's turn to predict and he was looking dubious.

He stated that Barbara had zero interest in things like Playgirl, and would not say him (Dick). And then Bert suddenly began promoting himself by flexing his muscles a few times. Then finally, Dick said, "You know what I'll say? I'll say Nixon! She'd probably like to see him that way just for laughs."

The audience is reacting with dubious laughter and Bert is equally dubious that Dick would predict an off the wall answer like that, going "I can hardly wait to see her reaction when she finds out you said that."

Well....time to blink Barbara back. She seems clueless because just as Dick said, she has zero interest in those kinds of things and then as if in desperation....."Oh, how about President Nixon?"

The audience reaction, Dick's reaction that she actually said it and Barbara's reaction that Dick had predicted that answer was uproarious and Bert had one of those, "That's INCREDIBLE!" moments. It's my personal pick for the best moment on Tattletales that I've seen.

They did air some episodes as late as the fall of 1977 around 1995. During GSN's first year on the air, a lot of episodes hadn't been cleared yet, so they went from '74-77 quite quickly, and cycled back to the beginning again when they made their first major schedule change in January 1996. They never kept it on the air long enough to get that far in the run again. I think they might have aired some later episodes during the old "Wide World of Games" they used to have.

They've never aired any episode from the syndie version (I'd really like to see one...), but they did air pratically all of the '82-84 series.

The '80s run might yield some "Before They Were Stars" moments (Meg Ryan, for example, although she's quickly moving into the "After They Were Stars" territory). But by and large, I've only got three people who rate in the "They Never Do Game Shows" category so far: Sammy Davis Jr. did a week in 1975, Nancy Sinatra did a couple of weeks with her husband (he's since died), and Cheryl Ladd appeared with her first husband back in 1974 under her maiden name (Stoppelmoor), back when her biggest claim to fame was being the singing voice of Melody in Josie & The Pussycats.

I think they're going to have to rely on funny moments. Or we're gonna see a lot of Betty and Allen.

Or Charles and Dodi.

Or Dick and Dolly or Scoey and Claire.

/Don't know where that came from.

Speakin' of which, which if any of the Klugmans appeared on TT (probably early in the run)?

They had aired the entire '80s revival of Tattletales but since 1997, GSN hasn't been able to air a full week of Tattletales beyond August 1982. I don't know when the black microphones that were also seen on Child's Play made its debut but I'm pretty it did make its debut before CP made its debut. As far as I can remember, GSN has only aired 1 episode from X-Mas week 1983 on every Christmas marathon they had with Tattletales being included, but I still don't know when the "Places, please" intro debuted but I think it debuted later in April 1983 at the same time as CP introduced the new "Turnabout" end game but Matt may have to confirm me about all of this.

TTBOMK, neither Brett nor Jack ever did "Tattletales". I can't find any listing for them in old TVGuides, and GSN did run practically all of the first couple of years of the show and they never appeared.

GSN has never aired any of the Bob Newhart shows (most of them were quite funny) - I wonder if they'd be able to include a few of them in any DVD release - or would that fall under the same "clearance" clause?

I wonder if we'll see Bob and Dorothy Jo.

calliaume wrote:

But did she go and spoil it all by saying something stupid like "I love you"?

{ducking}

It would be cool to see the night time version. It wasn't cleared in my market, but all the ads I've seen in old TV Guides had everyone attired in evening wear (tuxedos and gowns). Not sure if that was always the case, however.

Wasn't there a similar clearance issue with Jack and Joan Benny on Password? Their episode made it onto the DVD release.

Unless I'm mistaken, wasn't the reason Jack and Joan's episode never aired on GSN due to a major glitch on the tape?

According to what the webmaster at kinescopes.com found out, there was a huge audio problem with the tape, or at least the copy GSN has. Can anybody who has that set tell what source the episode came from? A kinescope is out there and if the audio problem is on the master, they may have had to go to that.

Greg

Do the It Had To Be You or Celebrity Match Mates pilots---respectively hosted by Ed McMahon and Gene Rayburn---still exist?

Some collectors have a bad copy of It Had To Be You, which usually suggests that there's still a good one someplace.

You'll never see the Darrows due to a Clarence issue.

/Can't think of another famous Clarence.

//Somebody had to say it.

Would Tattletales work today? With all the celebrity crap on TV these days you'd think it might have a shot -- up the ante a little.

Not amused by your shenanigans.

Finds you guilty.

Wants this discussion Oveur.

/Roger.
//Huh?

Is probably too obscure, but all the good ones were taken.

/Still, a neat original line from Chris.

How could you forget Clarence the angel?

Ahem...

/Right on!

Well, as long as we're being obscure...

/then there's this little number from Trading Places
//you mess with the bull, you get the horns

Yes they both exist, It Had To Be You in b/w kinescope and Celebrity Match Mates on color videotape.

The speaking voice of Melody appeared frequently on "Tattletales" as well - Jackie Joseph, who at the time was married to Ken Berry.

What about Cla'ence? He's still around, doing funny things under his real name of Brad Sanders.

He gave himself the nickname Cito -- I thought you couldn't give yourself a nickname.

I don't see this show ever coming back, at least not five-a-week. Getting enough celeb couples to do the show could be troublesome, and if they don't use celebrity couples Sony's lawyers would probably come a-knockin'.

It's funny--I'd have never imagined this coming back either, but given how low the bar is set for "celebrities" now, I can see this once-a-week in prime time. Anyone know the whereabouts of Amber and Boston Rob from Survivor?

Question: who was Cheryl Ladd married to?

David Ladd, a modestly successful producer and the son of actor Alan Ladd.

And a fool of a man for ever letting that Charlie's Angel go.
This is unexpected happy news. I figured Beat The Clock had a better chance of being released than Tattletales. Is there a tentative release date for this?

He's got a ways to go to pass Tate Donovan, who dumped both Jennifer Aniston and Sandra Bullock.

Hate 'em both. Don't blame Tate on that one.
Burt Reynolds on the other hand...allowing Dinah Shore to slip away. Twit.

Well...he did get Loni Anderson.

/Am more of a Bailey Quarters man himself...

Loni does nothing for me, either. With you completely on Jan Smithers.
Why that Brolin bloke passed her over for Barbra Schnoz Yentl is beyond me.
ObGameShows: Yentl was the correct Final Jeopardy! response on the 12.8.08 episode.
ObThisTopic: WKRP's Frank Bonner was on Tattletales along with his wife one week.

Brolin was on too...with his first wife.

Son of a gun! Truly, I did not know this. Jane Cameron. A very pretty lady who died too young.
Was this appearance during his run on Marcus Welby, M.D.?

I was remiss in failing to mention two stalwart Tattletales couples: Patti Deutsch and Donald Ross, and the ever-popular Mitzi McCall and Charlie Brill.

TT did have some famous couples, George and Elana Hamilton, William and Marcy Shatner, Stiller and Meara, plus a number of game show hosts with their wives, Bill Cullen, Bob Barker, Chuck Woolery (with JoAnn Pflug), Allen Ludden, Monty Hall, Bobby Van, Jack Narz, Steve Allen, Gene Rayburn, Richard Dawson and even Dennis James. When I saw TT in person in 1977, I saw two nighttime shows with Bob & Ginnie Newhart, Dick & Dolly Martin, and Totie Fields & George Johnson. Totie won $1,500 for the banana section one one show, which I was in. The next day, I managed to get in (they didn't want the same people showing up every day) and saw three daytime shows with Bobby Van & Elaine Joyce, Jack & Wallace Albertson, and Adam Arkin & his wife or lady (don't remember which, heck it's been 30 years). Shame that Bob Newhart hasn't cleared his TT appearances. The shows he was on usually had Dick & Dolly Martin and were funny as hell.

I didn't see a release date for the TT DVD. It's safe to assume it will be out sometime in '09, I guess.

BTW, when you saw TT in person, you had to leave one section at at time. There was only one check writing machine. The section that won the most money left LAST.

Interestingly, though Jack Klugman and Brett Somers never did TT, Charles Nelson Reilly was on several times, with Elizabeth Allen, Julie Harris and Karen Morrow.

I'm making an assumption here (and we all know what that does), but you were in whatever section you wound up in for the duration of the taping?

And while we're at it, were you randomly assigned a section or did you get to choose?

Approxmently how much did this mean for each member in that section?

I never would have guessed Charles was such a ladies man! Three different chicks! Bravo!

Um...you may not have gotten the memo...

To answer the last few questions:

You were told to sit in a certain section - you did NOT get a choice. You stayed in that section for the duration of the taping (two or three shows). The celebs changed sections for each show, the audience stayed put.

The money was split 100 ways - there were 100 people in each section. So $1,500 was $15 apiece. Not bad for sitting in an audience.

You were also warned by announcer Gene Wood that if an answer was heard on stage, the question would be thrown out for your section, and everyone in your section would be waiting for you in the parking lot.

As for CNR, the G-T people liked him, which best explains his appearances on TT. He did admit to being gay, but he could play it "straight" very well. Elizabeth Allen was Paul Lynde's wife on his short-lived TV sitcom. That's what tipped it off for me.

So Dick Sargent might have been in CNR's demographic BEFORE he was dating Fannie Flagg?

Since Sargeant also admitted to being gay, yes! Fannie Flagg was also "outed" by a former lover some years back, and Richard Deacon was just going through the motions with Dody Goodman on TT, if the Wikipedia article about him is correct. Hey, TT offered national exposure to celebs.

Yes, James Brolin appeared around April 1974. He didn't play the game very well, but he was on the same panel as Dick Gautier and Donald Ross, IIRC.