Sing That Tune!

It was an inevitable combination, the beloved pastime of karaoke meets game shows. What couldn't be expected is that two networks premiered different karaoke-themed game shows the same week.

Last night, NBC premiered "The Singing Bee" hosted by former boy band member-turned-dancing star Joey Fatone. The format is much as the title implies, like the familiar spelling bee. A panel of contestants move on by correctly filling in the missing lyrics, or if they miss they're eliminated, until there is one. The winning player plays a "bonus round" of sorts where they can earn the top prize of $50,000 for correctly answering 5 out of 8 missing song lyrics.

The concept is good, and fits well within a half-hour format, and is actually surprisingly entertaining to watch. Joey Fatone is no great host by game show standards, but he is entertaining and fits well with the excitement and theme of the show.

Tonight, not to be out done, FOX premiered "Don't Forget The Lyrics!" hosted by another man known for music, Wayne Brady. While it also has its roots in karaoke, it is vastly different from "Bee". First, it uses the familiar money ladder ripped off from Millionaire, with the top prize of $1,000,000 if you answer 10 missing lyrics correctly. You also have 3 lifelines, or as they are called, "backup singers," if you need help along the way.

Wayne Brady does a decent job and is pretty funny, though you know he just wants to join in and start singing along with them. Also in a half-hour format, it would fit much better stretched into an entire hour. The premiere's contestant only made it through 5 lyrics before the episode completed, and you can't really expect to watch every episode to keep up. If you're going to have a half-hour show, at least finish a contestant in a half-hour.

Despite the differences, there are a lot of similarities between the two shows. First, both feature live bands, though the Bee's house band was far superior. The songs used were all hits that most anyone would know, and the missing lyrics weren't too obscure and usually came from the chorus. Though I don't find it particularly compelling splitting hairs about every "well", "and", or other extra syllable in the lyrics. Don't Forget did a much better job of handling this, by limiting the answers to a small set of words that usually didn't involve such minor bizarrities.

One of my biggest issues with Don't Forget is that the contestant sings the entire verses leading up to the missing line. I do NOT need to hear a bad singer trying to muddle her way through a song, if I wanted that I'd watch American Idol. Fortunately Bee resolves that by having professional singers as part of the band, who sing everything up until the missing lyrics along with the contestant, who you can barely hear. This makes it much more like listening to a great cover band than a bad karaoke night. Seriously, karaoke is all about hearing people you know sing bad, not people you don't know.

The Bee also included some gratuitous dancers, who I think were all previously laid off from Shatner's short-lived "Show Me the Money." While I didn't really understand the purpose, they certainly added to the exciting and upbeat setting of the show.

Overall, I think The Singing Bee comes far closer to the mark than Don't Forget The Lyrics! does. Neither is perfect, but I'll actually set the DVR for the former.

Gameshow Marathon

I could apologize to my countless fans for my lack of blogging since I've been back from vacation... but why should I do that? I don't see you paying a dime to read my blog... so deal with it and be glad I actually have something interesting to say again (or for once.) :)

On to more important things... the newest television show to make its way onto the game show revival circuit, a gameshow of gameshows called Gameshow Marathon. 6 celebrity contestants compete in 6 different classic gameshows to crown one the ultimate game show champion.

The first episode of The Price is Right was pretty average... while I enjoy TPiR, it isn't exactly the most exciting thing to watch most of the time. I DVR it during the day and fast forward so I can see the 6 pricing games, but skip the Showcase Showdown and then just turn it off before the (not-so) Fabulous Showcases. The episode was OK... but I'm looking forward to better.

Fast forward to Thursday night's "Let's Make a Deal". Slightly more entertaining, though not exactly captivating. I hate to admit that Deal or No Deal has far more suspense than LMaD ever had. The highlight of the show was probably the Zonk prizes that featured Gilbert Gottfried in classic LMaD zonks. But yet again, despite the fabulous deals behind Door #1, Door #2 and Door #3, something was lacking.

On to last night's resurrection of the 1950's classic Beat the Clock. Now we're moving up in the world. It's amazing how such a simple show can be so entertaining. It was nice how they used stunts from the original show in this one. Entertaining.

Then tonight, we get the big money... Press Your Luck! I forgot how exciting this game show is... the revival might be even more exciting than the original. It was outstanding! Sadly the original host of PYL, Peter Tomarken, died earlier this year... and of course the original show was announced by the legendary Rod Roddy who died a few years back now. This show needs to be back on the air. There was a brief 2-season or so revival of the show "Whammy: The All New Press Your Luck" that aired on GSN a few years back, but it was abysmal in comparison.

The most amazing thing about all of these Gameshow Marathon revivals is the recreations of the original sets. The set designers for this show have done an absolutely amazing job recreating the exact same sets from the original shows, down to the most minute details (though most were obviously scaled down to fit within a smaller soundstage). Considering a show like Press Your Luck with such a distinct and detailed set that probably was dismantled and thrown away when the show went off the air 20 years ago... just amazing.

Now I am a huge supporter of bringing back classic game shows, but EVERY revival up until this one has significantly (and poorly) updated and changed the sets, and in most cases significantly changed the gameplay, from the original. It's no wonder the revivals never last more than 2 seasons. The original recipe was perfect, that's why the shows stayed on the air for so long in the first place. TV producers need to realize that, and I think they'll have instant hits on their hands.

What I'm really looking forward to is in 2 weeks the episode featuring the classic Match Game. I fully expect to see the classic orange shag carpet and gaudy 70's colors. The other nice thing is that they're briging back a decent celebrity panel, including the queen of game shows, Betty White who was a semi-regular on the original Match Game. This should be a show to end all shows!

A few other comments regarding the Gameshow Marathon format. First, host Ricki Lake. Not exactly my top choice (or even any choice) for a host, but she's doing a reasonable job. It's probably unreasonable to expect her to match the skill and talent of the original hosts who really defined the roles.

Now the celebrities... a bunch of B-list celebrities (or as some would say, perhaps C-list celebrities), including the 80-year old Leslie Nielsen, who seems to be bordering on senility... Tim Meadows, who hasn't done much of anything notable since leaving SNL... Kathy Nijimy, best known for her role in the Sister Act movies, but lots of other smaller comedic roles since... and well, other random people who aren't exactly showstoppers. I wonder if they actually tried to find some real celebrities to be on this show, or if they just assumed nobody would come. At least they're somewhat entertaining.

I guess that's the last of my ranting for now. Hey, I like game shows.

Deal... or No Deal?

Tonight began yet another primetime gameshow that we stole from the Brits. The show, Deal or No Deal, is being run as a primetime mini-series-type special that will run each night this week at 8pm on NBC. Reminds me of the original schedule of Who Wants to be a Millionare, before they started running it every night for a month, and then eventually even syndicated it, until people got so sick of it they run away.

I digress... so Deal or No Deal. The premise of this show is so ridiculously simple I feel like I'm sitting back in my STAT 394 class determining the probability and expected value of each decision. Once you filter out all the lights, glitz, and strategically placed commercial breaks, you're left with this:

1) There are 26 numbered briefcases, each containing a value from $.01 to $1,000,000.
2) The contestant selects one of the briefcases.
3) The contestant then selects the remaining briefcases one-by-one, which are opened to reveal the values contained within.
4) At various points throughout the process, the contestant is made an offer to sell the briefcase they selected for a specified amount of money. If they take the offer (Deal) the game is over, otherwise (No Deal) the game continues until they either take a Deal or all of the remaining cases are opened.

That's all there is to it. The fascinating part (to me at least) is how "The Bank" a.k.a. the man upstairs with a yellow legal pad who is supposedly making the offers, though I consider it far more likely that a computer is making all of the calculations, is actually coming up with his offers. Now, I didn't take too close of a look at the values being offered at various points, but I'm pretty sure they're just offering the expected value of their selected briefcase based on the values remaining. For example, when the contestant tonight was down to just 2 briefcases (their own, and one other) the two remaining values were $50,000 and $500. So what is the EV of the case she selected? (50000+500)/2 = 25250. And what was she offered? $25,000 even. Sounds about right to me.

How long is this going to last? My guess is probably, oh... about 5 episodes. :) Why? Because the show has several fatal flaws that are the curse of all bad gameshows:

1) The audience can't play along. Well, they CAN, but really, it's about as much fun as when your friend goes "I'm thinking of a number between 1 and 26". "Oooh... sorry, wrong."
2) B-list celebrity turned game show host. The host of this show is Howie Mandel. Name one thing he's done in the past 10 years... yeah, that's what I thought. Now the same might have been said about Regis when he first took on the role as host of Millionaire... but he proved himself nicely... it helps that people knew who he was and he's a likable enough guy. Howie reminds me of when they got John McEnroe to host that failed attempt at a game show called "The Chair" where people were answering trivia questions while strapped into a chair and they lost if their heart rate went up too much. Can we say ridiculous premise?
3) Lack of variety. After about 5 episodes of this, every episode will start to feel the same. It's not like they can change up the questions, or have new celebrity guests, or anything different. See reason #1... how many times can you play "I'm thinking of a number" before it gets old... oh yeah, maybe twice. 'Nuff said.

Now that I've devoted more time than this show deserves, I have a question... what's the deal with America stealing all of our gameshows from the British? Are we not creative enough to create our own incredibly ridiculous premises and pretend to give away exorbitant amounts of money, but in reality give away nothing more than the slimmest chance of winning anything substantial? I have one thing to say: No Deal.