49-657: My Word! is a British radio quiz panel game broadcast by the BBC on the Home Service (1956–67) and Radio 4 (1967–88). It was created by Edward J. Mason and Tony Shryane , and featured the humorous writers Frank Muir and Denis Norden , known in Britain for the series Take It From Here . The show was piloted in June 1956 on the Midland Home Service and broadcast as a series on
98-464: A Clue since 1972, The News Quiz since 1977, My Word! from 1956 to 1988, and My Music from 1967 to 1994. The British version of What's My Line? may have been the first television panel show in the UK, with an original run from 1951 to 1963 and several remakes in later years. The word game Call My Bluff aired from 1965 to 2005, the charades show Give Us a Clue ran from 1979 to 1992, and
147-509: A Secret and To Tell the Truth . At times, they were among the top ten shows on U.S. television, and they continue to experience occasional revivals . All three Goodson-Todman primetime shows were cancelled by CBS in 1967 amid ratings declines and trouble attracting younger viewers, although the programs were consistently profitable by being among the cheapest television shows to produce. Their cancellations came as attention to demographics and
196-465: A Secret is about secrets ; To Tell the Truth , Would I Lie to You? and The Unbelievable Truth deal with lies ; and It Pays to Be Ignorant and I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue are parodies . Some panel shows are variations of classic parlor games. Twenty Questions is based on the parlor game of the same name, Give Us a Clue is modelled after charades , and Call My Bluff and Balderdash are based on fictionary . Frequently,
245-538: A beauty spot between a carp pond and Lover's Leap – "There's Manet asleep 'twixt the carp and the leap". In another, Muir confessed to forging fan letters purportedly from Monica Dickens , Val Gielgud , Asa Briggs and Fay Compton , so that "I am monarch of all I survey" became "I am Monica, Val, Asa, Fay". A Norden story explaining "Charity shall cover the multitude of sins" became a lament for his diminishing capacity for alcohol and consequent need to enunciate extremely carefully after drinking spirits: "Clarity shall cover
294-721: A broadcast during their time as panellists, but Robertson and Scott-James missed one apiece, their absences covered respectively by Pamela Frankau and Katherine Whitehorn . Lionel Hale (one of the intended contestants in the pilot show) deputised for both Muir and Norden in 1967 as did John Wells in 1975 and Barry Took on four occasions between 1978 and 1982. Ted Kavanagh took Muir's place for two programmes in 1957, and Edward Blishen stood in for Norden in two episodes in 1985. Fraser's absences between 1986 and 1988 were covered by Joan Bakewell , Victoria Glendinning , P. D. James , Libby Purves and Gay Search . After Mason's death in 1971 Longland took over responsibility for compiling
343-534: A charades show on NHK General TV from 1953 to 1968; and 私の秘密 ("My Secret"), based on I've Got a Secret on NHK General TV from 1956 to 1967. Currently, a wide variety of Japanese variety shows are popular, and many of them feature owarai comedians, Japanese idols , and other celebrities playing games. Some games involve bizarre physical stunts. Brain Wall , adapted in English-speaking countries as Hole in
392-431: A famous phrase or quotation. In early shows, once the real answers were given, Muir and Norden were invited to explain the origin of the phrase less seriously, in the form of a feghoot . An early example was the quotation "Dead! And never called me mother!" from a stage adaptation of East Lynne , which became the exclamation of a youth coming out of a public telephone box which he had discovered to be out of order. Later
441-509: A focus on younger viewers gained currency among advertisers. The departures of these three New York–based shows were also part of a mass migration of television production to Los Angeles, leaving only one primetime show produced on the East Coast. Later years saw several successes in the format, with Match Game ; The Hollywood Squares ; Win, Lose or Draw ; Celebrity Sweepstakes ; Password and Pyramid primarily running in
490-947: A linguistic game on ORTF and TF1 from 1969 to 1981; L'Académie des neuf ("The Academy of Nine"), based on Hollywood Squares on Antenne 2 from 1982 to 1987; Cluedo , based on the board game Cluedo/Clue on France 3 from 1994 to 1995; Burger Quiz on Canal + from 2001 to 2002; Incroyables Expériences ("Incredible Experiences"), about scientific experiments on France 2 and France 3 from 2008 to 2012; and Canapé quiz ("Sofa Quiz"), an adaptation of Hollywood Game Night on TMC in 2014. German panel shows include 7 Tage, 7 Köpfe ("7 Days, 7 Heads"), Genial daneben ("Idiot Savant"), Kopfball ("Headball"), Die Montagsmaler ("Pictionary"), Noch Besserwissen ("Even Better Knowledge"), Pssst … (similar to I've Got A Secret ), Die Pyramide (the German version of Pyramid ), Quizfire , Sag die Wahrheit ("Tell
539-576: A local French language adaptation of Taskmaster . In 2014, Super Channel ordered 36 episodes of a panel show called Too Much Information . A revival of Match Game aired on The Comedy Network from 2012 to 2014, the news quiz Front Page Challenge aired on CBC Television from 1957 to 1995, and the charades show Party Game aired in syndication from 1970 to 1981. French panel shows include Vendredi tout est permis ("Friday, Everything Goes"), an improv game on TF1 since 2011. Earlier panel shows include Le Francophonissime ,
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#1732855255185588-462: A loose adaptation of BBC Radio 4 's The News Quiz . HIGNFY , as the show is sometimes known, began airing in 1990, and has been the most-viewed show of the night, regularly attracting as much as a 20% audience share . The show's success grew after its transfer from BBC Two to the flagship BBC One in 2000. After HIGNFY' s success, panel shows proliferated on British TV. Notable example include QI on various BBC channels since 2003, Mock
637-518: A panel of celebrities, largely writers and intellectuals, but also actors and politicians. Listeners would mail in questions, winning prizes for stumping the panel. U.S. panel shows transferred to television early in the medium's history, with the first known example being Play the Game , a charades show that aired on DuMont and ABC beginning in 1946. The celebrity charades concept has been replicated numerous times since then. The most popular adaptation
686-471: A panel show features recurring panelists or permanent team captains, and some panelists appear on multiple panel shows. Most shows are recorded before a studio audience. The first known example of a panel show in the world is the radio program Information Please , which debuted on 17 May 1938 on the NBC Blue Network . An evolution of the quiz show format, Information Please added the key element of
735-414: A popular segment of the quiz. Examples included Norden's tale in which a young woman and a young man found themselves happily trapped in a sauna despite earlier assurances from the landlord that the faulty lock had been repaired: "Least said, soonest mended" became "Lease said sauna's mended". In another, "There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip" became a story about Édouard Manet in a drunken doze in
784-463: A semi-annual celebrity quiz. There are many other games featuring celebrities within Japan's variety genre. Prime Minister Ōta is a show featuring many comedians and politicians debating fictional proposals in a sort of game show version of a legislative chamber. Lionel Hale Lionel Ramsay Hale (26 October 1909 – 1 January 1977) was an English critic, broadcaster and playwright . Hale
833-470: Is Play the Game , a charades show in 1946. The modern trend of comedy panel shows can find early roots with Stop Me If You've Heard This One in 1939 and Can You Top This? in 1940. While panel shows were more popular in the past in the U.S., they are still very common in the United Kingdom . While many early panel shows stuck to the traditional quiz show format in which celebrities tried to get
882-462: The Horn as part of its daytime block of sports news and discussion shows. While presented as being a roundtable debate show , the series does contain some game show-like elements; the panel of sports journalists earn points from the host based on the strength of their points and arguments in specific topics (and may also mute panelists, if needed), with the lowest scorers eliminated at points throughout
931-548: The Truth", the German version of To Tell the Truth ), Typisch Frau – Typisch Mann ("Typical Woman – Typical Man"), Was bin ich? ("What am I?", the German version of What's My Line? ) and Was denkt Deutschland? ("What Does Germany Think?"). Early Japanese panel shows include 話の泉 ("Source of the Story"), based on Information Please on NHK Radio 1 from 1946 to 1964; 二十の扉 ("Twenty Doors"), based on Twenty Questions on NHK Radio 1 from 1947 to 1960; ジェスチャー ("Gestures"),
980-588: The US, but in countries including Chile, Germany and Russia. A televised version of the programme ran in Britain for a series of ten episodes on BBC Television from 10 July to 11 September 1960. The team and host were the same as for the radio series of that year; the producer was Barrie Edgar . A companion radio programme, My Music , ran from 1967 to 1993. When it was mooted, Muir and Norden told Shryane that they were too busy to take on another series, but they allowed themselves to be persuaded and became permanent features on
1029-686: The United Kingdom, where they have found continued success since the BBC adapted its first radio panel shows from classic parlor games. Perhaps the earliest UK panel show is the BBC radio adaptation of Twenty Questions , which debuted on 28 February 1947. Panel shows can have decades-long runs in the UK: Twenty Questions lasted until 1976, while Just a Minute has remained on the air, and had Nicholas Parsons as host from 1967 until 2019. Other long-running games on radio include I'm Sorry I Haven't
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#17328552551851078-491: The Wall , has comedians attempt to jump through oddly shaped holes in moving walls without falling into water, DERO and its successor TORE have celebrities solve mental and physical challenges to escape traps and hazards or presumably die trying, VS Arashi has a team of celebrities compete against J-pop group Arashi and their Plus One guest(s) in physical games, Nep League has various celebrity teams competing in various quizzes that test their combined brainpower in
1127-907: The Week on BBC Two from 2005 to 2022, 8 Out of 10 Cats on Channel 4 since 2005, Would I Lie to You? on BBC One since 2007, and the annual special, The Big Fat Quiz of the Year on Channel 4 since 2004. On the radio, The News Quiz , Just a Minute , I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue and The Unbelievable Truth are among the most popular and long-running panel shows, all of which air on BBC Radio 4. British comedy panel shows feature mainly male guests. A 2016 study that analysed 4,700 episodes from 1967 to 2016 found that 1,488 of them had an all-male lineup, and only one an all-female cast. The proportion of women rose from 3% in 1989 to 31% in 2016. Australian panel shows include advertising-focused The Gruen Transfer and its various spinoffs on ABC1 since 2008,
1176-524: The Week . 8 Out of 10 Cats is based on opinion polling ; What's My Line? is about occupations ; Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Face the Music center on music ; A League of Their Own , A Question of Sport and They Think It's All Over are sports -themed; Was It Something I Said? , Quote... Unquote and Who Said That? feature quotations ; My Word! involves wordplay ; I've Got
1225-408: The celebrity guests buzzing in to earn points from the host for punchlines and responses in various segments. In 2024, a reboot of the show, now titled After Midnight and hosted by Taylor Tomlinson , premiered on CBS . The streaming service Dropout has received attention for many of its shows' similarities to panel shows, notably Game Changer . Panel shows are particularly popular in
1274-509: The chairman of the panel show Country Questions and a regular team member on Round Britain Quiz and panellist on Any Questions? Although, unlike Arlott, Longland had no particular association with cricket he too was billed as umpire until 1962, after which he was billed as "in the chair", as were his successors. The programme ran for 38 series, until 1988. Muir and Norden were in every series, always on opposing teams. As Muir's partner, Barnett
1323-401: The daytime and airing in their greatest numbers during the '70s and '80s. These panel shows marked a shift in the format: whereas CBS' primetime shows had panelists guessing secrets about the guests, these new shows largely featured civilian contestants playing games with celebrity partners, or competing to either predict how the panelists will respond to a prompt or question, or determine whether
1372-431: The fields of Japanese, English, General Knowledge, Etc., and AKBingo! similarly features members of pop group AKB48 and others competing in physical challenges and quizzes. Other shows include 日本語探Qバラエティ クイズ!それマジ!?ニッポン ("Is it really!?"), a celebrity word game; くりぃむクイズ ミラクル9 ("Miracle 9"), a show somewhat similar to Hollywood Squares; Numer0n , a celebrity numbers game; and オールスター感謝祭 ("All Star Thanksgiving"),
1421-399: The first part of the round was dropped in favour of having the chairman simply announce the accepted origin of each phrase, thus opening up new fields of phrases that would have been too well known or too obscure to be posed as questions. In later series Muir and Norden chose their own phrases in advance of each programme, and their stories became longer and more convoluted. The stories became
1470-524: The five volumes was issued: Panel game A panel show or panel game is a radio or television game show in which a panel of celebrities participate. Celebrity panelists may compete with each other, such as on The News Quiz ; facilitate play by non-celebrity contestants, such as on Match Game and Blankety Blank ; or do both, such as on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me . The genre can be traced to 1938, when Information Please debuted on U.S. radio. The earliest known television panel show
1519-413: The improv game Whose Line Is It Anyway? aired from 1988 to 1998. Current British panel shows have become showcases for the nation's top stand-up and improv comedians, as well as career-making opportunities for new comedians. Regular comics on panel shows often go on to star in sitcoms and other TV shows. The modern British panel show format of TV comedy quizzes started with Have I Got News for You ,
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1568-576: The introduction, "Welcome to Whose Line Is It Anyway , the show where everything's made up and the points don't matter." QI ' s opaque scoring system is purportedly a mystery even to its creator, I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue dispenses with points altogether, and many other shows mention points only occasionally or at the end, instead of continuously displaying scores in front of players. Panel shows can have any number of themes. Many are topical and satirical , such as Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! , Have I Got News for You , The News Quiz and Mock
1617-409: The like. In many series the opening round consisted of obscure words for the panellists to define: examples ranged from such words as auscultation, bumblepuppy, cabless and crinkum-crankum to defenestration, hebetude, hobbledehoy and katydid to lallation, macaronic, palmiped and rahat lokum, or scrimshaw, tatterdemalion, unau and widdershins. In the final round, each team was asked to give the origin of
1666-662: The multitude of gins". A one-off pilot programme was broadcast by the Midland region of the BBC Home Service on 6 June 1956. When the series was launched on the national BBC network in January 1957, an edited edition of the pilot preceded the 14 new episodes. Over the years My Word! was syndicated through the BBC Transcription Services in more than 35 countries including not only Anglophone locations such as Australia and
1715-538: The music quiz Spicks and Specks on ABC1 from 2005 to 2011 and again since 2014, news quiz Have You Been Paying Attention? on Network Ten since 2013, and tabloid quiz Dirty Laundry Live on ABC1 and ABC2 since 2013. News quiz Good News Week aired on ABC1 from 1996 to 1998 and on Network Ten from 1999-2000 and again from 2008 to 2012, sports quiz A League of Their Own aired on Network Ten in 2013, and pop culture quiz Tractor Monkeys aired on ABC1 in 2013. Currently running New Zealand panel shows include
1764-424: The national Home Service network from 1 January 1957. The series also ran on BBC Television for one series from July–September 1960. For decades the programme was also broadcast worldwide via BBC World Service and was relayed to an international audience though the BBC Transcription Services . A companion programme, My Music , ran from 1967 to 1993. In 1956, Edward J. Mason and Tony Shryane , respectively
1813-415: The news quiz 7 Days since 2009, Have You Been Paying Attention? New Zealand since 2019, Taskmaster New Zealand since 2020, and Guy Montgomery's Guy Mont-Spelling Bee since 2023. CBC Radio One currently broadcasts two long-running radio panel shows: The Debaters , which debuted in 2006, and Because News , which debuted in 2015. In 2022, Noovo began broadcasting Le maître du jeu ,
1862-480: The one season in which Fraser took the chair her place as Norden's teammate was taken by Irene Thomas . After 20 years in the chair, Longland retired from the programme at the end of the 1977 series. He was succeeded by John Julius Norwich for four series, followed by Fraser for a single series and finally Michael O'Donnell for the last five series, from late 1983 to 1988. From time to time guests substituted for absent regulars. Neither Spain nor Powell ever missed
1911-476: The panelist answered a question correctly. Later, Nickelodeon premiered the youth-oriented panel game Figure it Out in 1997, the American version of Whose Line Is It Anyway? had a primetime run from 1998 to 2004 on ABC and a revival in 2013 by The CW , while Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! has become a popular weekend show on NPR since 1998. Since 2002, the sports channel ESPN has broadcast Around
1960-430: The popular BBC comedy series Take It From Here , who were based in a nearby office. They thought of themselves as writers rather than performers, but at Shryane's urgent request they agreed to stand in for the absentees. Muir was partnered by Isobel Barnett – a panel show regular – and Norden by the journalist Nancy Spain . Mason set the questions, and the chairman was the cricket commentator and poet John Arlott , who
2009-411: The programme. In 1972 and 1973 the two shows joined forces to present Christmas specials, My Word! It's My Music , with Longland and Steve Race as co-hosts and the regular My Word team joined by Ian Wallace and David Franklin (1972), and Wallace and John Amis (1973). Between 1974 and 1989, Muir and Norden published five collections of their My Word! stories, and in 1991 an omnibus edition of
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2058-456: The questions, and was joined in that role by Peter Moore in 1972. After Longland's retirement Moore continued to set the questions until 1987. For the final season, in 1988, O'Donnell combined the roles of chairman and question-setter. The two teams faced questions devised, for the first 21 series, by Mason, of whom Muir wrote: Mason and his successors provided word games and literary quizzes covering vocabulary, etymology, snippets of poetry, and
2107-412: The right answers and win, the primary goal of modern panel shows is to entertain the audience with comedy, with the game or quiz structure providing subjects for the comedians to joke about. Panel shows also feature comedic banter, friendly ribbing and camaraderie among the panelists. Scoring is often deemphasised in panel shows. The American version of Whose Line Is It Anyway? acknowledged this with
2156-413: The show. The winner receives 30 seconds at the end of the show to discuss any topic unopposed. In 2015, ABC announced primetime revivals for Match Game , which ran from 2016 until 2021, and To Tell the Truth , which ran from 2016 to 2022. From 2013 to 2017, Comedy Central aired @midnight , an internet culture and social media -themed panel game which used a more quiz show-styled presentation—with
2205-504: The writer and producer of the popular radio soap opera The Archers , decided that by way of a change they would devise and produce what Frank Muir called "a new kind of not-very-academic literary quiz". The Aeolian Hall in London was booked for the recording of a pilot show, but at the last minute two of the four panellists were unexpectedly unavailable. Shryane sought the help of Muir and his writing partner Denis Norden , scriptwriters of
2254-484: Was Pantomime Quiz , airing from 1947 to 1959, and having runs on each of the four television networks operating at the time. Other charades shows have included Stump the Stars ; Movietown, RSVP ; Celebrity Charades ; Showoffs and Body Language . TV panel shows saw their peak of popularity in the 1950s and '60s, when CBS ran the three longest-running panel shows in prime time : What's My Line? , I've Got
2303-471: Was billed as "umpire". The pilot was well received by the audience in the hall and by listeners to its first transmission. The BBC commissioned a series, which was transmitted in early 1957. Muir and Norden had no intention of becoming regular panellists, but Shyrane persuaded them. Arlott did not return for the second series, which began in August 1957. He was succeeded by Jack Longland , known to BBC listeners as
2352-608: Was born in Beckenham , Kent. In the 1940s, Hale presented the radio quiz Transatlantic Quiz and an early television quiz show called Quiz with Hale . He made regular appearances on Panorama between 1953 and 1955 as a theatre critic, and was featured as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme Desert Island Discs on 3 January 1958. One of Hale's plays, These Two , ran for a short time (eight days) on Broadway in May, 1934. These Two
2401-405: Was succeeded during the first series by the novelist and critic E. Arnot Robertson . On Robertson's death in 1961 the film critic and Greek scholar Dilys Powell took her place until the show finished, when she was aged 87. Norden's first partner was Nancy Spain; after her death in 1964 she was succeeded by the journalist Anne Scott-James , and then from 1979 by the historian Antonia Fraser . In
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