This Week's Game Show TV Milestone

[AaronHandy3]

FEBRUARY 18, 1974

It would be the very first time that viewers of Match Game 74 would "stay tuned for TattleTales next over most of these CBS stations!"...for that's when The Game Of Celebrity Gossip premiered! Developed by Goodson-Todman Productions, hosted by singer-actor Bert Convy, and announced by Jack Clark, John Harlan, Johnny Olsen and Gene Wood, TattleTales replaced the CBS Daytime drama The Secret Storm, a mainstay on The Eye Network for 20 years (Feb. 1954-Feb. 1974).

TattleTales’ precursor was He Said, She Said, a 1969-70 New York-based low-budget syndie gameshow from G-T with four celebrity couples competing for specific couples in the studio audience, with the winner receiving a week’s vacation at a Holiday Inn, emceed by Joe Garagiola (his first game). Recorded @ studio 31 (several other sources cite studio 41) in CBS Television City in Hollywood, TattleTales featured host Convy asking celebrity couples questions, sometimes very personal ones. In round one, the wives appeared on stage while the husbands were secluded back stage listening to music through headphones to block out any noise they might have heard from the stage; the second round found the celebrity couples switched. The audience sections were referred to as the red, blue and affectionately the banana (yellow) sections. Each rooting section had 122 seats and members received their earnings on their way out the door; to collect their checks, the members had to show a rooting section voucher with the appropriate color.

In the beginning of TattleTales (the celebrities shown during the first week was Dick Gautier & Barbara Stuart, Jerry Stiller & Anne Meara, and Bobby Van & Elaine Joyce), the game was played a little differently than later on in the shows run. A question was read and the first wife to buzz in related a situation that concerned her marriage and a short clue that summarized her answer. The question along with her clue was then read to the husbands. who had been secluded backstage. The husband who believed it was his wives response sounded a bell and tried to relate a similar story (shown from backstage on a television monitor). If they matched they won $100. In round two this was reversed with the wives trying to guess what the husbands said. The highest scoring team of the day won a extra 1,000 dollars and all of there winnings were divided among there selected sections of the audience. These questions were alternated with with "TattleTales Quickies" questions similar to that described in the Game Play section. Effective the June 11, 1974 episode, the game had nothing but "TattleTales Quickies" questions, which were no longer known as such. An ill-fated round was later added in which the audience tried to guess how each couple would answer a question; it lasted no longer than a week (January 7-10, 13, 1975)!

TattleTales went over wildly on CBS. In 1975 and 1976, host Bert Convy and his wife Ann would play on separate occasions, and alternate G-T emcees like Bob Barker, Bobby Van, Gene Rayburn, Jack Narz, and Richard Dawson would host the game in his stead. Match Game 7X served as the nominal lead-in for TattleTales in many CBS markets, and remained so until 1977, when The Eye Network made a grave decision to move Match Game 7X into the morning! That same year, Bert Convy earned an Emmy Award as Best Game Show Host, and TattleTales launched a weekly syndicated nighttime edition.

The CBS Daytime edition of TattleTales went on to its reward on March 31, 1978, after 4 years and 1,075 telecasts; the syndie version lasted in several markets for half a year after that. CBS returned TattleTales to its daytime schedule 4 years after that, on January 18, 1982, announced by Johnny Olsen and emceed once again by Bert Convy, and this version lasted until June 1, 1984. Currently, Game Show Network has done justice to both the '70s and the '80s versions of TattleTales by showing it in repeats (thanks to CBS' well preservation of its episodes!).

A Happy 30th Anniversary To TatteTales!