Author Topic: The $50,000 pyramid.  (Read 1991 times)

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Offline wink87

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The $50,000 pyramid.
« on: July 03, 2018, 06:30:51 PM »
Anyone know why this show never lasted all that long?

Offline blozier2006

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Re: The $50,000 pyramid.
« Reply #1 on: July 03, 2018, 06:55:06 PM »
Anyone know why this show never lasted all that long?
I'd assume the awkward tournament format and the slashed budget in non-tournament episodes might have been factors.

Offline pannoni1

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Re: The $50,000 pyramid.
« Reply #2 on: July 04, 2018, 04:20:26 PM »
Keep in mind though that unlike the Cullen $25K which was weekly, this was daily, so of course it wouldn't have the same budget, and it was a novel idea at the time for a tournament that would work better in the original $100K, though the execution toward programming wasn't quite yet there for it, even if it was a respectable version. Before Wheel of Fortune made daily syndicated game shows a "fad" in the mid-late '80s, there wasn't much support for those types of shows, which were dominated by Feud, TTD, and TJW. Reruns of hit primetime programming in those days where few people had cable and VCRs were popular then in daytime, and this of course was why the $20,000 Pyramid was axed with The Love Boat reruns in its place. As a result, many markets were relegated to airing $50K on indie affiliates, and some small markets without them didn't pick it up. Airing them in the morning while competing against network game shows didn't help too, as in the New York market, it aired at 10:30 AM on indie WPIX, right after the revamped Hollywood Squares. In Philadelphia, it aired on WKBS at Noon, which was third behind WTAF and WPHL among the indies in that market. Then you had a market like Buffalo where it aired on WIVB at 7:30 on CBS, but had to compete directly with the more popular Joker's Wild on WGR (NBC) and nighttime Feud on WKW (ABC). Without a daytime network version which provided good support for the original $25,000 and $100,000 versions, this version was all on its own, and was also why Peter Marshall's run of The Hollywood Squares also ended around this time for similar reasons. At least the gap between $50K and New $25K was pretty short.
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