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Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Survey Says...Funny Family Feud Answers!


I might have said this before on the blog, but one of the things on my bucket list is to be a contestant on a quiz or game show.  I don’t even necessarily have to win all of the fabulous cash and prizes that are up for grabs.  I’d even take home my corn popper and board game as a consolation prize.  I think that the experience alone would be something worth talking about.  Alas, Canada isn’t the biggest producer of game shows, so I fear that I may have to wait a while yet.

It’s easy to watch a game show from the comfort of your own living room.  But when you’re underneath those hot studio lights as a contestant, there is always the threat of losing a turn, losing all your hard-earned cash and prizes, or making a complete fool out of yourself in front of a live studio audience.  It’s easy for me to say that I would do quite well on a game show as a contestant, but until I’m actually on that stage, I can only speculate.  For all I know, I could get up on that soundstage and give off some of the dumbest answers that anybody has ever heard, and end up having my blunders being featured on one of those blooper shows.

(Although, I have to admit that I get easily entertained by ridiculous game show answers.)

I certainly hope that all of you are entertained by game show bloopers as well, because today’s blog subject happens to be about a game show that has had hundreds of them.  Let’s take a look at an example from the 1970s to see what I mean.


Well...I imagine SOME pregnant women start showing in September.


Today we’re going to look back on the classic television game show “Family Feud”.  It’s a show that has aired on and off over the last thirty-six years, and has been presented by six different hosts.  Just who are/were the hosts of Family Feud?  Survey says...







If you click on each of the names, you can see the hosts in action during their run on the show.  I’ve seen all six hosts in action, and I have my personal favourites.  Dawson is probably the host that is the most recognizable of all the hosts, and is probably most people’s favourite host.  I grew up watching Combs version myself, and I found him to be a great host too.  I also liked O’Hurley’s stint as host.  Steve Harvey I’m kind of indifferent to.  Karn was better on “Home Improvement”, and Louie Anderson...well, I like that he tried his best, and that he brought the show back after a four year hiatus...but he’s not my favourite host.


TRIVIA:  When Louie Anderson was picked to host “Family Feud” in the 1999 revival, the other candidate up for the job was reportedly country singer Dolly Parton!  Could you imagine Dolly Parton hosting “Family Feud”?  I think she would’ve been a hoot!

Many of the hosts found personal success with hosting the program.  Richard Dawson ended up marrying a former contestant who appeared on “Family Feud” in 1981, while Richard Karn and John O’Hurley have moved onto other television projects.  Other hosts hit a downward spiral, and in the case of Ray Combs, his downward spiral was irreversible.  He ended up committing suicide in 1996 following a severe car accident two years earlier and reported marital problems.

Now, even though the show seemed to go through a revolving door of hosts and producers, the rules of the game stayed the same.  Two competing families (or two teams of celebrities raising money for charity) would face off against each other in a battle of wits.  Each team would have five players (four in the 1994/95 season) on it.  Each team would send a player to the podium for the face-off round.  There would be a board with a list of hidden answers corresponding with a survey question asked to one hundred random people.  The job was to try and get the most popular answer, as the higher your answer was, the more points you scored.  Whoever won the face-off would decide whether their team would continue playing that round, or pass to the other team.


From there, the family would then try to get all of the answers revealed off the board.  If they ended up revealing an answer, they would add points to their total.  If they missed an answer, well, they would get one of these.


And just like the game of baseball, three strikes, and you were out.  From there, the other family could attempt to steal all of the other team’s hard-earned points that they had earned by successfully guessing an answer they couldn’t.  If they were right, they won the round.  If they missed, the other team kept their points.

Needless to say, some of the answers that were given during these first few rounds were rather...unusual.

In some cases, the contestants get a little too eager to win the face-off round that they buzz in a little too soon.


Sometimes, the contestants completely misunderstand the question. 



And, sometimes the answers given make one want to bash their head repeatedly into a wall.



But that was part of the fun of “Family Feud”.  You never knew what people were going to say!

In the earliest incarnations of the game, the family that reached 300 points first would win the chance to go onto the bonus round, but the rule has since changed in that the team with the highest total after four rounds wins the chance to go to the bonus.

The bonus round was given the affectionate name of “Fast Money”.


And, when they say “Fast Money”, they mean fast.  Each winning team would choose two people to play the bonus round for the chance at a huge cash prize.  The first team member would get five questions asked to 100 random people, and their job was to get as many of the top answers as possible in fifteen seconds (it was changed to twenty in the 1994/95 season).  The total points they received were added up, and from there, the second teammate (who was in seclusion) would try to get additional points.  Because teammates were not allowed to repeat answers, they were given an additional five seconds to come up with alternate answers for the game.  If both players accumulated a total of 200 points or more, they would win “Fast Money”.

The “Fast Money” bonus round was always my favourite part of the show.  People really had to think quickly on their feet to come up with appropriate answers at lightning speed if they stood a chance.  And, the suspense that came from the round was quite thrilling.

But the real reason why I enjoyed “Fast Money” so much was because the majority of dumb answers could be witnessed during this round.  You already saw an example of this in action with Richard Dawson and the “September” lady, but I have so many more examples to show to all of you, just for you to see what I mean.

I mean, just watching this family in action, is it any wonder why they ended up losing the game?



Yikes.  That was awful. 

Then there are those answers that make absolute sense, but the humour surrounding the answer can make people lose all their composure, such as this moment from the Steve Harvey version.


Have you ever had the moment where you’re watching “Family Feud” and you hear an answer that you think is absolutely ridiculous, and yet the answer still scores some points?  Watch this clip from the John O’Hurley version, and you’ll see what I mean in the first part.


It’s not just the American version that bloopers occur.  Did you know that the show “Family Feud” is also quite popular in the United Kingdom?  The only difference is that the game there is referred to as “Family Fortunes”, but the rules are more or less exactly the same.

And one thing that I have learned from watching the international version is that British people can give rather odd answers as well.  The last three clips in this package is proof of that, and I’ve already cued this LINK to start at the “Family Fortunes” moments.

One of the most memorable contestants of the UK version involves a very nice gentleman who sadly had a one track mind.


And to conclude this look back on “Funny Family Feud Answers”, one more post from the UK version involving a new type of bean...



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