page_title: Match Game
section_title: Match Game 73–79 (1973–79, CBS)
hierarchical_section_title: Match Game / Match Game 73–79 (1973–79, CBS)
caption_attribution_description: English: en:Charles Nelson Reilly in 2000. See link below for details.
context_page_description: Match Game is an American television panel game show that premiered on NBC in 1962 and has been revived several times over the course of the next six decades. The game features contestants trying to come up with answers to fill-in-the-blank questions that are often formed as humorous double entendres, the object being to match answers given by celebrity panelists.
  The Match Game in its original version ran on NBC's daytime lineup from 1962 until 1969. The show returned with a significantly changed format in 1973 on CBS and became a major success, with an expanded panel, larger cash payouts, and emphasis on humor. The CBS series, referred to on-air as Match Game 73 to start and updated every new year, ran until 1979 on CBS, at which point it moved to first-run syndication and ran for three more seasons, ending in 1982. Concurrently with the weekday run, from 1975 to 1981, a once-a-week fringe time version, Match Game PM, was also offered in syndication for airing just before prime time hours.
context_section_description: In the early 1970s, CBS vice president Fred Silverman began overhauling the network's programming as part of what has colloquially become known as the rural purge. As part of this overhaul, the network reintroduced game shows beginning in 1972. One of the first new offerings was The New Price Is Right, a radically overhauled version of the 1950s game show The Price Is Right. The success of The New Price Is Right prompted Silverman to commission more game shows. In the summer of 1973, Mark Goodson and Bill Todman took a similar approach in adapting The Match Game by reworking the show, moving it to Los Angeles, adding more celebrities and increasing the amount of prize money that could be won (it was this show, along with The $10,000 Pyramid and Three on a Match  of the same time, that reintroduced five-figure payouts for the first time since the quiz show scandals of the late 1950s).
  The new version had Rayburn returning as host and Olson returning as the announcer. The gameplay for this version had two solo contestants attempting to match the answers given by a six-celebrity panel. Richard Dawson was the first regular panelist. Due to CBS News coverage of the Watergate hearings, the network delayed the premiere one week from its slated date of June 25 to July 2.
  The first week's panelists were Dawson, Michael Landon, Vicki Lawrence, Jack Klugman, Jo Ann Pflug, and Anita Gillette. Rayburn reassured viewers of the first week of CBS shows that "This is your old favorite, updated with more action, more money, and, as you can see, more celebrities." The first few weeks of the show were somewhat different from the rest of the run. At first, many of the questions fit into the more bland and innocuous mold of the earlier seasons of the original series. In addition, many of the frequent panelists on the early episodes were not regulars later in the series but had appeared on the 1960s version, including Klugman, Arlene Francis, and Bert Convy.
  However, the double entendre in the question "Johnny always put butter on his _____" marked a turning point in the questions on the show. Soon, the tone of Rayburn's questions changed notably, leaving behind the staid topics that The Match Game had first disposed of in 1963 for more risqué humor. Celebrity panelists Brett Somers (Klugman's wife at the time) and Charles Nelson Reilly began as guest panelists on the program, with Somers brought in at the request of Klugman, who felt she would make a nice fit on the program. The chemistry between Somers and Reilly prompted Goodson–Todman and CBS to hire them as regular panelists; Somers remained on the show until 1982, while Reilly continued appearing through the 1983–84 and 1990–91 revivals, with a brief break in 1974–75 when Gary Burghoff, Nipsey Russell, and Rip Taylor substituted for him. Burghoff and Russell would continue to be semi-regular panelists afterward.
  Celebrity panelists appeared in week-long blocks, due to the show's production schedule. A number of celebrities, including Betty White, Dick Martin, Marcia Wallace, Bill Daily, McLean Stevenson, Fannie Flagg, Elaine Joyce, Sarah Kennedy, Patti Deutsch, Mary Wickes, Bill Anderson, and Joyce Bulifant were semi-regular panelists, usually appearing several times a year. Celebrity panelists also included personalities from other Goodson–Todman produced game shows, such as The Price Is Right's Bob Barker, Anitra Ford, Janice Pennington and Holly Hallstrom, and Password's Allen Ludden. The panelists were all seated in a strict order: The male guest panelist of the week, Somers, and Reilly usually sat in the top row from the viewer's left to right, (occasionally a recurring panelist would sit in for Somers or Reilly), and the female guest panelist of the week, Dawson (after 1978, a semi-regular male panelist), and a semi-regular female panelist (most frequently White, Flagg, Deutsch, Bulifant or Wallace) occupied the bottom row.
caption: Charles Nelson Reilly (pictured in 2000) was a regular panelist from 1973 to 1991.
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