All
American Old Time Radio Show Classic
You Bet Your Life
2 CD Set
For a small taste of this great
series,
listen to the preview below.
This show comes on 2 CDs In MP3 Format
You Bet Your Life is an American radio and television quiz show. The
first and most famous version was hosted by Groucho Marx, of Marx Brothers
fame, with the unflappable announcer and assistant George Fenneman. The
show debuted on radio in 1947, then made the transition to the NBC
television network in 1950. The television version was changed very little
from the radio version. It was filmed before a studio audience, then
slightly edited for television broadcast. In 1960 it was renamed The
Groucho Show and ran a further year.
Groucho would be introduced to the music of "Hooray for Captain
Spaulding", his signature song introduced in the 1928 Broadway musical
Animal Crackers. Fenneman would say, "Here he is, the one, the ONLY..."
and the audience would finish with a thunderous "GROUCHO!" In the
early years Groucho would feign surprise: "Oh that's ME, Groucho Marx!"
Much of the tension of the show revolved around whether any of the
contestants, in pre-contest conversation with Groucho, would say the
"secret word", a common word seemingly selected at random and revealed to
the audience at the show's outset. If a contestant uttered the word, a toy
duck made to resemble Groucho with a mustache, eyeglasses and with a cigar
in its bill, would descend from the ceiling to bring the contestant-pair
$100. A cartoon of a duck with a cigar was also used in the show's opening
title sequence. In one special episode, Groucho's brother, Harpo came down
instead of the duck. Marx would sometimes slyly direct their conversation
in such a way as to encourage the secret word to
come up.
The contestants were paired individuals, usually of the opposite sex.
Sometimes celebrities would be paired with "ordinary" people, and it was
not uncommon for the contestants to have some sort of newsworthiness about
them. For example, one episode aired soon after the end of
the Korean War featured Janet Wang, a Korean-American contestant who had
been a prisoner of war.
In the contest itself, contestants would choose among available categories
and then try to answer a series of questions dealing with the chosen
category. One popular category involved attempting to name a United States
state after being given a number of cities and towns
within the state.
At first, each couple started with $20. They were asked four questions in
their given category. For each question, they bet up to all of their
money. According to co-director Robert Dwan in his book, As Long As
They're Laughing, producer John Guedel changed this because too many
couples were betting and losing all their money. He changed the format to
having couples start with $100, then pick four questions worth from $10 to
$100. A correct answer added the value of the question; an incorrect
answer cut the previous grand total in half, so that a couple that
answered the $70, $80, $90, and $100 questions would end up with $440;
missing all four questions would reduce their total to $6.25 (augmented to
$25 with a
question such as 'Who's buried in Grant's Tomb?').
Later, this was changed to couples answering questions either until they
got 2 consecutive questions wrong or answered 4 consecutive questions
correctly for a prize of $1,000. Toward the end (1959-61), contestants
picked four questions worth $100, $200, or $300; they could win up to
$1,200 but needed only $500 to qualify for the jackpot question. The two
contestants worked together ("Remember, only one answer between you."). If
the couple bet all of their money at any point and lost (or if they ended
up below $25), they were asked a consolation question for $25. Consolation
questions were made easy, in hopes that no one would miss them, although
some people did. The questions were in the style of "Who was buried in
Grant's tomb?" "When did the War of 1812 start?" "How long do you cook a
three-minute egg?" and "What color is an orange?" although it should be
noted that the Grant's tomb question was sometimes answered incorrectly
(the correct answer is no one, but Grant was accepted even though people
are not buried in tombs). In addition to the quiz prizes was the famous
secret-word duck. Eventually, the prize was $100 for saying the secret
word. The famous "secret-word duck" was replaced from time to time with a
wooden Indian figure.
In all formats, a final question was asked for a jackpot amount for the
couple who had gotten the highest total amount during the game.
In the early years (1947-56), the prize for the jackpot question started
at $1,000, with $500 added each week until someone correctly answered the
question.
With the coming of the big-money quizzes, contestants faced a wheel with
numbers from one to ten; one contestant picked a number for $10,000; later
on, they picked another number for $5,000. The wheel was spun; if either
number came up, a correct answer to the question
augmented the couple's total to that amount of money, otherwise the
question was worth a total of $2,000. From 1956-59, contestants risked
half their $1,000 won in the quiz on a shot at the wheel, one of the two
players in a couple could keep their half of the money while the other
risked their half.
The play of the game, however, was secondary to the interplay between
Groucho, the contestants, and occasionally Fenneman. The program was
hugely successful and was rerun into the 1970s, and later in syndication
as The Best of Groucho. As such, it was the first game show to have its
reruns syndicated.
The radio program was sponsored by Elgin American watches and compacts.
Early seasons of the television show were sponsored by Chrysler, with
advertisements for DeSoto automobiles incorporated into the opening
credits and the show itself. Each show would end with Groucho sticking his
head through a hole in the DeSoto logo and saying, "Friends…go in to see
your DeSoto Plymouth dealer tomorrow. And when you do, tell them Groucho
sent you."
So sit down and listen to one of the most loved
quiz shows on radio with one of the funniest hosts around, Groucho Marx
with over 75 hours and 145+ episodes, see if the figure out the “secret
word”. Give a shot yourself by skipping past the beginning and see if you
can figure
out “the Secret Word”.
Here is the list episodes presented for your
listening pleasure.
