Beat the Clock

I began about a couple of years ago watching Kinescope repeats of Beat the Clock on "the Game Show Network". It brought back many memories from when I originally watched it live when I was a kid. One night, among the repeats, I notice the inclusion of an African American family as contestants. I was surprised, and I guess so were a lot of the viewers in the fifties. Because the only time you seen Black people on Television in the fifties, were ether-portraying servants, or Musical entertainers appearing on Variety shows. But I did thought it was interesting that "Beat the Clock" included an African American Family that I think on their next appearance on the show to continue with their stunts, they had no sponsor.... It was too bad, but understandable that "Hazel Bishop Cosmetics " pulled their sponsorship on the family's second appearance. But one has to remember that in fifties and into the early sixties, Television networks and their sponsors did not want to offend their racist Network affricates in the South. So any appearance of Black on Television then was nil.... But I have applause Bud Collier and the producers for being bold enough to take the risk to include a Black Family on the show at a time when Black were beginning to make progress in terms of respect and dignity in the media.

I remember this show years ago. This along with To Tell the Truth, What's My Line, I've Got a Secret and the Old Price is Right were staples in my home. I agree with the person who said that shows like the Fear Factor should take a look at this show. It was very simplistic. A couple would attempt these seemingly impossible stunts. If they completed the first stunt they got a prize worth 100.00 , the second 200 and a bonus round in which the female has to figure out a famous quote from jumbled words. If they win that they usually will get nice TV and in later seasons a TV and a stereo. If they just won the 200.00 round they might get a washing machine or a fridge and 100.00 a radio. The stunts were not dangerous but just as suspenseful as they are in shows like Fear Factor. If the stunt involved something like whipped cream or water one of the models would come out and take a picture. What is amazing is a lot of the women are wearing high heel shoes and a dress while doing these stunts. I would say most of the time people are able to complete the bonus. But some of the shows the stunts seem very hard. Later they added these super bonus stunts, worth 1000's and the amount went up s long as no one got them. These tasks were next to impossible. If I described them one would think they weren't until they actually saw the stunt. One involved wearing a hat and getting the balls hanging from the rim to balance on the rim. One involved a toupee. I am now looking at the GSN and the stunt is up to 26,000!

What I think sets the shows of the 60's apart from the game shows of today was the hosts. Bud Collyer, Bill Cullen, Daly , and Garry Moore, were all class acts. And the lack of vulgarity. Beat the Clock showed that stunts can be exciting without being vulgar and exploitive. Bud Collyer was almost as involved in the stunts as the contestants. He treated everyone very nice and if the contestants showed up with their children he would take time to talk to them and give the girls a Roxanne doll(the hostess)and the boy a board game. Even if the kids weren't there he would send them something. I really miss hosts like him. Who seem to be having just as good a time as the contestants. They all seem so cynical now.

This original version of the Beat the Clock franchise is also the best version at the same time. Simply charming and in a beautiful classic, contemporary style, sympathetically moderated and just wonderfully innocent. A beautiful show, which is not one of the best of its time, but has more or less co-invented a genre on which many great programs were based.

This is truly one of the classic game shows from the golden era of television. This show is definitely better than shows like "Fear Factor" and "Dog Eat Dog", which to me take the premise of "Beat the Clock" to a rather unwatchable extreme. At least the contestants of BTC didn't humiliate themselves or put themselves in great danger as they tried to win prizes every week. You really could tell that even if they lost on the show that they still had fun and really had a good time and it was for the whole family. The other two shows just seem like they take pride in trying to sicken as many people as they possibly can and they also seem to take great pride in humiliating people and putting them in all sorts of dangerous situations. Hopefully, a new generation can see why "Beat the Clock" was so beloved and then question why such garbage as the other two shows are still on the air.

I was a contestant in 1961and was picked out of the audience to do a trick by myself....I had to wear a jumpsuit which I put on backwards by mistake and was holding it closed in front...Bud asked me if I had butterflies I did not beat the clock so I got only a Polaroid camera,which I used for quite a few years...at the end of the show he asked my son who was 8 years old at the time and was in the audience with my husband to come on stage and asked him if he wanted to be a policeman like his father...he said no that they work too hard and he wanted to become a teacher...I wish I could get a copy of that episode it would be so nice seeing it again...bud was so nice to talk to...I do have a lovely 8X10 photo that was sent to me some time later,of Bud and me...I love it....