Chuck Barris
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Chuck Barris (born Charles Hirsch Barris in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on June 3, 1929) produced American game shows during the 1960s and 1970s. He specialized in formats that, according to many media critics, were often of dubious taste and style.
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[edit] Early career
Barris' younger sister, mother, and father all died by the time he was a teenager. He attended Drexel University, where he was a columnist at the student newspaper, The Triangle and graduated in 1953.
Barris got his start in television as a page and later staffer at NBC in New York, and eventually worked backstage at the TV music show American Bandstand, originally as a standards-and-practices person for ABC. Barris soon became a music-industry figure. His most successful venture in this area was the writing of Freddy Cannon's 1962 top ten rock n' roll hit, Palisades Park. In addition to this, Barris eventually wrote or co-wrote some of the music that appeared on his game shows.
Barris first became successful during 1965 with his first game-show creation, The Dating Game on ABC, hosted by Jim Lange, in which three bachelors or bachelorettes competed for the favor of a contestant blocked from their view. The contestants' racy banter and its "flower power" set was a revolution for the usually conventional game-show genre.
The next year, for the same network, Barris produced The Newlywed Game, originally created by Nick Nicholson and Roger Muir (who were often mentioned as such in the show's credits during the 1970s and 80s.) The combination of the newlywed couples' humorous candor and host Bob Eubanks' exuberant, sly questioning made the show another hit for Barris -- and to date, the longest-tenured of any developed by his company. It ran for 19 total years on first-run TV, both on network and syndicated television. ("The Dating Game" lasted for 18 years).
[edit] 'Chuckie Baby'
The engaging but somewhat shy Barris rarely appeared on camera, though he once dashed onto the set of The New Treasure Hunt to sock emcee Geoff Edwards with a pie. But Barris became a public figure in a big way in 1976, when he produced and served as the host of the talent contest The Gong Show, which he packaged in partnership with TV producer Chris Bearde. The show's cult stature far outstripped the two years it spent on NBC (1976-78) and four years it ran in syndication (1976-80).
Barris's jokey, bumbling personality, his accentuated hand-clapping between sentences (which eventually had the studio audience joining in with him), and his catch-phrases (he'd usually go into commercial break with, "we'll be right back with more STUFF..." "this is me saying 'bye'" was one of his favorite closing lines) was the antithesis of the smooth TV host (such as Gary Owens, who hosted the syndicated version in its first season). Dubbed "Chuckie Baby" by his fans, Barris was a perfect fit with the show's goofy, sometimes wild amateur performers and its panel of three judges (including regulars Jamie Farr, Jaye P. Morgan and Arte Johnson). In addition, there was a growing "cast of characters" including an NBC electrician who played "Father Ed," a priest who'd get flustered when his cue cards were deliberately turned upside-down; Canadian comedian Murray Langston, who as "The Unknown Comic" wore a paper shopping bag over his head (with cut-outs for his eyes, mouth, and even a box of Kleenex, worn atop his head) and dressed in a tacky polyester jacket and open-buttoned shirt, told deliberately awful jokes (example: "Did you hear about the missionary who got barfed up when cannibals tried to eat him? Just goes to show you can't keep a good man down!!"), and "Gene, Gene, the Dancing Machine," arguably the most popular member of the "cast," who was another NBC stage hand, who'd show up, and dance whenever the band played the song, "Two O'Clock Jump." Siv Aberg, a one-time Miss Sweden, was also on hand, acting more or less as the show's "hostess."
One Gong Show episode consisted of every act appearing singing the song "Feelings", which was popular at the time. One of its most infamous incidents came on the NBC version in 1978, when he presented an onstage act consisting of two young women slowly and suggestively sucking Popsicles. Another incident resulted in Jaye P. Morgan's firing from the show, when she reputedly exposed her breasts on-camera.
[edit] Comeback kid
Barris's TV fortunes ebbed and flowed with the decades. The Dating and Newlywed games went off the air in the mid-1970s, leaving Barris with only one show, the 1973-77 revival of Treasure Hunt (titled The New Treasure Hunt). But the success of The Gong Show in 1976 allowed him to revive the Dating and Newlywed games, as well as adding the $1.98 Beauty Show to his syndication empire.
The empire crumbled again amid the burnout of another of his creations, the 1979-80 Three's A Crowd (in which three sets of wives and secretaries competed to see who knew more about their husband/boss). At the same time, Newlywed lost the sponsorships of Ford and Procter & Gamble and earned the resentment of Jackie Autry, whose husband and business partner Gene Autry owned the show's Los Angeles outlet and production base, KTLA. During the winter of 1980, he brought back another game show which was not an original of his, Camouflage, in which contestants answered questions for the chance to locate a "hidden object" (example: a toaster) concealed within a cartoon-type drawing. It only lasted a short time in syndication, quite possibly in part because it was the only one of his game shows which was devoid of any of the suggestiveness, raciness, or general mayhem. By September 1980, all the Barris games were off the air.
He revived Treasure Hunt again in 1981 in partnership with the original 1950s version's producer, Budd Granoff, who had become his business partner (the show itself was created by its original host, Jan Murray). Unlike the 1970s version of Treasure Hunt, Barris did not have direct involvement with the production of the show itself. This revival of the show lasted only one year.
Barris came back again in the mid-1980s. After a week-long trial of The Newlywed Game on ABC in 1984 (with Dating Game emcee Jim Lange), Barris produced a daily Newlywed Game (titled The New Newlywed Game) in syndication from 1985 to 1989, with old host Eubanks (and in 1989, comedian Paul Rodriguez). The Dating Game came back in syndication the next year for a three-year run hosted by Elaine Joyce. The Gong Show would also return for one season in 1988, this version hosted by "True" Don Bleu.
After the shows' runs ended, Barris sold his TV holdings to what is now Sony Pictures Television, which revived Dating and Newlywed from 1996 to 1999. Sony also revived Gong in 1998, this time as Extreme Gong, a Game Show Network original production. Another Barris show, 3's a Crowd, would be revived as All New 3's a Crowd, which, like Extreme Gong, was a GSN original.
One more attempt at reviving an old game show which was not his own originally, resulted in an unsold pilot of the 1950's-era game Dollar A Second, hosted by Bob Eubanks. It's had at least one showing on GSN, and has since become part of the collector/trader's circuit.
[edit] Chuck Barris, 'hit man'
In his "unauthorized autobiography" Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, Barris claimed to have also worked as a CIA hitman, with over 100 kills (the movie suggested only 33 kills). In interviews, when asked about whether he was really a CIA operative, he tends to respond, "I can't really confirm or deny it". In 2002, the book was made into a film, adapted by Charlie Kaufman and directed by George Clooney. Sam Rockwell starred as Barris. Barris has also written a sequel entitled, Bad Grass Never Dies.
[edit] Trivia
Survived lung cancer.
Nephew of singer/songwriter/actor Harry Barris.
Has been married 3 times. Lyn Levy, Robin Altman, and Mary Barris.
[edit] His family
His daughter Della Barris, who often appeared on The Gong Show, died of a drug overdose in 1998 at age 35.
[edit] Other shows hosted or created by Chuck Barris
- The Bobby Vinton Show
- Cop-Out (unsold pilot)
- Dream Girl of '67
- Family Game
- Game Game
- How's Your Mother-In-Law
- Operation Entertainment
- The Parent Game
- People Pickers (unsold pilot)
- Rah Rah Show
