Money Maze
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(The) Money Maze was an American television game show seen on ABC from December 23, 1974 to July 4, 1975. The host of the show was Nick Clooney, the father of veteran actor George Clooney and a Cincinnati-based television personality. Alan Kalter was the announcer. It was produced by Daphne-Lipp Productions, of which Dick Cavett was a principal.
The object of the game was to negotiate a large maze built on the studio floor. A contestant would direct his or her spouse from a perch above the maze; the spouse would need to find his or her way to a pushbutton on the side of a tower inside the maze.
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[edit] Front game
Two married couples against the other for the right to enter the maze. Three regular rounds were played. Each round had a particular topic, with eight related clues. Two clues would be shown on a screen; one couple would select a clue for the other to attempt to answer. A correct answer scored a point, and that couple would then select from two clues (a new clue plus the on they didn't act one before) for their opponent. An incorrect answer gave the opponents a chance to answer instead. If they did so, they had a chance to answer as many of the remaining clues as they could; if they were also incorrect, play would continue in the round. If the two couples each answered four clues in the round, a tiebreaker would be played where two additional clues were shown. The first couple to activate a buzzer would select a clue to answer for one point, then try to answer the other for two points. If they were wrong on either, the other couple got a free attempt.
The winning couple in each round would then send one member into the maze, with the other directing from above. The "runner" would have 15 seconds to find a phone-booth-size "tower" with pushbuttons on each side. Pressing the lit button before time expired won the prize. Later in the show's run, couples were given the option of trying to also reach a second tower within 25 seconds for a $500 bonus; if they accepted the challenge but couldn't reach both towers, the prize and the cash bonus were both lost.
The final round was the Catch-Up Round. Clues proceeded as in earlier rounds, except that the couple trailing in score at that point of the game would do all the answering and the leading team would select the clues. The first clue was worth one point, the second worth two, and so on. If the trailing couple incorrectly answered at any time before their score surpassed their opponents, the round was over and the other couple won outright. If the trailing couple tied or passed the leading couple's score, the leading couple got one (and only one) chance for a final clue that would win the game. The winner at the end of this round would play "The $10,000 Dash," a final maze run for a prize of up to $10,000. If both couples were tied going into the Catch-Up Round, they each effectively won the game, and each would run the maze for $10,000.
[edit] The $10,000 Dash
In the final run, five of the towers (out of eight available) would be lit. Four of them would have zeroes on top, and the fifth would have "the all important 1." The 1 was indeed important, because the runner had to activate it to win anything at all. To win the $10,000, the runner had to activate all the pushbuttons, and exit the maze — pushing another button atop a podium near the exit — within one minute. The total prize was determined by how many "zeroes" were reached: the 1 plus three zeroes won $1,000, the 1 plus two zeroes won $100, and so on.
[edit] Trivia
- The show is believed to be the first in American game show history where a profanity was not censored. When a husband was not making good progress inside the maze, his wife became frustrated and yelled, "Get out of the maze, Warren, get the hell out of the maze!"
- Late in the show's run, Clooney would open each show with a short song: "Life’s a chance/A happenstance/Come with me/And wander free/Try my way/And you’ll be on top/All the time!" Clooney was a fair singer; his sister, Rosemary Clooney, was better.
- This was Clooney's one and only network show. Nationally, he was better known as a host for American Movie Classics. He then returned to his home of Cincinnati, Ohio, where he became a news anchorman, newspaper columnist, and unsuccessful candidate for the United States House of Representatives.
- The large maze, estimated by some sources at 50 × 100 feet, was part of the show's undoing — it took nearly and entire day to set up the maze and another to break it down, tying up the studio for an extra two days for each five-show, one-day taping session. Audience members sat in bleachers around three sides of the maze.
- Alan Kalter announced several game shows, but is better known as the current announcer for The Late Show with David Letterman.
- The Money Maze aired as part of a three-show afternoon game show block on ABC in 1974 (The $10,000 Pyramid (who had occupied the 4:00 p.m. time slot prior to Money Maze) and The Big Showdown were the other two shows). The block lasted until July 4 of the following year, when both Money Maze and The Big Showdown disappeared.
- The Pilot and at least one episode from the series exist in ABC's archive. Like most daytime game shows on ABC, the tapes would be wiped after broadcast. The pilot exists among tape traders, and a small clip of the show aired in 2004 when Chuck Barris and George Clooney (related to Nick Clooney) were promoting "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind."
