| The New Price Is Right | |
|---|---|
| Format | Game show |
| Created by | Bob Stewart |
| Developed by | Jonathan Goodson |
| Directed by | Andrew Felsher |
| Presented by | Doug Davidson |
| Narrated by | Burton Richardson |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of episodes | 80 |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) | Kathy Greco |
| Running time | 30 minutes |
| Production company(s) | Mark Goodson Productions, LLC |
| Distributor | Paramount Domestic Television |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | Syndicated |
| Original run | September 12, 1994 – January 27, 1995 |
| Chronology | |
| Related shows | The Price Is Right (1972-Present) |
The New Price Is Right is a short-lived syndicated version of the American game show The Price Is Right, which aired from September 12, 1994 to January 27, 1995. This version of the show did not use the same on-air personnel as the daytime version which ran concurrently on CBS. Doug Davidson, who also appears on the CBS soap opera The Young and the Restless, hosted[1] with Burton Richardson as the announcer. The prize models were Julie Lynn Cialini, Ferrari Farris and Lisa Stahl.
The show was produced by Mark Goodson Productions and distributed by Paramount Domestic Television. This version had a different format, and significantly different rules, than the two previous syndicated versions and the early half-hour episodes of the daytime show.
After this version's cancellation, many of its concepts were adopted by European versions of the show. Various prop changes and rule modifications from this version, as well as many of the music cues, also carried over to the CBS daytime and prime time versions of the show. Additionally, several production members continued their involvement with The Price Is Right after this version's cancellation.
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The New Price Is Right differed greatly from its parent show in several ways. The entire concept, which had not been radically modified since 1975, was given a significant update in an attempt to appeal to a younger generation. Davidson was at the time a popular actor on The Young and the Restless, and Burton Richardson had made his mark as the announcer for The Arsenio Hall Show. The models were also younger: while the Barker's Beauties of the daytime show were mostly past the age of 40, The New Price Is Right chose younger models in their 20s. The prize budget for the show was also higher. Non-U.S. cars appeared as prizes, which at the time were prohibited from the daytime show by executive producer and host Bob Barker and producers Phil Rossi and Roger Dobkowitz. Kathy Greco (then associate producer of the daytime show) served as producer, with Jay Wolpert (a producer for the daytime version from its beginning until 1978) also part of the production staff. Each episode featured three pricing games, a Showcase Showdown (which could either resemble a modified One Bid or the Big Wheel), and a one-player version of the Showcase. For each pricing game, a contestant was chosen from the audience and immediately joined Davidson onstage, not having to bid in Contestant's Row as would be required on the parent program.
Some pricing games on The New Price Is Right were played with slight modifications to the rules as played on the daytime version. Games which usually featured grocery products (e.g., Grand Game and Hole in One) were played using prizes generally valued less than $400 instead, and some games featured other rule changes.
Unlike the other half-hour formats of Price, the Davidson version used the Showcase Showdown to determine which contestant competed in the showcase. Two different versions were used.
The most widely used Showcase Showdown game on The New Price Is Right was The Price Was Right, played similarly to the One Bid on the daytime version. A vintage commercial for a product was presented to the three contestants who were then asked to bid on what the product cost at the time the commercial first aired. The contestant with the closest bid without going over advanced to the Showcase.
In the event that all three contestants overbid (which rarely happened), the bids were erased and began again, with Davidson instructing contestants to bid lower than the lowest bid in the previous round. No bonus was awarded for a "Perfect Bid."
The producers had originally intended to use "The Price Was Right" on every episode, but when tapings for the series began the staff had only been able to complete research on 60 commercials and products. For the other twenty episodes (mostly in the early part of the show's run), the Big Wheel was used.
The Big Wheel was played with the same rules and bonuses in use at the time on the daytime show. However, contestants spun in order from highest to lowest winnings instead of the reverse.
With only one person playing the Showcase, the pricing game Range Game was modified for this round. A new prop was built with a $60,000 scale ($10,000 to $70,000). During the show's final commercial break, the winner of the Showcase Showdown chose a range at random between $3,000 and $10,000 (in $1,000 increments).
A single showcase was then presented. Once it was finished, the rangefinder was started up the scale. The contestant pulled a lever when they thought the showcase value was contained within the range. If correct, the contestant won the showcase, which was generally worth between $20,000–$60,000, comparatively higher than average showcase values on the daytime show (which, at the time, offered showcases usually worth between $10,000–$30,000).
The set differed drastically from that of the daytime show, featuring different color schemes and patterns for many of the set pieces, including the usage of a large video wall. Edd Kalehoff created an entirely new set of music cues, 286 in all[2], to replace the traditional "come on down" theme and prize music. The series used an up-tempo, smooth jazz-influenced re-recording of the daytime series' theme. The theme was later used in several international adaptations of this series, while a number of the prize cues found their way into the music library of the CBS show.
Two pilots were recorded on July 16 and 17, 1993. Davidson hosted the first, while KTLA news personality Mark Kriski emceed the second, with Bob Hilton announcing on both.
When the series began, a montage of clips was played at the beginning of each show, including brief clips of the 1993 pilots and previous versions. A shorter clip sequence was used for the second half of the run, which used highlight clips from the series' run to that point.
Unlike the previous syndicated series this version was not required to be aired in the late afternoon or early evening, thereby avoiding a clearance problem that plagued a 1985–86 syndicated Price is Right hosted by Tom Kennedy (which resulted in many late night time slots for the series as prime slots were unavailable). Many stations were able to air the show during daytime hours. In some markets, The New Price Is Right was paired with the veteran syndicated Family Feud, which for its seventh season saw a return of Richard Dawson as its host. Since The New Price is Right's distributor Paramount was also an equal shareholder in the soon-to-launch United Paramount Network (UPN), the series' major-market clearances were on stations that were owned by its other equal shareholder Chris-Craft Industries, such as WWOR in New York.
Despite not having the vast clearance problems that its syndicated predecessor had, The New Price Is Right shared its ratings trouble. The series never gained an audience, a problem that was blamed on, among various other things, preemptions for coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial and the drastic change in format as compared to the daytime series.
The New Price Is Right's low ratings contributed to many stations dropping the series within its first three months on the air. The New Price Is Right disappeared from most of these stations' markets afterward as there were no stations that were willing to pick up the low-rated series.
This version, along with the 1972–1980 weekly syndicated series hosted by Dennis James and Bob Barker, is one of only two American versions of Price that were not rerun by GSN.
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