"What's My Line?"

i remember when i first got back in the states and my friend had satellite tv and i'd watch tvland there all the time (it wasn't offered on local cable yet) and fucking sgt. bilko and honeymooners RULED and then our local cable picked it up and it was all three's company and shit and now it's fucking full house or some shit WTF. my sister and i both are crazy about the 50s reruns on gsn (#2 in my heart only to match game; fuck weakest link and greed and kennedy bullshit fuckit fuckit fuckit) - everyone seems profoundly smarter and more polite and possessing at least one ounce of class and we were wondering 'wtf happened to us?' and then we realized of course what happened was television.

FANNIE FLAGG FUCK YEAH

ihttp://www.matchgame.org/episodeguides/wml/wmlwash704.jpg

At 3am central, I believe.

And yes it is awesome.

way ahead of ya. 3:30 eastern time here. :-)

Daly has penned over sixty books exploring topics from Constitutional Law to Foreign Affairs. He began his career as a WWII correspondent in Italy covering General Patton and other military icons. Daly earned three Peabody Awards throughout his career.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS4wjBCS3q4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uix0Z1zZG00

Above are Duke Ellington and Julie London. Here is Eydie Gorme with Steve Lawrence on the panel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h856YKGlr_4

Linda Darnell -speaking Italian!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cef-S3oXSuA

This show is so soothing to watch in bed trying to fall asleep.
It is a joy to watch Arlene Francis' mind work as she's narrowing in on the contestant's job.
I don't think I'd ever seen Debbie Reynolds in "real life" when she was young. What a delight she was.
Typical of my generation, I've always thought formality in speech, social manners, and dress was a bunch of malarkey but Idk maybe it's cause I'm getting older, can really see the value of it via something like this show. "I'm goin to the Big City to be on TV, better go to the tailor asap!"

everyone seems profoundly smarter and more polite and possessing at least one ounce of class and we were wondering 'wtf happened to us?' and then we realized of course what happened was television.

j blount otm

Hate to say it, but you can really notice a change in classiness when game shows moved from Manhattan to Hollywood

They got more classy or less?

Less. John Daly refused to host the syndicated version in part because of the changes wrt the formality of the show, eg they started addressing the panelists by 1st name rather than "Mr/Mrs/Ms _____".

My grandfather was on the britishes version of this way back when - he used to make bows for a living (the archery kind)

It annoys me that BUZZR only seems to show a single season of this show, over and over, when there are so many other seasons of it they could show

I watch them on Youtube

There's always the whooping and hollerin' when an attractive female contestant or mystery guest is signing in and I'm like ugh just stop (esp for the non-mystery guest "average Janes"). But then Diahann Carroll comes on as mystery guest and she is ridic gorgeous but there was no whooping nor hollerin', just polite applause and I'm ugh cmon and objectify her for her looks already you racists! haha

Addicted to this show now. Watching in chronological order and I'm up to the Steve Allen period and being reminded how funny he was; he's only in his early 30s at this time.

Love Dorothy Kilgallen inspecting the male guests' suit makers (and of course they are always wearing suits). Evidently she's assessing the guests' economic status, but she also derives some significance from whether the suit was made in the guest's hometown versus bought in New York.

Yes! Steve Allen was some kind of genius, and very charming in his youth.

Willie Mays was a Mystery Guest in July 1954. I wonder if he's the earliest appearing Mystery Guest who's still alive today.

Arlene Francis identified him and went bananas, because she was a huge New York Giants fan. Who knew.

Oh! Josefa! Idk if you'll see this in your viewing journey, but someone from my hometown went on that show! She was a lighthouse keeper in Michigan, if you get that far. :)

Well I’m plugging through it chronologically so I’m up to the summer of 1954 (lots of jocular references to the Army-McCarthy hearings in the previous spring). Could’ve sworn they’ve had a lighthouse keeper on already but they do repeat particular jobs from time to time.

I believe she was in '53 so that was probably her?

Oh yes, I looked it up… she was on in a May ‘53 episode on which Mickey Mantle was the Mystery Guest.

Willie Mays was a Mystery Guest in July 1954. I wonder if he's the earliest appearing Mystery Guest who's still alive today.

Probably. Off the top of my head from fuzzy Buzzr channel memories, Terry Moore appeared, but that was in '55 or '56.

Now I'm into the Fred Allen era of the show, and he's killing me with his random questions to guests during the initial meet-and-greet segment...

"Have you read my book?"

"Do you live near Bob Hope?"

Have you seen the one from the day after he died? Has to be one of the first examples of a TV show dealing with something like that in real time.

Nope, I'm curious about that, and even more curious about how they deal with the death of Dorothy Kilgallen later, which must have been a genuine shock.

One more Fred Allen guest greeting:

"You live in Brooklyn? You're not happy with that, are you?"

Sorry to bump this again, but as a result of Willie Mays' passing, it does appear likely, as posited above, that Terry Moore is now the earliest appearing Mystery Guest who is still alive. I just watched her episode, which was in March 1955 and included this marvelous exchange:

Bennett Cerf: Am I correct in my assumption that you are not Marilyn Monroe?

Terry Moore: You are correct

Bennett Cerf: Are you a girl that sometimes can elicit the same kind of whistles and ejaculations?

Terry Moore: I would say in an entirely different way, if I do

They really had a "show must go on" attitude in those days. Instead of taking a week off they produced a show on Christmas Day 1955 and another on New Years Day 1956 (live shows). They produced a show the very day after panelist Fred Allen died, paying a touching tribute to him at the opening and close, with a normal show in between (Dorothy and Arlene wearing black).

Kim Novak is another early Mystery Guest (Feb. 1956) who is still with us. She was just 22 when she appeared.

Wally Cox, Victor Borge, and Fred Allen are what I call chaotic panelists.

They don't really know how to play the game, so they ask bizarre questions and make jokes and slow everything down. Fred Allen almost by chance managed to identify a few guests; the other two I doubt ever did.

Interesting to see Bunny Yeager as a regular (non-Mystery Guest) contestant on this, in a July 1957 episode. Her line is described as "'Cheesecake' Photographer." The panel came nowhere close to guessing it, though Dorothy Kilgallen was momentarily distracted by a spider crawling across the actual panel.

Dorothy Kilgallen says, “…one of the most exciting novels I’ve ever read, Atlas Shrugged.”

Oh, Dorothy. My child.

June 7, 1964. It's a noteable moment when Sheilah Graham is the mystery guest, and Cerf asks her about her "this new Hemingway book" -- A Moveable Feast, released earlier that year. They dance around the fact that Graham is in a position to refute EH's assertions about Fitzgerald's penis size! For 1964 television that's quite risqué.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvicqLcCj4c

(around 10:17)

Mort Sahl asked the most bizarre questions as guest panelist in 1959:

"Do you ever work covered with grease?"

"Would you say that people resent what you do?"

Mort: "Are people happy to see you in your work?"
John Daly: "If they think about it seriously, Mort, they will be"
Mort: "Do they think about it in the water?"

One would think there was something wrong with this man!

Bennett Cerf had a great line that I'm surprised made it on the air in 1959. After the guest was revealed as a woman who sells pajamas for dogs, John Daly explained that the pajamas cover the whole dog with its head and its legs sticking out.

Bennett: "Do you have different ones for male and female dogs?"

Just watched the segment with Brian Epstein as the mystery guest! Cerf obviously knew who he was, so it only lasted about 60 seconds. Brian did go home with 10 bucks though...

One of my favorite things that happens regularly on the show is when a guest's line is revealed and Bennett Cerf makes a frowny face as the guest leaves the stage, and then he voices a complaint about one of John Daly's answers during the just-concluded segment. He's a great kvetcher! Many times I think he has a point, although many other times Daly has a clever explanation for the answer in question.

I've now seen every available episode of the original 1950-1967 run on CBS. I'll take any questions.

It was a fascinating time capsule and cultural study. The show gets a little shaky after Dorothy Kilgallen's death in November 1965, though the parade of guest panelists they bring in subsequently are interesting characters - Phyllis Newman, Suzy Knickerbocker, Sue Oakland, and odder celebrities such as Israeli singer Aliza Kashi among them.

‘You gotta watch for those cheesy hotels.’

What's that a reference to?

Ha sorry—it was a brilliant Steve Allen line during a segment with the official Olympic ski timer, which always sticks in my head. And of course I can’t find it now…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XPIldknvjc

He had a few great lines in the episode. And Arlene looking as stunning as ever…

Weirdly Arlene got better looking in the 1960s when she was in her 50s. Much more flattering hairstyles.