WTF is wrong with Dawson?
Why does he seem so dour and sour and not at all very talkative and chipper as he was on FF?
I'm watching '78.
Was he more fun in earlier seasons?
He just seems burnt out and doesn't want to be there.
Damn I'm good.
I've read various accounts of how difficult he got to be on MG. You can see a very obvious difference in him between the early 1973 shows and the 1978 shows. In the early shows he was animated and pleasant, but by 1978 when he already had his own successful game show and didn't need MG anymore, he was a grouch who didn't want to be there and it showed.
Both Brett Somers and Betty White were quoted as saying that he was very difficult and apparently not a very happy person in general, and I think they were being nice.
There is a documentary on Youtube about MG and they say there that when MG brought in the big wheel in late 1978 because all of the contestants were picking Richard to match in the big money round and the show's producers felt that it wasn't fair to the othe celebrities, that was the straw that finally broke the camel's back for Richard and he was released from his contract shortly thereafter.
It's too bad he was so nasty, because he was very funny and witty when he wanted to be. Look how he was on "Family Feud" during the same period that he was such a jerk on MG, it was like a night and day difference.
There's an interview on youtube I've seen before where he says straight out that he considered the star wheel to be a deliberate slight against him.
I like the star wheel and was getting tired of them picking Richard all the time, even if they went with him in the Super Match and he just got them the $100.
Why not pick the one that got them the $500?
Damn I'm good.
Richard was being an egotistical jerk about the star wheel, if you ask me. He reveled in always being chosen and it stroked his ego, even though he had a very successful show of his own on the side. I guess he never thought about what it felt like to be Brett or Charles and never, ever get picked for the super match question, even though they were there just as much as he was and were certainly not stupid.
I can remember the few times before the wheel when the contestant did not choose Richard and the person that they chose was either kind of dumbstruck "Wow! Me?? Really??" or they seemed terrified that they would let the contestant down and not make a match. I guess they were so used to Richard being picked that they had no faith in themselves. I often think when I'm watching this show that I would have loved to have been a contestant and intentionally NOT chosen Richard for the super match, just to prove that others can do it too. For being someone who got paid a lot of money to be on national TV and play a game, Richard sure was a spoil sport and a sore loser.
I don't know why people seemed to gravitate to RD. He was the least likeable of the bunch. Out of the six panelists, he was always my last pick. No sense of humor.
Does anybody remember the episode of Family Feud where one of the family's flash round picks (a man in his mid 40s, probably) decidedly did NOT like RD, and when Dawson put his arm around the man in that smug, familiar way, the man made a total show of throwing Dawson's arm off? It was extremely obvious. It made me kind of like the guy.
Maybe because daytime TV is relegated to the lower echelon of show business celebrities and Richard was once on a hit prime time show. I'm speculating of course but maybe he was angry or depressed about the state of his career. The money on a daily game show couldn't be as much and then it grinds on year after year and you're still stuck there with Gene, Brett and CNR.
No! That's not true at all, Elvis takes 50% of everything I earn!Col. Tom Parker share
That could be. It makes sense. Even though it would be kind of nice if a person could be grateful for the comfy position of being well paid to laugh at their own jokes and play fill in the blank. Of course, the human ego being what it is that's not the way it usually works.
Do you not care for Gene, Brett and CNR? I liked the two guys okay. Brett was obnoxious.
I just saw a few episodes of "Match Game'73" on Buzzr today so they were from the first season of the show and were taped only a few years after Richard's primetime show, "Hogan's Heroes", ended.
In these early MG episodes, Richard could not have been more pleasant and cordial. He threw himself into the merrymaking and silliness, grinned a lot, and ad libbed cute little quips after revealing his answer to each question. He seemed truly happy to be there and very into it, or in other words, the polar opposite of the moody, sour faced Richard of the 1978 episodes who acted like he would rather be at the dentist having a root canal.
So in light of that, kapnkirk, I think it may have had more to do with him having his own hit game show when the later episodes, like those from 1978, were taped and feeling like MG was a waste of his time since he was a star again on "Family Feud" and didn't care about MG anymore. It's like he liked MG when he needed it and nothing else was happening in his career, but once he got his own show and it proved to be a hit, he was just too cool to be bothered anymore.
So in light of that, kapnkirk, I think it may have had more to do with him having his own hit game show when the later episodes, like those from 1978, were taped and feeling like MG was a waste of his time since he was a star again on "Family Feud" and didn't care about MG anymore. It's like he liked MG when he needed it and nothing else was happening in his career, but once he got his own show and it proved to be a hit, he was just too cool to be bothered anymore.
I agree.
It's like night and day or Dr. Jekel and Mr. Hyde on those later episodes of MG and when he has FF going on at the same time.
Damn I'm good. share