Stool Pigeon 2019 – The Results

By | August 5, 2019

Alright, let’s open the box and see what you’ve written. Remember: we can’t prove the veracity of any of these, the only people who know the truth are the people involved and the writer themselves. We’ll try and sort fact from fiction though.

  • Epic Gameshow is filming at the moment – Price is Right films two episodes on Friday including a Christmas special! (Not really gossip, but factual. As long as they don’t mess up Play Your Cards Right.)
  • Stephen Mulhurn to host new ITV gameshow Who Gets The House in which families compete for a bigger slice of their inheritance. (Ha ha!)
  • Despite Jeremy Vine’s ritualistic insistence on Revenge of the Egghead that CJ wrote the penalty questions himself, I have heard it from CJ himself that he did not in fact write any of them. (This is the sort of thing that could BRING DOWN THE BBC. I hope you are happy, 12 Yard.)
  • CHALLENGE BRIG: get Anne Hegarty, Richard Osman, Rick Edwards or someone with a name entry on UKGS and at least 123,456 Twitter followers to take part in a live Ask Me Anything interview on the Bar by the end of August and it’s worth £100 to the UK charity of your choice. You’re on a freeroll here. (Hmm.)
  • Went to a mega long record at Media city recently for a show called Quizmaster for ITV. Not sure I’m allowed to say anything else about it… (You didn’t sign an NDA and you’re anonymous! Anyway this came up variously in last month’s Stool Pigeon).
  • ITV have had to pay through the nose for The Masked Singer after getting into a bidding war with Channel 4. What makes it sting even more is that they were offered the format first (before it was a hit on Fox) and admitted at a recent industry event that they laughed it out of the room when it was first pitched. (Believable. And speaking of The Masked Singer, congrats to Friend of the Bar and regular German correspondent Nico W who worked on the recent highly successful German version.)
  • Supermarket Sweep is going to be returning in September and will be more riskae hence the move to ITV2. (Would you like to fondle me baps, babe? Can you handle my banana? Etc.)
  • A contestant gets to question 15 in the new series of Millionaire, and gives a Final Answer. I won’t say what the outcome is. (Gosh. Has Stellify gone from making it too hard to making it too easy? At least they seem reasonably happy to give cash out.)
  • I feel like for the nickelodeon crystal maze, they are likely to go for a social media influencer, perhaps one that already lives in the UK (to save money) They did it with the new version of double dare and that worked out pretty well. Just not sure who. (Is Stampy The Cat still A Thing? I’m 38 now.)
  • A team is apparently winning [REDACTED] in an upcoming episode of the Celebrity Chase. (I’m redacting this because we don’t really do spoilers, and it also means when it happens it will still be a surprise. It’s a lot of money though.)
  • It’s time to rattle those pots and pans. (Is… is it a red tomato day?)
  • One of the topics on this evening’s Just a Minute is/was ‘Gameshows’! Mostly about Sale of the Century and Jeopardy(Gosh.)
  • Famous online trivia contest LearnedLeague (players over the years include Ken Jennings, Brad Rutter, James Holzhauer and at least three UK Chasers) has been approached for a loose quiz show interpretation, i.e. someone likes the name and wants to use it. (Hey producers! If you want a show that’s a bit like LearnedLeague but the rights are much cheaper, there’s this podcast I hosted and produced once upon a time…)
  • Rumor has it that Ninja Warrior UK has got axed. No confirmation yet but let’s see happens. (Seems like an odd period to axe it, after someone has won it and the numbers have been consistent (if unspectacular), but Lost in TV who normally advertise the audience tickets for filming August/September don’t seem to be advertising them this year. So who knows?)

And that’s all the weather… for now.

15 thoughts on “Stool Pigeon 2019 – The Results

  1. Brandon

    So that Mulhern thing is like a more literal interpretation of Don’t Blow The Inheritance, crossed with Divided?
    (I know this is a joke, reminds me of that period where formats where sometimes pitched as a joke like Sick Day and Fertile TV)

    Reply
  2. Chris B

    Last Stool Pigeon said Millionaire would be on first week in August which obviously hasn’t happened. Wonder if it will be either Bank Holiday week end of August or first week of September and back to school new season sort of time now as a guess.

    Also wonder if the potential Q15 is in show one again.. *Insert Hmm finger on chin emoji here*

    Reply
    1. Brandon

      I suppose one of the problems that Millionaire has is that unless 2 episodes have no returning contestant and a final run that ends exactly on the klaxon, the producers can’t control the episode order.(They did at least once in 2010 for unknown reasons) This means they can’t get higher viewing figures for all the episodes by showing that someone reaches Q15 in trailers (as they did for John Robinson)and put the big-winning episode at the end of the series. However, now that the contestants go through a more traditional audition process, the producers could choose to put the more intelligent contestants at the end of the week.

      Reply
      1. Chris B

        It seems like New Millionaire isn’t bothered about episode having no returning contestants to manipulate the order of the episodes, as they frequently get people in to the chair and then sound the klaxon without a question being asked.

        I’ve always got the feeling that New Millionaire has “front loaded” their good contestants/runs to get people talking about it in the hope it’ll last them the week – hence my comment about Ep 1. (It’s entirely possible it may just be good luck of course! ) If they were on weekly, they’d probably try it the other way. Interesting to see if it’s true!

        Reply
    2. Danny Kerner

      Well it looks like the ITV insider spoke up again. Can they turn Supermarket Sweep for broadcast in 4 weeks? i honestly don’t think so. The schedule will be quite tight next year with winter Love Island for it to premier there so a 2019 launch is more likely. with it going out 5 nights as well for 4 consectutive weeks makes it have to go out before November otherwise it will clash with I’m A Celeb.

      Reply
      1. Whoknows

        Supermarket Sweep will be on at 8pm so won’t be affected by these 9pm shows.

        Reply
    3. Danny Kerner

      well, they will probably do it when Lethal weapon hits the midseason point. So September is likely.

      Reply
      1. Chris B

        Also I’m pretty sure it’s going to be on ITV2, so it should be relatively unaffected by whatever is happening on the flagship

        Reply
  3. John R

    Theo is replacing Touker for 4 episodes this series of Dragons Den as sadly Touker was taken to hospital with pneumonia during filming, obviously to the average viewer they are unlikely to spot the difference!

    Reply
  4. Danny Kerner

    Well in regards to Ninja Warrior UK, the application request form is still open until August 31st so if cancelled it will be announced in September however i feel it hasn’t. Probably a late recording this year.

    Reply
    1. Brekkie

      Yes, considering it doesn’t air till Spring a later recording is more than possible. Ben and Rochelle seem to be the Friday hosts of This Morning this year and unlike the last couple of summers Ben is covering for Piers on GMB as well.

      Reply
  5. Philip

    I wonder when the new series of Celebrity Chase will start. There is 11 episodes from this year’s batch plus 7 unaired episodes from last year.

    Reply
    1. Chris B

      Celeb Chase seems to go up against Strictly quite a lot, usually the results but wouldn’t be surprised to see it on Saturdays to boost X-factor’s last throw of the dice champions/celeb double series.

      That said it looks like BGT’s champions series starts soon, is that going to be weekly or daily? If daily maybe it might get paired with Millionaire?

      Reply
  6. Alex McMillan

    In absolute awe that we are getting a second Price Is Right one-off Christmas special hosted by Alan Carr.

    Reply

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