OK, let’s see how the ALL NEW TOUGH STOOL PIGEON with TOUGH CHRIS works out. A couple of people still went for obvious gags, and I’m not going to include them. So there.

This being said, this is still anonymous hearsay so may not be 100% true. Some interesting things though:

• Yes, this *is* E4 testing the waters for a proper return.
• Big Brother: Best Shows Ever was being used to prepare the audience for a CBB revival next year (thus the focus on fun celebrity episodes instead of things like Fight Night), but Endemol was planning on doing the format that’s currently flopping in Australia (last week one episode finished fourth in its timeslot, in a country with only three major commercial networks) and is now having second thoughts.

Quite interesting, I’ve not watched the new Aussie Americanised version yet, but I’ve always said that Aussie TV is basically British sensibilities with US advert breaks, and it’s probably not that surprising that a country very used to one type of format has difficulty in getting behind another. I’m just not sure what the point of doing it on E4 would be – is it worth building a house for what’s likely to be around 300,000 nightly viewers? And won’t Love Island be back next year anyway?

• Not particularly exciting or unexpected, but during a talk a few weeks ago Ben Frow basically said Channel 5 is not likely to green-light any more quiz or game shows while he is in charge.

What is Channel 5? A miserable little pile of secrets.

• Not sure if this is ‘game show’ news or not but 6 part best of Saturday Night Takeaway planned from September.
• Dave Berry ended up being a regular panellist on the first series of Through The Keyhole due to a mix up between the commissioners and producers. They thought ITV had wanted him to be on throughout the series but the channel had just suggested him as an example of the sort of panelists they could have. By the time the mistake was realised the contract was already signed and they had no choice but to honour it leading his rather odd appearance in every episode of the first series.

Some Deadly Knowledge there. I did wonder at the time if this was an ITV effort to make Dave Berry a “thing” in a way nobody really cares about outside of London.

• The forthcoming series of Celebrity MasterChef is truncated because the restrictions began to hit while they were filming the semi-finals. Sensing full lockdown was imminent, the crew and the contestants worked round the clock to condense what would have been two weeks of shows into one mega semi-finals-and-finals week, all shot in a couple of days.
• A Weakest Link 20th anniversary special, looking back at some behind the scenes stuff, classic memorable moments and how the format was developed, is going to be shown in August. That sounds very similar to the 1000 episodes special they made back in 2006 so it might just be a re-edited version of that.

Not really sure what the point of this is, if you’re not going to take it past the Children in Need one-off, when testing the water was surely the point (and that they stuffed up), then why bother with a documentary on a show that hasn’t been on for years? Unless this is the launchpad for Robert Rinder’s Weakest Link, then fine.

• University Challenge 2020/2021 is canceled due to the lockdown interfering with the taping (the restriction started just a few days before Round 2 taping) and BBC’s refusal to postpone the taping to autumn. They don’t want another Corpus Christi scandal since some students will graduate by that point. We’re expecting a brand new set 2021/2022 and the same old Jeremy Paxman. He is now older than Bamber Goscoine when the show was canceled by ITV.
• The Circle will be closely reflecting the international versions of the show for season 3 which are all pre-recorded in advance and will be ditching the studio audience live editions.
• I’ve heard Millionaire is starting recording again in July.
• BBC have a daytime quiz coming up titled The Money Walker hosted by, I believe, Gok Wan, that’s about all I know currently. Nothing too exciting but it’s an interesting host choice.

Gok Wan’s another “yeah, why not?” choice, although the title makes it sound like The Walk of Temptation from The Mole dragged out to sixty minutes. Should you take £690, or reject it for what’s in the next box which could be up to £3,000? Repeat until the last box has £250 in it.

And finally:

• I won’t even pretend this is Stool Pigeon material but I can’t be bothered just to mail you directly. What do you think about Glasscar where the new season at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Qr2qTiQf8A debuted directly in competition to the Marble League? It doesn’t have nearly the same degree of charm or personality, but the propulsion system to replace the elevator is a game changer and I suspect has a good chance of becoming the norm in years to come.

Not sure I like it, or at least not in its current form, it means that all tracks are going to have to have a large straight in it and lengthier track segments which means less emphasis on the technical side of marble racing. Say what you like about the elevator – that it’s an imperfect solution that forces unitary time differences if you like – but how many race changing moments have happened because of it? Drama.

*Shuffles papers*

Goodnight.

Alright, it’s time to open the Stool Pigeon. As lockdown begins to ease and production companies start to think about filming again, what’s the exciting gossip?

I’m going to put my foot down this month – the point of the exercise is not blatant lies, it’s not meant to be comic. It’s not even meant for news really – stick your name on it and put it in a comment. Tell us something interesting we don’t know from the comfort of relative anonymity.

Box closed, results incoming.

And apparently without COVID insurance and it could bring down Adventure Line if someone is caught with it. Incredible jeopardy.

Anyway, they’re about halfway through filming 11 episodes (plus eight Toujours Plus Forts!) and they’re promising it won’t be a “wasted” series. Here’s what we’ve gathered so far.

• There will be social distancing and games have been reworked to allow this. Whatsmore, teams are reduced to five from six. Also, as I understand it (and may have misunderstood it), teams will stick around the Treasure Room and Passe-Partout will deliver people to their cells, not unlike the bonus challenges on Toujours Plus Fort! last year. Passe-Muraille will also be there, although whether he’ll be dressing up a lot I don’t know.
• Lady and (new) Mr Boo will return in non-contact capacity. We *believe* Willy Rovelli’s back – although they won’t be playing Restaurant and he’s only tweeted once about being in La Rochelle since start of filming. Blanche/Rouge return, as does The Cage in some capacity. The Genie is back. New characters include Cyril Feraud as Cyril Gossbo – the “perfect” television host made up to look like a nightmarish real-life Ken doll with a new gungy quiz, and there was a picture released last night of a door with what looks like a fortune teller on, who looks a little bit like Steve Pemberton’s “local shops for local people” character from League of Gentlemen.
• Other new doors that have been revealed so far include what looks like some sort of waiting room, and a big purple door with a question mark and an illuminati-style eye. Also there’s a picture of a sort of invitation from Blanche for a new thing.
• Mud fight has gone (because of COVID) so Miss France won’t be able to collect on her prize this year – but it’s disappeared and come back before. Time Travel has gone but that was probably always a one-off for the thirtieth anniversary last year so not too surprising. Percolator’s gone but that’s had its time (and Hotel is the superior spinny-floor game anwyay). Recycling’s gone but that never really lived up to its Star Wars trash-compactor idea anyway.
• They’ll be wearing masks on enterting the fort and masks in the Treasure Room, but it looks like contestants will be mask free for most of it.

It’s usually worth keeping an eye out on sites like fortboyard.net who trawl the social media sites to get daily filming information.

In other news, in theory the new Microids game Escape Game: Fort Boyard comes out for all major formats July 7th. Featuring “over 25 events!”

Tonight at 9:45pm. 40 becomes 20.

With the announcement of The Cube making a comeback, here’s a very fast turnaround Plays Badly on the The Cube app.

Floor is Lava starts on Netflix on Friday, which as far as we can work out is just the Museum from Fort Boyard, a three minute semi-regular event, turned into an entire series. Still, might be fun though.

We quite liked Rutledge Wood on Hyperdrive, and given he was a host on the US version of Top Gear now appears to be gunning for the role of The US Richard Hammond.

Edit: I thought this was going to be a pretty boring week, but in the last hour we’ve had ITV are bringing back The Cube and Cyril Feraud’s got a character job as a Ken-like doll gameshow host on Fort Boyard this year. Amazing. Edit Edit: And S3 of The Circle.