trivia

It pleases me to no end when I see how many fellow TV lovers are ready and able to answer my trivia questions. Last week it only took "Tammy" twelve minutes to share with us Keith Partridge's middle name of Douglas.

As many of you may already know, I interviewed Danny Bonaduce during my live show at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre. He shared many great Partridge Family stories. My favorite would have to be how he got the job as Danny. Before he became Danny Partridge he was working with veteran TV director (and Dick Van Dyke's neighbor on The Dick Van Dyke Show) Jerry Paris on a TV movie. They were way behind schedule, and Danny made a joke about how Jerry might be fired if they went over budget. Mr. Paris was not in the mood to be mocked by an eight year old boy so he grabbed Danny's script, ripped out the pages with his dialogue and shouted, "There, we're all caught up now, kid." As horrible as that sounds, Danny insists that Paris felt so bad about the incident that when he auditioned to be a Partridge, Paris, who was directing the pilot, made it up to Danny by casting him as the red-headed scamp we all came to love.

Now on to this week's question...

Last weeks question proved to be a little tougher than my first one. While it didn't take long for the right answer to be deduced, it did take a good amount of teamwork. I was, however, surprised to hear about the alleged lawsuit that decided Trapper John MD was a spin off of the movie M*A*S*H and not the show.

In any event I received a great trivia question from "elf" that goes like this, "Can you name anyone who has won the grand prize on the original Gong Show who later went on to be nominated for three Oscars?"

This one took some thinking but I'm pretty sure the answer is Danny Elfman. His original band ,The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo (later shortened to Oingo Boingo), won the grand prize on the ol' Gong Show and he then went on to be nominated for Oscars for his scores to Big Fish, Men in Black and Good Will Hunting. Excellent question, elf.

This weeks question is for true TV fans only ...

Well last weeks trivia question wasn't as hard as I thought. It would appear that the readers here at TV Squad are a bit more knowledgeable about TV, if not more web savvy, than I am used to.

Along with all the answers I got for last week, I also received a request for some information. A reader by the handle of Jefferson wrote, "There was a really crappy show on Fox in the '90s - and yes, I am aware that does not narrow down the field. It was a 1/2 hour sitcom that centered on a group of individuals that survived a nuclear blast and was now living together in some stranded hut together where they have to rebuild civilization and all that stuff. "

Well, as I'm sure many of you know that series was called Woops! starring Evan Handler and Cleavant Derricks among others. It ran on FOX for one season in 1992.

On to this week's question ...

At least once a week, someone will write me an email asking me to "settle a bet" or "ease their mind" about some trivia question that they can't seem to find the answer to. I'm also happy to use my knowledge to help out in any way I can.

On my own weekly podcast, I always ask a trivia question that I consider to be somewhat simple although difficult to research online. Rarely do I get a correct answer. So I thought I would use the TV Squad forum to give readers a chance to answer the trivia questions as well.

So here is the first question inspired by the great Boston Legal episode, 'Son of the Defender'. Good luck.

Happy Easter Sunday, everyone. Is everyone enjoying their day? Are you spending time with your loved ones, stuffing a rabbit with candy and cooking it over a fire pit, building a gigantic Jesus out of marshmallow Peeps, or whatever the heck it is you do to celebrate? That's great, I salute all your traditions, lovers of TV and stuff.

Since you've obviously decided to take some time to check out this blog, I thought I'd direct you to this nifty collection of TV quizzes. Some of them are harder than others, or maybe they're not, I guess it all depends on who much you know. Perhaps you're at a Paul Goebel level of knowledge, or maybe you only know as much as Bifford Glaffenploeg, who is a person I just made up, and therefore knows nothing about anything.

Anyway, have fun with the quizzes, then come back here and let me know how you did. I can't believe I actually missed two on the Disney or Warner Bros? quiz. I feel so common.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot: our pals at AOL also have a new TV quiz posted every week. I didn't do very well on the "glasses" quiz.

This is either big news for game show fans or much to do about nothing.

The show sent out a note this week that promises something major is going to happen on the show tomorrow (Friday) that has never happened on the show before:

"This Friday, March 16, 2007...for the first time in 23 years, Jeopardy history will be made...it was such a remarkable event we consulted a game theory expert, and he said it may never happen again!"

OK, now they have me curious, and since they mention game theory, I think I've narrowed it down to three possible events.

I used to play this game with myself when I was bored where I would try to create "chains" by linking names and phrases together. For example, I might morph "I'm A Little Teapot" and the "Teapot Dome Scandal" into "I'm A Little Teapot Dome Scandal."

Now, someone needs to jog my memory because I know there's an actual game that also became a short-lived game show based on this same idea. While I wait for someone to remind me what that was called*, I've created another game for y'all to play. Just like my last two games, you won't win anything, but I think this one is a little more challenging that my last two.

I've written plot descriptions for twenty-one series below. Here's an example:

Does anyone out there remember Starcade? I sure don't. However, I've been getting up to speed by watching full episodes of the '80s game show. Starcade pitted two contestants together to answer trivia questions about video games and then play different arcade games for points. If you were a child of the '80s as I am, it's cool to remember all the games you used to play. They even have an episode that features Dragon's Lair, which I remember as being the most frustrating arcade game I ever played.

Reruns of the series popped up on G4 from 2002 - 2004, and according to both IMDb and Wikipedia, the second unaired pilot of Starcade was hosted by Alex Trebek. I assume he was taken off the show for asking contestants questions about both Kierkegaard and Frogger.

The episodes are worth checking out not just for the cool retro look, but also for the great "prizes," such as the portable record player pictured on the right.

After sucessfully strip-mining every unknown piece of information about the original Start Trek series, our friends at G4 have decided to do the same thing with The Next Generation.

Earlier this week, TrekToday.com reported that the network will show all seven seasons of ST:TNG in their patented "2.0" format, with the episode sharing the screen with trivia, behind-the-scenes information, a live chat, and a stock ticker (I can't explain that one; you'll have to see it). They'll also be keeping track of the "Picard Maneuver" -- how many times a crew member tugs down on his or her uniform when he or she stands up -- among other statistics. G4 will start airing ST:TNG 2.0 on January 15 at 9 PM.

I'm sure the folks at G4 will do a fine job with this. But they don't have Wil Wheaton working for them. I mean, as far as behind-the-scenes info and wise-ass reviews are concerned, how much better can you do than using someone who was actually on the show? Wil's been doing a helluva job with his Next Generation reviews, so I'd say check with us first before watching a 2.0 episode. You'll have double the fun.

[via tv filter]

Starting November 27 and airing through December 1, you'll be able to catch reruns of VH1's Pop Up Video on VH1 Classic, one of the last remaining "music" networks that actually show videos on a semi-regular basis. If you're a pop culture and trivia nut like me, you probably loved Pop Up Video, a series that would showcase videos both new and old, complete with facts about the song, artist or video itself that would pop onto the screen throughout the video. The series was a font of useless knowledge and loads of fun until it ventured away from videos and began to give the same pop-up treatment to commercials and other non-musical things. I can't speak for everyone, but I'm not all that interested in knowing the inner workings of an OxyClean commercial.

The Pop Up Video repeats will air every night at 8:00 and 8:30 pm. If you've been meaning to bone up on your knowledge of Journey and Tina Turner, this is your chance.

I've lamented on this blog numerous times the absence of "classic" cartoons on television. I would even love to see Looney Tunes, Merrie Melodies, Terrytoons, and selections from the Tex Avery library as part of Adult Swim. Heck, bury them at one o'clock in the morning away from the newer offerings, that'd be just fine with me as long as they were there and accessible. These days, however, the only "Looney Tunes" one can usually see are Baby Looney Tunes or Loonatics Unleashed, modified and updated versions that are just dandy for younger kids who might not know the history behind those characters, but not so great for older folk with a greater appreciation for animation history.

In the late 90s, Cartoon Network did offer something to those of us who like to delve a bit deeper into animation. The show was called Toonheads, and each episode would focus on a specific director, animator, voiceover artists, era, or whatever. One episode might be dedicated to voice actor Daws Butler while another would plot the evolution of Tom and Jerry as different directors took over the cat and mouse duo. Every cartoon would be separated by brief snippets about the work and the people behind it. The episodes weren't exactly rife with information, but it was nice to know there was a series that actually took these old cartoons seriously, rather than just slapping them into various timeslots as a means to fill up airtime. 

Jeopardy! champ Ken Jennings now has a blog on his site, "Confessions of a Trivial Mind." And it's pretty damn entertaining. I was expecting some dry commentary and historical facts, but there's a lot of pop culture stuff on there too, and he updates it frequently. He has a message board too, which seems to be pretty active.

Jennings has a new book coming out, Brainiac, and is a regular columnist for mental_floss magazine.

[via TV Tattle]

NBC has created a game on its website to go along with the live telecast of the Golden Globes, which air on Monday night (8-11 pm EST). It will feature a film and television trivia game that parallels whatever is happening on the Globes. It looks like the website is also going to have polls up as each category is announced so the internet can vote for who it wants to be Best Actress or whatever, and the results will appear in real-time up until the winner is announced. I think it would be interesting to see who people are hoping will win each category, compared to who actually wins.

You know what the website needs, that it doesn't have? A Golden Globes drinking game. Somebody kisses Jack Nicholson's ass? Take a drink! Someone does an impression of Tom Cruise jumping on Oprah's couch? Drink! Scripted, playful banter between presenters falls flat? Drink up!

That's the name of Jeopardy champ Ken Jennings's new column for Mental Floss magazine. If you're not familiar with Mental Floss, it's actually a very cool, clever magazine about...well, just about everything. Check out the site and the back issues.

And for the record, Jeopardy! should always be spelled with an exclamation point, and Mental Floss should be spelled mental_floss.

[via TV Tattle]