Revivals, resurrections or resuscitations?

There must be something in the air. I’ve just written about the latest revival of Jeopardy!, only to notice that this month we can also expect the revival of two venerable old stagers from years gone by, although both are game shows rather than quizzes.

Let me give you a starter for ten. Which three word phrase links Alfred the Great, Geoffrey Chaucer, Elizabeth I, Michael Miles, Nicky Campbell, Bradley Walsh, Carol Smilie, John Leslie and Graham Norton among others? Answer – Wheel of Fortune. The phrase was notably coined by late Roman writer Boethius, in his book “The Consolation of Philosophy”, where, if my memory serves me correctly, he envisaged Fortune as a beautiful but fickle lady, who held a wheel, which determined the fortune (small f) of men. When you’re at the top of the wheel there’s only one way to go. Like Malory’s “Morte d’Arthur”, Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress”. Wilde’s “Ballad of Reading Jail” and Jeffrey Archer’s “Prison Diary”, “The Consolation of Philosophy” was written while its writer was in chokey. He upset Theoderic the Great, who couldn’t have been a fan of the book since he had Boethius tortured then executed.

“The Consolation of Philosophy” became extremely popular in the Middle Ages. Alfred the Great translated at least part of it into Old English – Chaucer into Middle English and Elizabeth Ist into early Modern English.

Slightly later, the first ever quiz show on ITV was Michael Miles’ Take Your Pick. This ended when the ITV company that produced it lost their franchise in 1968. Miles moved to Southern TV where he hosted the first “Wheel of Fortune” game show for three years until he died. I vaguely remember watching it when I was tiny, and basically I recall contestants being invited to spin the eponymous when to see whether they’d won for the sake of argument a twin tub washing machine or a dishmop.

The Wheel of Fortune Game show that I suspect that many UK readers remember was a rather different kettle of fish. Like the several UK versions of Jeopardy!, Scottish Television’s “Wheel of Fortune” was a UK version of a successful US game show, based losely on the game of Hangman. The US show will celebrate its half century next year, and the STV show didn’t do badly, lasting for 12 years. I particularly remember Nicky Campbell’s long tenure, but I was surprised to see that Bradley Walsh cut his hosting teeth on the show for a season. This had no other relation to the earlier ITV show other than the name, and the use of a big wheel, hence the name. Having seen the previews of the show that airs this Saturday, it looks like a revival of the STV show.

Why revive game shows? Silly question. You revive game shows because you think that if they have worked for an audience before, they might well work for an audience again. Okay, so Jeopardy! has never caught on in the UK, but its success in the USA makes it an acceptable gamble. “Wheel of Fortune” ran for more than a decade, but it’s been over 20 years since it ran and you never know, maybe it might have similar success again and find a whole new audience.

A better question would be why have it presented by Graham Norton? I’m not suggesting that he would be anything other than successful – he’s a great and very popular entertainment broadcaster, which is something that his longevity pays testament towards. But I did think that he was solidly established as one of the jewels in the BBC firmament. Getting him to present a game show is something of a coup for ITV, and I can imagine that they must have paid him a pretty penny.

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It’s a long time ago that I reported that the BBC was reviving ITV’s 1990s ratings powerhouse Gladiators. I didn’t know that there had been a short lived Sky TV revival in the noughties. As with Wheel of Fortune, a big name host will be fronting the show – none other than Bradley Walsh, along with his son Barney.

Can it work again? Well, the original show debuted on ITV at the same time as the hype, razzmatazz and cartoon violence of the pseudo sport WWF (later WWE) American wrestling gained popularity in Britain. It’s fair to say that we hadn’t seen anything quite like “Gladiators” in the UK before – the closest thing was possibly “It’s a knockout”, which was further from Gladiators than Saturday afternoon 'grunt 'n groan' wrestling bouts on World of Sport were from the WWF. Since Gladiators ended on terrestrial TV at the end of the 20^th century though we’ve seen quite a few other shows which also put physically gifted (and some not so physically gifted) members of the public through physical challenges, ranging from “Total Wipeout”, through “Survivor”, “Desert Forges”, “Ninja Warrior UK” and “SAS Who Dares Wins” to name a few. Not only will Gladiators The Next Generation be judged against the original British version, it will also be judged against what has come since.