Wednesday, September 13, 2023

A second hand failure: It Pays to be Ignorant (1973)

 Many moons ago, we talked about the original TV version of It Pays to be Ignorant, which ran for 1 season on TV in 1951. 22 years later, Monty Hall (Let's Make a Deal) and business partner Stefan Hatos revived Ignorant as a weekly syndicated series, largely because celebrity panel shows were big back then. 

Joe Flynn (ex-McHale's Navy), who had spent the post-McHale years as a serviceable character actor, and had a role in Disney's "Medfield College" series of comedies with Kurt Russell, was tapped to host, joined by panelists Jo Anne Worley (Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In), who also sang the show's closing theme song, Charles Nelson Reilly (ex-The Ghost & Mrs. Muir), better known now for a lengthy run on Match Game, which had been revived two months before Ignorant, and British comic Billy Baxter, who did not land another American gig.


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As with the 1951 series, Ignorant was ignored by most of the country, and Hatos & Hall replaced it a year later with another revival, this one for Masquerade Party, which also bombed. At least, now you know how prepared Reilly & Worley were for any questions about "Dumb Donald/Dora" on Match Game later on.

Rating: B.

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