Bob Stewart (television producer)

Bob Stewart
Born	Isidore Steinberg August 27, 1920 (1920-08-27) Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
Occupation	Television producer
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Bob Stewart (born Isidore Steinberg on August 27, 1920 in Brooklyn, New York) is a former American television game show producer. He was active in the TV industry from 1956 until his retirement in 1992.

Stewart is known for creating some of the most popular game shows for Mark Goodson-Bill Todman Productions. These shows include To Tell the Truth, Password, and The Price Is Right. His biggest success as an independent producer was the Pyramid series, starting with The $10,000 Pyramid in 1973.

The Price Is Right and To Tell the Truth, both created by Stewart, are the only two game shows to be seen nationally in either first-run network or syndication airings in the US in every decade from the 1950s onward, although the version of The Price Is Right that has been seen since 1972 on CBS features a retooled format in which Stewart was not involved.

Stewart with Goodson-Todman

Stewart's early broadcasting career included stints first at WNEW-AM in New York City, and then at NBC's flagship TV and radio stations, WNBC-TV and AM, also in New York. In the book The Box, the native New Yorker said he got the first spark for The Price Is Right during his tenure as a staff producer at WRCA-TV (now WNBC-TV) when he happened to observe an auction taking place on 50th Street on his lunch hour. He developed the idea into the working title of The Auctionaire.

Stewart joined Goodson-Todman Productions in 1956, after he bumped into broadcaster (and future game show producer-host) Monty Hall on the street and Hall told him he knew Goodson-Todman's attorney. "You got any ideas?" Stewart quoted Hall as asking.

The Price Is Right, using some of the Auctionaire concept, premiered on NBC November 26, 1956, with Bill Cullen as host. It lasted seven years on NBC before being bumped in favor of Hall's Let's Make a Deal in 1963; after that, Price moved to ABC, where it lasted another two years. Seven years later, after Stewart had left Goodson-Todman, Mark Goodson retooled the show, mixing Stewart's original bidding format with elements from Let's Make a Deal to create The New Price Is Right, which debuted in syndication and on CBS' daytime lineup in September 1972.

CBS' To Tell the Truth, emceed by Bud Collyer, hit the air less than one month after the original Price debuted, in December 1956. Stewart said he auditioned the concept to Goodson and his producers by trying to have them guess which one of three men had been in the infantry in World War II and was now managing a grocery store. (The original pilot, hosted by Mike Wallace and existing as a kinescope, was titled Nothing but the Truth.)

Five years later, in 1961, Stewart scored again with Password, a word-association guessing game. The show, the first game to pair celebrities and civilian contestants, became the top-rated program on daytime TV and popularized the concept of an end-game bonus round (the popular "Lightning Round") for additional money. (In June 2008, CBS and FremantleMedia revived the game in an updated big-money format titled Million Dollar Password based on the Lightning Round as well as Stewart's Pyramid game formats. His son, Sande Stewart, served as a creative consultant.)

Stewart was one of a coterie of Goodson staff producers who came up with ideas for game shows and segments. Producers such as Stewart, Frank Wayne, Chester Feldman, and Gil Fates earned Goodson's respect not only for their concepts but for their skill in executing them.

Bob Stewart Productions

Before Price's cancellation in 1965 (the current CBS version did not premiere until 1972), Stewart left Goodson-Todman to set out on his own in 1964 and formed Bob Stewart Productions the same year. His first network game as an independent producer, the memory game Eye Guess, aired on NBC daytime from January 3, 1966 to September 26, 1969, and featured close friend Bill Cullen, who emceed Price, as host.

Stewart's next entry, the CBS primetime celebrity game show The Face Is Familiar with host Jack Whitaker, ran from May 7 to September 3, 1966. Another Stewart celebrity game, Personality (hosted by Larry Blyden), aired on NBC from 1967-1969. Completing the decade for the packager was the short-lived You're Putting Me On, hosted first by Bill Leyden and later by Blyden, which ran from September-December 1969.

Other than Eye Guess, Stewart's other moderate early success was Three on a Match, hosted by Cullen, which aired on NBC from August 2, 1971 to June 28, 1974.

Stewart's biggest success with his own production company along with its pet name Basada, Inc. (named after his sons Barry, Sande, and David), and one of TV's most honored and popular game shows, was Pyramid, hosted by Dick Clark, which, like Password, was a word-association game. Its March 26, 1973 premiere on CBS marked the first time a quiz show mounted a five-figure or higher possible cash payoff since the short-lived 100 Grand in September 1963.

Pyramid's network run would span 15 years, off and on, with escalating dollar amounts in the title reflecting raises in the payoff amount over the years. It has proven to be one of the most enduring game shows, airing almost continuously between first-run network/syndicated airings and cable reruns since 1982, when the second CBS version began. Its nine Emmy awards for best game show rank it second to the current Alex Trebek version of Jeopardy!, which has 11.

The network version of Pyramid (hosted by Clark) ran from 1973-1980 (moving to ABC for its final six years, after CBS cancelled it during a ratings panic in March 1974) and from 1982-1988 on CBS (with a three-month break from January-April 1988 for Blackout). It was also popular in syndication, running once a week on weeknights in many markets from 1974-1979 (with Bill Cullen as emcee), daily from January-September 1981 (the tournament-format $50,000 version, Clark emceed this version), daily from 1985-1988 (hosted by Clark and running concurrently with the CBS version), and again from January 7 to December 6, 1991 (with John Davidson). The latter two sported potential cash payoffs of $100,000, which champion contestants could qualify to play for monthly.

Another version of Pyramid, not packaged by Stewart but by Sony, which possesses the rights to most of the shows he created, aired in syndication from 2002-2004 hosted by Donny Osmond.

Pyramid nearly led to Stewart's one significant foray outside the world of TV games. Occasional panelist David Letterman, who appeared on the ABC version from 1978 onward (alternately amusing and annoying Clark) and emceed a game show pilot The Riddlers for Stewart, actually hired him to produce the daytime NBC show Letterman would host in 1980. However, due to creative disagreements, Stewart left the staff four days before the show's premiere.

Bob Stewart Productions was the last major game show production company to relocate from New York to Los Angeles, with its first show there in full-time production being The Love Experts for syndication. This had occurred by Fall 1978, but Pyramid actually continued first-run production in New York until its last $50,000 tapings in Spring 1981. As an odd incident of programming irony, during the first half of 1980 the company's New York-based Pyramid on ABC was competing in the same 12:00 Noon (Eastern) time slot against its Los Angeles-based Chain Reaction on NBC.

By 1982, almost all of the Bob Stewart games were originating exclusively from Hollywood. The exception was that the updated versions of Jackpot! and Chain Reaction that were produced for the USA Network on cable during the mid-1980s were videotaped in the Canadian cities of Toronto and Montreal, respectively. The updated version of "Jackpot!" was co-produced with the Canadian television network Global. Stewart, a native New Yorker, had resisted the move because he appreciated the intelligence and energy contestants from the Big Apple brought to Pyramid, as well to his other shows. Luckily for Stewart, the show's energetic format was familiar enough to potential contestants nationwide that it endured through the 1980s and beyond.

Other game shows from Bob Stewart Productions (mostly employing a word or puzzle format) included Jackpot! (1974-75), Winning Streak (1974-75), Blankety Blanks (1975), Shoot for the Stars (1977), Pass the Buck (1978), Chain Reaction (1980), Go (1983-84), and Double Talk (1986).

Jackpot! and Chain Reaction were moderate successes for Stewart in their 1980s runs on USA Network (1985-88 and 1986-91, respectively) after having relatively brief runs on NBC. A revived Chain hosted by Dylan Lane and produced in New York by Michael Davies ran on GSN for two brief seasons.

Retirement

In the mid 1980s, Bob Stewart began winding down his career, and his son, Sande, gradually took over operations, with all shows after 1987 being known under Bob Stewart & Sande Stewart Productions. In 1990, the company was renamed Stewart Tele Enterprises. Bob Stewart would fully retire in 1992 after the second run of The $100,000 Pyramid was cancelled, with Sande taking over full operations. Sande later produced some game shows on his own, including Your Number's Up, which went up against the elder Bob Stewart's Pyramid, Remember This?, Sports on Tap, Inquizition, Hollywood Showdown, Missouri Lottery Fun & Fortune, and Powerball Instant Millionaire.

Stewart Tele Enterprises was sold to Sony Pictures Entertainment in 1994, and many of Bob Stewart's creations air frequently on GSN. Bob Stewart himself has participated in panels and special events related to quiz shows, including the annual Game Show Congress gatherings in the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

While Bob Stewart has not been an active producer since 1992, he serves as a Creative Consultant in his son's new production company, Stewart Television, and is listed on the official website as Stewart Television's founder.

Up until 2006, Bob Stewart held a record for the most Daytime Emmy Awards in game show production. The record was broken by Harry Friedman, who serves as Executive Producer of Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!.

In 2009 Bob was inducted into the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame for his contributions to television and its evolution.

Bob Stewart shows

• Eye Guess (1966-1969, NBC)
• The Face Is Familiar (1966, CBS prime time)
• Personality (1967-1969, NBC)
• You're Putting Me On (1969, NBC)
• Three on a Match (1971-1974, NBC)
• Pyramid

The $10,000 Pyramid (1973-1974, CBS; 1974-1976, ABC)

The $20,000 Pyramid (1976-1980, ABC)

The $25,000 Pyramid (1974-1979, weekly syndication)

The $50,000 Pyramid (1981, daily syndication)

The (New) $25,000 Pyramid (1982-1988, CBS)

The $100,000 Pyramid (1985-1988, daily syndication)

The $100,000 Pyramid (1991, daily syndication)

• Jackpot!

1974-1975, NBC

1985-1988, USA Network

1989-1990, daily syndication

• Winning Streak (1974-1975, NBC)
• Blankety Blanks (1975, ABC)
• Pass the Buck (1978, CBS daytime)
• The Love Experts (1978-1979, daily syndication)
• Chain Reaction (1980, NBC daytime, 1986-1991 USA Network)
• Double Talk (1986, ABC; revival of Shoot for the Stars)

External links

• Official Stewart Television Website
• Bob Stewart at the Internet Movie Database
• Bob Stewart Interview