What is “Hollywood Squares”?
A: Hollywood Squares is an American game show.
On the show, two contestants compete in a game of what?
A: tic-tac-toe to win cash and prizes.
The show piloted on NBC in 1965 and the regular series
debuted when?
A: In 1966 on the same network.
The board for the game is a 3 × 3 vertical stack of open-faced cubes, each occupied by who?
A: A celebrity seated at a desk and facing the contestants.
The stars are asked questions by the host and the
contestants judge what?
A: The truth of their answers to gain squares in the right pattern to win
the game.
Though Hollywood Squares was a legitimate game show,
the game largely acted as the background for what?
A: The show's comedy in the form of joke answers often given by the stars
prior to their real answer.
The show's writers usually supplied what?
A: The jokes.
In addition, the stars were given what prior to the
show?
A: The questions' subjects and bluff (plausible, but incorrect) answers.
Host Peter Marshall explained at the beginning of the Secret Square game that the celebrities were briefed prior to the show to help them with bluff answers, but what?
A: They heard the actual questions for the first time as they were asked on air.
Marshall hosted the original version of Hollywood
Squares that aired on NBC from 1966 to 1980, as well as what?
A: A nighttime syndicated version that ran from 1971 to 1981.
It then returned to NBC in 1983 as part of a 60-minute
hybrid series with what?
A: Match Game, featuring Jon Bauman hosting the Hollywood Squares portion of
that show.
Following Marshall's retirement, the show has since
been revived twice in syndication: a version hosted by John Davidson from
1986 to 1989, and another hosted by whom?
A: Tom Bergeron from 1998 to 2004.
In 2013, TV Guide ranked it at what?
A: No. 7 in its list of the 60 greatest game shows ever.
Though there have been variations over the years in the
rules of and the prizes in the game, certain aspects of the game have
remained what?
A: Fairly consistent.
With rare exceptions, the matches were male vs. female
with the male playing what?
A: The X position and referred to informally as Mr. X, with the female
playing the O position and referred to informally as Ms. Circle.
One of the contestants was usually a what?
A: A returning champion.
Taking turns, each contestant selected what?
A: A square.
The star was asked a question and gave an answer, which
was usually preceded by a what?
A: A zinger.
The contestants had the choice of agreeing with the
star's answer or what?
A: Disagreeing if they thought the star was bluffing.
On rare occasions, a star did not know the correct
answer to a question and was unable to come up with what?
A: A plausible bluff.
In such instances, the contestant was offered the
chance to what?
A: To answer the question and earned or lost the square based on how they
answered.
Usually the contestants declined, in which case they
incurred what?
A: No penalty, and the same star was asked another question for that
contestant to agree or disagree.
What was the objective?
A: To complete a line across, vertically, or diagonally or to score as many
squares as possible.
Contestants could also win by doing what?
A: By capturing five squares.
Early in the Marshall run, a player was required to get
enough squares to make it mathematically impossible for what?
A: For the opponent to get three in a row; it is possible to capture as many
as six squares without blocking the opponent from getting a diagonal three
in a row, which did occur in an early episode).
Correctly agreeing or disagreeing with a star's answer
did what?
A: Captured the square.
If the contestant failed to agree or disagree
correctly, the square went to whom?
A: His/her opponent.
During most of its daytime run, NBC broadcast The
Hollywood Squares at what time?
A: 11:30 a.m. Eastern/10:30 a.m. Central.
It dominated the ratings until 1976, when it made the
first of what?
A: Several time slot moves.
When did the daytime show aired its 3,536th and last
episode on what date?
A: June 20, 1980.