No, I am not making this up.
I was looking up something entirely unrelated on YouTube when it suggested this to me. Which kind of startled me.
You know, I was ragging on current TV the other day, when I encountered a new twist on the unfortunately familiar realm of Reality TV:
Just ran across something called “Exatlón Estados Unidos” on Telemundo. So I can tell you that not only English-speaking people have lost their minds. I’m kinda worried about humanity in general now…
— Brad Warthen (@BradWarthen) February 25, 2021
In case you don’t know what that is, count yourself blessed. But I was referring to this. It’s the collision of two national obsessions: Reality TV and sports. In other words, it’s a fake sport, being treated as “reality.”
But this thing I encountered today reminds me that once upon a time, game shows were occasionally interesting. And when I say “once upon a time,” I see that this installment originally aired exactly 15 days after I was born — and before most of y’all came along. So I remember “What’s My Line?,” but not this episode.
Of course, even though the host answered the panel’s first few questions — since panelist would easily have recognized the contestant’s voice — Dorothy Kilgallen figured out who it was fairly quickly.
Wow. I wonder how this appearance came about. Eleanor Roosevelt as a game show contestant? This is weirder than Bill Clinton playing the sax on Arsenio’s show…
Dorothy Kilgallen
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Brad, just google famous guests on What’s My Line and you will find dozens of interesting appearances by people long departed this earth. Same with To Tell The Truth and other long gone shows.
Search on Youtube as well.
To Tell the Truth is airing currently pretty much in the original format. The set has a modern look but otherwise very similar to the 60s version.
Thoughts keep popping into my mind. Dorothy Kilgallen was actually a journalist with an interesting life history. She even delved into the JFK assassination and, of course, there are conspiracy theories about her death in 1965.
Hey, back in those days, you actually had to be SOMEBODY to have a conspiracy theory about you.
Nowadays, they’re handed out more generally…