Barris sold his production company for a reported $100 million and moved to France. The Gong Show was canceled in 1980, and a film version that year was a flop.
Barris filled 27 hours of programming a week at the peak of his career. He was a steelworker and salesman before joining NBC as a page. Barris graduated in 1953 from Philadelphia's Drexel University. His father, a dentist, died when his son was young.Īfter attending several colleges, Mr. They just want to have some fun."Ĭharles Hirsch Barris was born June 3, 1929, in Philadelphia. "These people don't take participating on a game show as seriously as you think they do, Mike. "The contestants on our shows come because they have a good time," Mr. Barris on 60 Minutes, asking how he could bring people on television only to embarrass them. The Gong Show became a huge hit in the late 1970s, especially among young people. Barris' manic hosting style, the show was known for the awkward gyrations of Gene Gene the Dancing Machine and the groan-inducing jokes of the Unknown Comic, who wore a paper bag over his head. Because the word "sex" could not be used on television at the time, host Bob Eubanks often asked questions about "making whoopee," which led to giggles, embarrassing comments and millions of viewers.īesides Mr. Barris launched a second show, The Newlywed Game, with four recently married couples who answered comical and intimate questions about their partners. Contestants were told that it was an FBI agent who was there to arrest anyone who cursed or said anything salacious. Barris hired a tough-looking actor to stand just offstage. The show became a hit.Īfter some responses in the show's early tapings became too explicit to run on the air, Mr. It was considered crass, demeaning and sexually suggestive - which it was, by design. When The Dating Game premiered on ABC in December 1965 ("from Hollywood, the dating capital of the world"), critics called it a new low in television. (Occasionally, a man asked questions of three women.) She then selected one of the men to accompany her on a date. Barris was out of work and had run through his record royalties.īorrowing money from his family, he formed a production company that introduced a game show in which a young "bachelorette" questioned three young men hidden behind a wall. 3 on the Billboard pop charts in 1962 for singer Freddy "Boom Boom" Cannon. He wrote a song, Palisades Park, that reached No. He moved to Los Angeles in the early 1960s to be in charge of daytime programming for ABC-TV. One involved monitoring American Bandstand host Dick Clark to make sure he was not taking payola from record companies. He held several jobs in television early in his career.
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