woman with mouth open and hands on sides of head behind podium that says car; man in front of podium pointing at it; blue, yellow and red circles with question marks surround them

Illustration: MOA Staff (Source: CBS via Getty Images)

Are You a TV Game Shows Quiz Whiz?

Test your knowledge of ‘Jeopardy!,’ ‘Family Feud’ and more

Jayme Deerwester,

AARP

Published March 30, 2023

11 Questions

Back in the day, staying home sick from school often meant self-medicating with a marathon of TV game shows. Press your luck with our quiz about long-running favorites like The Price Is Right and Jeopardy! as well as shorter-lived gems like Win Ben Stein’s Money, and see if you can come away a winner.

Are You a TV Game Shows Quiz Whiz?

[ {
 "question" : "Who hosted “The Newlywed Game?”\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "Bob Eubanks",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "Jack Barry",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Hal March",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Monty Hall",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "From 1966 to 1974, Bob Eubanks was the man who tested couples to see how well they knew each other. The daytime game show premiered in black and white in 1966, but production switched to color videotape later that year. And at the time, “whoopie” was reportedly the most risqué word ABC would let Eubanks use when referring to sex.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "To win “Hollywood Squares,” contestants needed to know how to play this children’s game:\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "Four Square",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Tic-Tac-Toe",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "Hangman",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Connect Four",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "Contestants, who were designated either an X or an O, had to agree with the answer given by the celebrities occupying three squares in a row to win. The grid was the same as for tic-tac-toe, the game that taught the supercomputer in the 1983 movie “WarGames” that to avoid a global nuclear war, the only winning move was to not play.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "How much does it cost to buy a vowel on “Wheel of Fortune?”\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "Nothing",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "$50",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "$250",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "$500",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "The price of buying a vowel in order to solve a puzzle is one of the few items that hasn’t increased with inflation over the past 40 years. It has always cost $250.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "Who was the original host of “Family Feud”?\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "Richard Dawson",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "Alex Trebek",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Steve Harvey",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Bob Barker",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "After serving as a regular panelist on “Match Game,” Dawson came up with the idea for “Family Feud,” which was produced by Mark Goodson. He hosted the show from 1976 to 1985, and in 1978 won an Emmy for outstanding host or hostess in a game or audience participation show. He even met his second wife, Gretchen Johnson, when she was a contestant on the show in 1981.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "What cause did Bob Barker always promote when he signed off at the end of “The Price Is Right?”\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "Recycling",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Spaying and neutering pets",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "Feeding the homeless",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Helping veterans",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "Barker credited his wife, Dorothy Jo Gideon, with opening his eyes to animal rights issues. As he became more aware of the exploitation of animals, Barker told the Television Academy, “I just felt compelled to do what I could to change the situation. And that’s what I’ve been doing.”\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "This “Jeopardy!” contestant holds the record for the most consecutive game wins:\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "James Holzhauer",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Ken Jennings",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "Brad Rutter",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Amy Schneider",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "Jennings’ winning streak of 74 regular season games, set in 2004, remains untouched nearly 20 years later. He also has the highest overall prize total, with $2.5 million. James Holzhauer is second, with $2.4 million, but he has the record for the most money won in a single episode: $131,127. Brad Rutter has the most all-time wins, including tournaments. Schneider has the second-most wins of all time and amassed nearly $1.4 million in winnings.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "On which game show could you hear contestants chanting, “No Whammy, no Whammy, stop!”\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "“Supermarket Sweep”",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "“The Gong Show”",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "“Press Your Luck”",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "“The Joker’s Wild”",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "On “Press Your Luck,” contestants would smash a button to stop the cursor from moving around the game board, which was littered with various sums of money along with the “Whammy,” an animated character that would erase all their gains.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "True or false: If the judges struck the gong for you on “The Gong Show,” it meant they thought you were really good:\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "True",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "False",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "Long before Simon Cowell stopped “American Idol” auditioners midsong or hit his “X” button to dash dreams on “America’s Got Talent,” the gong was the go-to method for stopping dubious displays of talent.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "What color was the slime on Nickelodeon’s “Double Dare?”\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "Blue",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Green",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "Pink",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "Yellow",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "If contestants dared respond “I don’t know” when host Marc Summers asked them a question, they would soon be covered in neon-green slime. The recipe changed over the years: It started out as green Jell-O, then switched to a mixture of oatmeal, baby shampoo, green food coloring and water, and later, cottage cheese and food coloring.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "The 1994 movie “Quiz Show” focused on the rigging of this game show, which resulted in a congressional investigation:\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "“Jeopardy”",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "“Twenty-One”",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "“Cash Cab”",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 }, {
 "answer" : "“The Price Is Right”",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "Robert Redford’s 1994 movie focused on the scandal that resulted from “Twenty-One” producers providing answers to favored contestants ahead of each taping, then making them take a dive when it was time for some fresh blood. The film focused on two real contestants, Charles Van Doren (Ralph Fiennes) and Herb Stempel (John Turturro), who blew the whistle on the whole thing.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
}, {
 "question" : "True or false: Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel got his big break hosting “Win Ben Stein’s Money”?\n",
 "answers" : [ {
 "answer" : "True",
 "correctAnswer" : true
 }, {
 "answer" : "False",
 "correctAnswer" : false
 } ],
 "multiSelect" : false,
 "explanation" : "From 1997 to 2002, long before he ascended to late-night TV fame, Kimmel hosted “Win Ben Stein’s Money” with the Nixon speechwriter-turned-”Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” star on Comedy Central.\n",
 "hint" : "",
 "hintLink" : "",
 "questionImgCaption" : "",
 "questionImgCredit" : ""
} ]

Quiz Progress

0 Correct

0 Incorrect

get help and give help through AARP Community Connections

Caption for quiz image

Credit for quiz image

NEED A HINT?

CLOSE HINT

CORRECT

INCORRECT

Answer:

Are You a TV Game Shows Quiz Whiz?

0 Correct

0 Incorrect

Score:

Oops...something went wrong. Please log out and log back in to continue.

Jayme Deerwester is an editor and writer with two decades of experience at USA TODAY, where she covered entertainment, travel, personal finance and technology. When not in front of a computer, she can be found rowing, kayaking or playing with her dog.