The Gong Show

1 9 7 6 - 1 9 7 8 (USA)

For real 'scraping the bottom-of-the-barrel' entertainment, you couldn't go past The Gong Show. Debuting in 1976, Chuck Barris introduced The Unknown Comic, the flounder dance, and (in the process) greatly influenced modern day performance art with this cool spoof of the amateur talent show.  

Celebrities would judge contestants, and after pretending to restrain themselves would give a really bad act 'the Gong'. 

After an intial pilot with Gary Owens as host and Arte Johnson, Joanne Worley, Richard Dawson and Adrienne Barbeau as judges, Barris managed to sell both a daytime and a night time version. The show premiered on NBC's daytime schedule in June 1976 and the syndicated evening version showed up in the fall. Barris hosted in the daytime, replacing Owens as host of the evening show after its first year.

The show would always throw in one or two people who actually were talented - someone had to win a prize, after all. The top scorer of the day won the grand prize of $516.32. But  generally it was the epitome of bad TV. 

By the time The Gong Show ceased production in 1980, such noted B-list personalities as Jamie Farr, David Letterman, Rex Reed, Steve Garvey Pat Harrington, and Scatman Crothers were given command of the gong. As a result of the popularity of the  show, lots of schools and camps (and Australian 'variety' shows - not naming any names, Daryl) pinched the idea and held their own gong-style talent shows. Spin-offs included The $1.98 Beauty Contest and The Gong Show Movie. 

TRIVIA NOTE
Host/co-producer Chuck Barris was a real renaissance man. Not only was he responsible for those twin pillars of popular culture, The Dating Game and The Newlywed Game, but he also wrote Palisades Park for Freddy Cannon in 1962.