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Bob’s Full House

LORD MONKHOUSE’s finest hour, aka How To Design The Perfect Game Show. This one had it all. On would come Bob in a smart suit with some nifty gags and instant catchphrasery: “In bingo lingo it’s clickety-clicks, time to take your pick of the six!” Contestants arranged in novel four-booth system, reminiscent of PUNCHLINES. Booths fronted with bingo card, with game split into three rounds – light corners, light middle line and light whole card by answering questions. Winner of each round gets to choose wonderful/tacky prize from array revealed by rotating cylindrical screen (always a His ‘n’ Hers bathgown set on offer). Last round was pacey, quickfire stuff, with regular updates on progress from the Monk (“Dave NEEEEDS three…Sharon, you NEEEEEED seven…”). Central to the show was that most 80s of devices – the rotating structure (see BLANKETY BLANK, BULLSEYE). Here we had a three-sided construction, with the Monkhouse Mastercard, Golden Card Game and Bob’s Full House logo on each side. Golden Card Game oozed excitement with the holiday destination was gradually revealed letter by letter (“Let’s hope it’s not Bognor!”) Plus ever-present danger of being “wallied” if you got a question wrong. Everything you’d ever want from a game show and the perfect shopwindow for Bob’s genius. Fact.

9 Comments

9 Comments

  1. Chris O

    March 13, 2010 at 9:57 pm

    Without a shadow of doubt the finest game show I can ever recall seeing on British TV. You could tell by watching it he was in complete control of the way the show ebbed and flowed, rattling off gags both scripted and unscripted in a way no-one else could to the benefit of everyone watching. He was slick, funny, professional and unbeatable on that show. An absolute classic.

  2. gareth jones

    March 26, 2010 at 8:30 am

    the best show bob ever did by a country mile.as a youngster i used to be so impressed at how he managed to rattle off the questions at the end.i also loved when he helped contestants on the final game to win the prize.if the bbc get bored of showing repeats of allo allo could they please show some repeats of this even if its just at xmas.this is the stuff they should bring out on dvd.

  3. THX Kling Klang

    July 7, 2012 at 2:00 pm

    Right, this has been pointed out to me recently. Bob would say “In bingo lingo it’s clickety-clicks, time to take your pick of the six!” But he’s in error. Clickety-clicks is bingo lingo for sixty-six, not six. This has ruined the programme for me retrospectively. Not really, it was still great.

  4. Richard Davies

    October 15, 2012 at 8:55 pm

    Plenty of memories of watching this, trying to puzzle out the holiday destination from just a few letters was always a challenge.

    An interesting touch in the earlier editions was using the LED score board to display the end credits.

  5. Glenn A

    October 27, 2012 at 5:33 pm

    Does anyone remember Bob’s very successful revival of Opportunity Knocks? It seemed to work well as we knew off screen he was a decent guy, unlike Hughie Green.

  6. Chris Diamond

    November 28, 2012 at 7:39 pm

    I’d like to point out how shoddy the carpet on set is.

  7. L Boakes

    January 6, 2013 at 9:44 am

    Don’t suppose anyone has got a recording of the 1989 Christmas Special – the last show they ever made, apart from the Celebrity New Year Special?

    I was one of the contestants on that show, but lost my copy of it several years ago and as I no longer live in the UK, I can’t watch / record reruns on satellite tv to replace it.

    I know it’s a long shot, but maybe someone has it…

    Thanks.

  8. David Paul Morgan

    October 27, 2014 at 3:09 pm

    I too have been looking for the Christmas 1989 show. Paul here. just saw L-Boakes comment.
    I will have another look in my boxes and cupboards, but when the S-VHS & VHS recorders in the house broke, a LOT of cassettes just were thrown out 🙁

    I remember having a great chat with Bob and John Junkin – what clever men they both were.
    I spent the Lunn Poly £1000 voucer on myself in the end. I put £250 on top and went on the USA West Coast tour for 14 days in 1990!

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