''Punchlines'' was a

comedy Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term o ...

panel game A panel show or panel game is a radio broadcasting, radio or television game show in which a panel of celebrities participates. Celebrity panelists may compete with each other, such as on ''The News Quiz''; facilitate play by non-celebrity conte ...

show that aired on

ITV ITV or iTV may refer to: ITV *Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of: ** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...

from 3 January 1981 to 22 December 1984 and was hosted by

Lennie Bennett Michael Berry (26 September 1938 – 8 April 2009), known professionally as Lennie Bennett, was an English comedian and game show host. After attending the Palatine Secondary School in Blackpool, Bennett became a journalist for the '' West Lanc ...

. The show itself was based on a failed 1979 American game show pilot of the same name hosted by

Bill Cullen William Lawrence Francis Cullen (February 18, 1920 – July 7, 1990) was an American radio and television personality whose career spanned five decades. His biggest claim to fame was as a game show host; over the course of his career, he host ...

, which in turn, was an attempted reboot of another American game show from 1966-69 called ''

Eye Guess ''Eye Guess'' was an American game show created by Bob Stewart and hosted by Bill Cullen, which aired on NBC from January 3, 1966, to September 26, 1969. The game combined a general knowledge quiz with a ''Concentration''-style memory element, w ...

''.

Format

Main Game

Each week, teams of a celebrity guest and a member of the public had to match the punchlines which were given by 8 other guests who were seated in ''

Celebrity Squares ''Celebrity Squares'' is a British comedy game show based on the American comedy game show ''The Hollywood Squares, Hollywood Squares''. It first ran from 20 July 1975 to 7 July 1979 and was hosted by Bob Monkhouse, then—also hosted by Mon ...

'' style boxes to the questions that were asked by the host, and the first team to reach 150 points won the chance to win a major prize, while the losing contestant left with a Lennie Bennett doll in the first two series, then from series three onwards, they left with a case of champagne and some glasses. At the beginning of each show, they would all look into the camera one at a time and introduce themselves. From the third series onwards, the Punchliners consisted of a mixture of the original Punchliners and more well known celebrities. The original Punchliners included

Rose-Marie ''Rose-Marie'' is an operetta-style musical with music by Rudolf Friml and Herbert Stothart, and book and lyrics by Otto Harbach and Oscar Hammerstein II. The story is set in the Canadian Rocky Mountains and concerns Rose-Marie La Flemme, a Fren ...

, Fogwell Flax, Bryan Joan Elliott, Aiden J. Harvey, Judy Gridley, Patti Gold and, making his first regular TV appearance,

Matthew Kelly Matthew Kelly (born David Allan Kelly, 9 May 1950) is an English actor and presenter. Having been trained as a theatre actor, he first came to public prominence as a television presenter of ITV light entertainment shows such as '' Game for a ...

Bonus Round

In the final, round the winning contestant had to match seven of the eight punchlines correctly to win the star prize but if they failed to do so, they went away with the prize that corresponded to how many correct punchlines they had matched.

Australian version

A pilot for an Australian adaptation of the show, hosted by

Jeremy Kewley Jeremy Leo Kewley (born 16 August 1960) is an Australian actor, writer, producer and convicted child sex offender. He made his professional acting debut as an adolescent in the feature film '' The Devil's Playground'' (1976). Early life Kew ...

was made for the

Seven Network The Seven Network (commonly known as Channel Seven or simply Seven) is a major Australian commercial free-to-air Television broadcasting in Australia, television network. It is owned by Seven West Media, Seven West Media Limited, and is one of ...

in 1986. However, it never made it to air since then.

Transmissions

Series

Specials

References

External links

* *{{UKGameshow, Punchlines 1980s British comedy television series 1981 British television series debuts 1984 British television series endings 1980s British game shows ITV comedy Television series by ITV Studios London Weekend Television shows