Who's Whose
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''Who's Whose'' is a panel quiz television game show that ran on the
Columbia Broadcasting System CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...
(CBS) television network. It premiered as a
TV series A television show, TV program (), or simply a TV show, is the general reference to any content produced for viewing on a television set that is broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, and cable, or distributed digitally on streaming platf ...
on June 25, 1951, and is noted for being one of the first television series to be dropped after one episode.


Host and panelists

''Who's Whose'' was hosted by long-time comedian and radio game show host Phil Baker. His on-air assistant was a man in a turban, dubbed "Gunga". The three regular celebrity panelists for the show were Robin Chandler, Art Ford, and Basil Davenport. They were joined by guest celebrity panelist Emily Kimbrough. The show was broadcast
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and a
kinescope Kinescope , shortened to kine , also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program on motion picture film directly through a lens focused on the screen of a video monitor. The process was pioneered during the 1940s ...
was produced for stations that aired it on a delayed basis.


Game play

A round began with the "panel of experts" facing a group of either three men or three women. Through questioning, the panel tried to determine which of the three was the spouse of the person sitting with Phil Baker. In an additional separate round, the panel attempted to pick out the spouse of a noted celebrity.


Background

''Who's Whose'' was brought in to replace '' The Goldbergs'', which was dropped by its sponsor (
General Foods General Foods Corporation was a company whose direct predecessor was established in the United States by C. W. Post, Charles William (C. W.) Post as the Postum Cereal Company in 1895. The company changed its name to "General Foods" in 1929, a ...
) when its creator
Gertrude Berg Gertrude Berg (born Tillie Edelstein; October 3, 1899 – September 14, 1966) was an American actress, screenwriter, and producer. A pioneer of classic old-time radio, radio, she was one of the first women to create, write, produce, and star in a ...
refused to fire the
blacklist Blacklisting is the action of a group or authority compiling a blacklist of people, countries or other entities to be avoided or distrusted as being deemed unacceptable to those making the list; if people are on a blacklist, then they are considere ...
ed actor Philip Loeb. The last episode of ''The Goldbergs'' ran on June 18, 1951. The official explanation given by the sponsor for dropping the show was that it was for "economy reasons". ''Who's Whose'' was slated to run in ''The Goldbergs old
timeslot Broadcast programming is the practice of organizing or ordering (scheduling) of broadcast media shows, typically radio and television, in a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or season-long schedule. Modern broadcasters use broadcast automatio ...
during the summer and then be replaced in the fall.


Audition show (pilot)

The concept for ''Who's Whose'' was tested in May 1951. An audition show (nowadays known as a
pilot An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its Aircraft flight control system, directional flight controls. Some other aircrew, aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are al ...
) was produced, but it was created in a unique, cost-saving way. The sound from the test program was recorded on
audiotape Audiotape is magnetic tape used for storing audio. Information stored can be in the form of either an analog or digital signal. Audiotape can be used in various tape recorders including machines for reel-to-reel audio tape recording on open reels ...
in a radio studio, while the visuals were recorded by taking a series of
still camera A camera is an instrument used to capture and store images and videos, either digitally via an electronic image sensor, or chemically via a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. As a pivotal technology in the fields of photograp ...
photograph A photograph (also known as a photo, or more generically referred to as an ''image'' or ''picture'') is an image created by light falling on a photosensitivity, photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor. Th ...
s of the proceedings. The show's concept was then demonstrated by playing back the audio while flipping through the still photos. This technique was dubbed a " two-bit
kine Kine or KINE may refer to: Radio and TV stations * KINE-FM, a radio station (105.1 FM) licensed to Honolulu, Hawaii, United States * KINE (AM), a radio station (1330 AM) licensed to Kingsville, Texas, United States * KINE-LP, a defunct low-po ...
". After the show was sold to CBS, a standard kinescope was produced to further develop the concept of the show.


Packaging and sponsorship

''Who's Whose'' was brought into existence as a "package" deal by the
advertising agency An advertising agency, often referred to as a creative agency or an ad agency, is a business dedicated to creating, planning, and handling advertising and sometimes other forms of promotion and marketing for its clients. An ad agency is generall ...
Young & Rubicam VMLY&R was an American marketing and Marketing communications, communications company specializing in advertising, Digital media, digital and social media, sales promotion, direct marketing and brand identity consulting, formed from the 2020 mer ...
(Y&R). Packaging was the common practice dating back to the days of network radio, whereby an outside entity such as an advertising agency would assemble the various production elements, including a
commercial sponsor Sponsoring something (or someone) is the act of supporting an event, activity, person, or organization financially or through the provision of products or services. The individual or group that provides the support, similar to a benefactor, is k ...
, which are needed to bring about a show. The proposed show would then be presented to a network as a "complete package". (The similar concept of
movie packaging In film industry terminology, movie packaging or film packaging is a type of product bundling in which a top-level talent agency starts up a film or television project using writers, directors and/or actors it represents, before giving other a ...
is still fairly common.) Actual production of the show was handled by independent packager Lester Lewis. General Foods picked up sponsorship of the show in order to advertise its
Sanka Sanka is a brand of instant decaffeinated coffee, sold around the world, and was one of the earliest decaffeinated varieties. Sanka is distributed in the United States by Kraft Heinz. History Decaffeinated coffee was developed in 1903 (see Dec ...
coffee brand, which it was already selling on ''The Goldbergs''. General Foods was able to place the show in the same timeslot as ''The Goldbergs'' because it basically "controlled" the timeslot in which the show ran, namely Mondays from 9:30 to 10:00 pm
Eastern Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, and the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico. * Eastern Standard Time (EST) is five hours behi ...
on CBS-TV. This was also a common practice which also dated back to the days of network radio, where a single sponsor would pay the full costs for a certain timeslot and thus be given a great deal of leeway in determining what ran during that period. Today, rising commercial rates have made this practice usually too expensive for any one sponsor to afford (in any event, regulations following the
1950s quiz show scandals The 1950s quiz show scandals were a series of scandals involving the producers and contestants of several popular American television quiz shows. These shows' producers secretly gave assistance to certain contestants in order to prearrange the ...
discouraged networks from ceding that much power to advertisers).


Critical response, cancellation and aftermath

The reaction to the ''Who's Whose'' was decidedly negative; it was lambasted by critics as the worst television show produced to date. It was described at the time as "one of the most poorly produced TV shows yet to hit our living room screen" and "a miserable flop". Rex Lardner, columnist for ''
The New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...
'', wrote that the show was "the worst ever to hit television" and called for the return of ''The Goldbergs''. Reviews reported that the program was lacking in production, that the four panelists played the game poorly, and emcee Phil Baker was uncomfortable and clumsy. Not only did the panelists fail to correctly identify the wife of the famous celebrity, baseball player
Dizzy Dean Jay Hanna "Dizzy" Dean (January 16, 1910 – July 17, 1974), also known as Jerome Herman Dean (both the 1910 and the 1920 Censuses show his name as "Jay"), was an American professional baseball pitcher. During his Major League Baseball (MLB) ca ...
, but Dizzy Dean himself caused additional consternation for the staff when he disappeared while backstage awaiting his appearance. Fortunately they discovered that he had wandered off with an employee to listen to a Yankees-
Dodgers The Los Angeles Dodgers are an American professional baseball team based in Los Angeles. The Dodgers compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) West Division. Founded in 1883 in Brooklyn, New York, the ...
baseball game on the radio. Just days after its premiere the series was canceled and replaced by a new panel quiz series, ''
It's News to Me English auxiliary verbs are a small set of English verbs, which include the English modal auxiliary verbs and a few others. Although the auxiliary verbs of English are widely believed to lack inherent semantic meaning and instead to modify the ...
'', with General Foods (and Sanka) remaining as the sponsor in the timeslot. Phil Baker, who had signed a contract to receive $1000 a week, was paid off to conclude the contract. Young & Rubicam's long-term reputation for successfully "packaging" shows was damaged by the ''Who's Whose'' debacle. This failure, along with a number of other recent disappointments and failures, was followed by reports in August that the agency was likely getting out of the business of packaging radio and television shows, and that high-ranking people would be leaving the agency.


References

{{Reflist American panel games 1950s American game shows 1951 American television series debuts 1951 American television series endings CBS game shows Television series by CBS Studios Television series canceled after one episode