QD: The Master Game
The usual disclaimer:
This page has nothing to do
with Noel Gay Productions or Channel 4.
Over the years there have been many varieties of quiz
show, from the intellectual (such as
Call My Bluff)
to the unashamedly populist
Play Your Cards Right.
QD: The Master Game was fundamentally similar to
shows such as the mid-1980s TVS-produced
Ultra Quiz,
though it also had an affinity with the more intellectual
shows. To briefly summarise - over five half-hour
programmes (shown Monday to Friday on Channel 4 in 1991) an
initially large number of contestants take part in a series
of intellectual challenges; the number of contestants are
reduced through elimination to a more manageable number for
the final stages.
So what exactly did QD stand for, apart from yet
another quiz game? An ongoing competition that took place
during the five days when QD was shown was for viewers to
guess what QD stood for, with the answer being revealed on
Friday. To guess this one required knowledge of Latin
and/or access to a Latin dictionary, since QD was an
abbreviation for the Latin 'quinque dies' (or five days) -
though if QD had reminded you of the famous abbreviation
QED (quod erat demonstratum) you were probably half way
there! This illustrates clearly that QD was not going to be
just another ordinary quiz show.
The presenters were the experienced Tim Brooke-Taylor
(who was one of the Goodies - a popular BBC comedy show of
the 1970s) and Lisa Aziz, who was the daughter of Khalid
Aziz (he was a presenter who had worked for TVS, the ITV
company who also coincidentally produced Ultra
Quiz).
The studio set was fairly elaborate and must have
cost quite a lot of time and money to construct (the show's
producers must have been confident of QD being commissioned
as a full series). This view of the studio gantry shows the
large signs showing the days of the week: the appropriate
one being lowered into view. The show also used video
effects heavily, with captions spinning into view and an
elaborate title sequence (which unfortunately we don't have
in its full form).
By Friday (the show from which all of these pictures
were taken) the number of contestants had been reduced to
six, and all of them remained 'in play' in order to decide
which person was to receive the £5000 prize.
The person with the highest score at the start of
Friday's play (Tony Hodgson) was rarely troubled during the
show and went on to win the final prize, though the prize
for the contestant who was the most popular with the studio
audience had to go to Wilba Luff, who was extrovert yet
likeable (Wilba incidentally is a nickname for William).
Simply mentioning his name provoked cheers and yelps from
the audience!
Fingers on buzzers! The challenges were a mixture of
practical tests (see below) and general knowledge/memory
tests; one which featured in Friday's show was that the
contestants had to try to memorise the contents of a book
full of abbreviations - they were then tested on how much
of the book they had actually remembered, though in this
case some of the questions could be answered if you had
good general knowledge skills. An example question: What
does IMF stand for? (Answer: International Monetary
Fund.)
One of the ongoing challenges during the week was for
the contestants to design a graphic logo which incorporated
QD and the European flag symbol. No prizes for guessing who
won this round...the others didn't stand much of a
chance!
There must be at least six video copies of QD in
existence, since the 'losers' (and I'm assuming Tony
Hodgson as well) received a video cassette of the entire
week's programmes. The runners-up also each received this
neat-looking 10" television/video combination to play it
on. Tony (to win the £5000) then had to answer 30 questions
(based on all that he had done during the five days) in
three minutes, which he did - but only just.
Tony Hodgson (centre) received his cheque for £5000
at the end - he was asked how he would spend the money. He
replied that he would possibly buy a computer for
educational purposes for his family (sensible chap that he
is). We've worked out that at the time his options would
have been either a 66 MHz 486 DX/2 PC or Apple Mac Quadra
900 4/160 (the latter leaving no change from £4095, and
little change for extras such as a single-speed CD-ROM).
Overall the general feeling was that both the contestants,
the studio audience, and (hopefully) the viewers had
enjoyed these five days in 1991.
Despite the enthusiasm shown for the pilot, Channel 4
did not commission a full series; the official reason given
(according to Tim Brooke-Taylor) was that it would have
cost too much. Unofficially its demise may have been down
to simply the fact that the relevant commissioning editor
wasn't too keen on the idea in the first place - it was
Bill Cotton who came up with the idea, and his friend
Michael Grade just happened to be head of Channel 4 ! Tim
also said that "I loved the scary week and cannot speak
highly enough of the contestants and the production team. I
also have a copy and am proud of the whole thing. But don't
ask me about commisioning editors."
We would like to say thank you
to Tim Brooke-Taylor who gave us some invaluable
information concerning QD, though we would still like to
hear from anyone else who was involved in the making of
QD: The Master Game; it doesn't matter whether you
were a contestant, a cameraman, or even just a member of
the studio audience. Email HTW with your experience and
help us fill in the gaps.
