Darrin Rose to Host Comedy Network’s “Match Game”; Yvette Nicole Brown and Colin Mochrie Panelists
Match Game, which debuts on October 15th on Comedy Network in Canada, has named Darrin Rose the host. Darrin has appeared in Canadian comedies such as Mr. D, MuchMusic’s Video on Trial, and was a part of the Toronto-based sketch comedy troupe The Sketchersons. “It’s fun to be part of such an iconic game show, if only because my dad is finally interested in my career,” said Rose. “He said ‘the new Gene Rayburn, eh? I guess now I can stop telling my friends you’re a real estate agent.’”
“Darrin’s comic timing, his charisma, and his charm make him the perfect match for MATCH GAME,” said Corrie Coe, Senior Vice-President, Independent Production, Bell Media. “With his outstanding stand-up chops and wide range of on-camera success, Darrin is ready to put his own stamp on this iconic game show.”
Some of the panelists have also been announced. Those people include @yvettenbrown, who is currently doing fantastic on GSN’s The Pyramid; Colin Mochrie who most of you should know as one of the funniest people on the planet from Whose Line is it Anyway; Laura Cilevitz, Graham Chittenden, Sean Cullen, and Debra DiGiovanni among others. If some of those names don’t get you excited for a comedy game show then I don’t know what will. Take a look at a picture Nicole took from the set below. Looks like they’re giving Colin Mochrie the Charles Nelson Reilly seat.
You can also click here and here to see some other photos the celebrities took on Twitter.
This revival will be interesting to see, and it’ll be equally interesting to see what happens to the Match Game format in the United States because of it. It’s well established that Fremantle has been trying to get a successful revival off the ground for decades now, with only a short lived syndicated revival and a few pilots on Fox and GSN to show for it. If Match Game works out on the Comedy Network, you may just see it back in America. Stay tuned and be sure to watch if you can starting October 15th on the Comedy Network.
Source : Bell Media
The bigger lady, with black hair, is Debra DiGiovanni. She’s a stand up comedienne & a regular on the hilarious Video on Trial.
Her twitter is @debradigiovanni
…as is Darrin Rose. Except not the “comedienne” part.
Nemmind. My eye skated right over that part of the intro. Apologies.
Comedy Gold (the network that replaced Canada’s TV Land) has been airing Match Game 73 repeats in anticipation of the new series, with no credit crunching or speed-ups. They had an all-day marathon on Labour Day.
I’d be interested to see what the prizes are going to be. Canadian-produced game shows tend to be cheaper than American ones, so we’ll see how that plays out in terms of the prize money. Still, I can’t believe they only casted for this in Montreal. I would’ve auditioned, if Montreal wasn’t 6 hours away from where I am.
There was an online form to fill out that BuzzerBlog had previously posted a link to. Montreal is pretty far from Thunder Bay, Ontario, where I am. I didn’t get called by anyone, but I’m definitely looking forward to this new version coming up. Hopefully it will do well and Comedy will produce more than the 60 episodes they already have.
This will be interesting to see. I still think that Match Game in the 21st century will be very difficult to pull off, but they do seem to be heading in the right direction with the panelists.
The French-speaking population in Canada seems to have gotten the idea for a couple of years already. We’ll have to wait and see if the English speakers warm up to the idea as well.
Personally, I don’t think it could be pulled off here in the US Mike, as that classic time of the 70′s has come and gone. The reason the 70′s version was (and still is) the most popular version was CHEMISTRY – pure and simple! The stars were aligned just right when Gene Rayburn, Brett Somers, Charles Nelson Reilly, Richard Dawson, Johnny Olson, and the many panelist and semi-regulars populated the show back then, and today, all you’d hear is a bunch of edits, like we did with the horrid 1998 version.
I couldn’t agree with DENo1 more; Gene Rayburn said many times after MG’s cancellation, that “it’s a weak format…” He should know. The only reason it lasted
as long as it did, was on account of a combination of the celebrities, with Gene as “the glue that held it all together.”
The ABC version might have had a better shot, as Ross Shaffer was just about as good a Rayburn surrogate as could be had. THe big mistake was its reliance on its own lackluster “stable of stars” and B-, C-, and even D-list comedians as a crutch, instead of a tool; thus proving “you can’t fake chemistry.”
Also, don’t forget that at that time, the kind of questions put toward the contestants and celebrities constantly pushed the envelope, as that kind of material… how do I say it… just wasn’t common back then.
I couldn’t see it working today, simply because we’ve come a long way since then. A long way forward? Or backward? That’s a matter of oppinion.