Quizmaster: The Life & Times & Fun & Games of Bill Cullen

by Adam Nedeff

What do Bob Barker, Dick Clark, Pat Sajak, and Alex Trebek have in common? Bill Cullen hosted more game shows than all of them combined. And all of them have referred to Bill as the best game show host of all The Life & Times & Fun & Games of Bill Cullen is the remarkable story of a “a kid with polio” who became a mechanic, truck driver, photographer, pilot, disc jockey, and the finest master of ceremonies that a game show could ever have.On the game show Quick as a Flash in 1949, host Bill Cullen was assisted for some of the questions by actress Mercedes McCambridge. In 1973, McCambridge supplied the voice for a child in what horror movie?THE EXORCISTOn an episode of the game show Catch Me If You Can in 1948, host Bill Cullen welcomed a contestant who was unemployed and seeking work as an actor. That night, he won a gas range. The following year, that actor made his film debut, playing a painter in The Lady Takes a Sailor. His final film role, in 2000, was playing elderly Hardy Greaves in The Legend of Bagger Vance. Who was that actor?JACK LEMMONThe long-running game show I've Got a Secret was created and produced by a comedy writer who later became a star in his own right with a wildly popular series of albums featuring his parodies of popular songs. Who was he?ALLAN SHERMANIn 1956, The Price is Right premiered with host Bill Cullen. Bill got the job after an actor-comic said no. In 1961, that actor's legendary sitcom made its debut on CBS. Who said no to The Price is Right?DICK VAN DYKE

Genres: Biography, Nonfiction, Tv

578 pages, Paperback

First published July 8, 2013

About the author

Adam Nedeff grew up in Vienna, West Virginia, and spent his childhood infinitely more interested in late night comedy & game shows than afternoon cartoons.

He majored in radio & television at Marshall University and spent a few years toiling as a disc jockey before moving to Los Angeles to see if he could make a career out of his childhood obsessions.

He has appeared as a contestant on three game shows, worked behind-the-scenes for "Wheel of Fortune" and "The Price is Right," and even co-founded a small business, Home Game Enterprizes (www.homegameenterprizes.com), which stages live game shows for private parties and corporate functions.

With encouragement from late night star Conan O'Brien, he finally began writing books about game show history, starting with "Quizmaster," a comprehensive biography of beloved game show host Bill Cullen, and followed that with the four-volume set "This Day in Game Show History."

Reviews

[Brenda Osborne · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are a game show nerd like me, this book is a must! Bill Cullen was a dear, sweet man and a master game show host. His life is very interesting and I couldn't put the book down. Some intriguing tidbits: childhood polio left him with a permanent "silly walk" had a pilot's license, flew from New York to Los Angles every week to host two different game shows and was happily married for 35 years. Pick up this book for a heart warming and highly informative story!

[Cheryl Winter · Rating 4 out of 5]

This man was a master of his trade. Very interesting history and walk through the game show world. It brought back many memories of TV gone bye.
A very educational walk through this book.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book. I love old game shows-- and I mean reeeeally old game shows--- and I love seeing Bill Cullen in pretty much any of them. He is firmly ensconced in my pantheon of black and white tv game show greats. I can't think of any tv personality of his era that was more instantly likable or relatable. His version of The Price is Right was miles above any subsequent shows with the same name. Yep. I love Bill Cullen, and this book provided a lot of information about his background and personal life that I was unaware of. I was watching episodes of I've Got a Secret from 1961 during the same timeframe I was reading the book, and the camera tricks used to hide Bill's pronounced limp due to childhood polio became immediately obvious. Before I knew about the limp, I just thought there were some odd directorial decisions, or perhaps they were waiting for stagehands to get out of the shot before switching cameras.

I liked the writing style, the balance between personal and professional information, and the way the author slipped in as much about David Letterman as humanly possible. (I see what you did there, Adam!)

Now, here's a word from our resident disgruntled audio book listener:

I liked the narrator's voice. He read perhaps a tiny bit fast, but nothing too outrageous. But he must have been quite young, because he mispronounced so many names that anyone who was watching tv in the Sixties would have known how to say that I started to write them down:

Jimmy Durante, Desi Arnaz, David Niven, Victor Borge, Joe Garagiola, Bennett Cerf (that one really hurt my heart), Tom Poston, and Jim Lange. He also mispronounced the following words: regaled, La Jolla, subsidiary.

If there are any audiobook producers reading out there, please hire me to narrate your books, and I promise to research the heck out of all the words instead of assuming I know how to say them.

[isaacq · Rating 4 out of 5]

make no mistake, the title of this book should be "Quizmaster: The Career of Bill Cullen"

i love Bill Cullen, and was very curious about the man. based on this book's title i assumed it was a biography, and looked forward to learning more about Bill's offscreen life. regrettably, fully 90% of the book, if not more, is about Bill's radio and TV shows. his first marriage is glossed over in 2 sentences, and i realized quickly that this wasn't a biography so much as the story of Bill Cullen's career in broadcasting.

this book is so competently and lovingly written, replete with interesting stories about the business of game shows during several high and low points for the genre.

throughout the chapters, the author quotes liberally from transcripts of many of Bill's shows, beautifully demonstrating the humour and humanity Bill brought to his interactions with contestants. however, what about all the times Bill and Ann appeared on Tattletales, as themselves, telling endearing stories about each other? even just a handful of quotes from those appearances would have shed more light on offscreen Bill than anything we get here. i'm being unfair because i expected a different kind of book... but the title was definitely misleading.

[Koren · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my third book about past game show hosts so a lot of the game show history in this book was also written about in the other two. That said, Bill Cullen is one of my favorites and Blockbuster is one of my all-time favorite game shows. I love his sense of humor. I enjoyed learning more about Bill Cullen. I pictured him to be more of a down-home country boy but I was definitely wrong.

[Steven Beningo · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent biography of a legendary game show host!