Blockbusters: Story, Cast and Series Facts

Story and premise

Blockbusters was originally hosted by Bill Cullen, who won an Emmy Award for hosting it. Obscured by The Price Is Right and dozens of Bob Stewart game shows, most of them erased, this was his first time winning the award. Blockbusters is also based off of Three On A Match and Winning Streak which are Bob Stewart Game Shows hosted by Cullen. Mark Goodson was able to acquire the format and use it for regular game play. It was also used in a kids version with a Beat The Clock element on QUBE named Across The Board in Ohio. Hosted by Nelson Davis and Bob Marvin with Dave Ulmer, Bill Cullen was in the studio hosting How Do You Like Your Eggs? with Howard Blumenthal and Tom Weebil. On Across The Board the teams were Red and Green. Blockbusters introduced a very large Green puzzle board contains the initials of the answers. Unlike Across The Board, one team had to go horizontally. The other team had to go vertically. Since the Blockbusters board was Green, one of the teams was White instead. And most interesting of all is the White team outnumbers the Red team! As a result, the white team's horizontal traverse was longer. Arranged in Hexagons, the attempts to go from one side to the other was interesting, and impossible to tie. They also had a Honey Comb pattern for the set design. The Bonus Round involved changing the White lights to Gold and required a horizontal traverse no matter which team was playing. Being on N.B.C., they offered a generous winnings limit so contestants could return dozens of times. The episodes were Straddled. After its original N.B.C. run, it immediately spun off to United Kingdom which lasted for decades.

Series details

• Title: Blockbusters
• Format: Game Show
• Language: English
• Premiere date: 1980-10-27
• Final broadcast date listed: 1981-06-11
• Status in TVmaze: Ended
• Network listed by TVmaze: NBC
• Network country: United States
• TVMaze ID: 62668
• IMDb ID: tt0180342
• TVDB ID: 376093

Cast and credited roles

• Bill Cullen — Host

Seasons in the TVmaze catalogue

• Season 1980: premiered 1980-10-27; final listed air date 1980-12-19.
• Season 1981: premiered 1981-03-19; final listed air date 1981-06-11.

Source and licence

Adapted from Blockbusters on TVmaze. The synopsis is reproduced as plain text; catalogue facts, cast and season records are selected and reformatted. This adapted text is available under CC BY-SA 4.0, following the TVmaze API licence. Network and web-channel credits identify the service listed in this source; they do not establish current streaming availability.