Games - Card Sharks

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	Games - Card Sharks

Card Sharks was an American television game show in which contestants guessed whether a playing card was higher or lower than the card that preceded it.

Broadcast history

Card Sharks; a Mark Goodson-Bill Todman production, debuted on NBC on April 24, 1978. Jim Perry hosted this version, which lasted until October 23, 1981. The show returned to CBS on January 6, 1986 at 10:30 AM, replacing the hit Press Your Luck
, which was bumped to the 4:00 PM slot replacing Tom Kennedy's Body Language
. This run of the show ran until March 31, 1989. Bob Eubanks was the emcee. A syndicated version began in September and was hosted by Bill Rafferty. This version only lasted one season. A short-lived syndicated revival, with different rules than the previous versions, aired debuted during the fall of 2001, but was cancelled by years end. Pat Bullard was the emcee.

Reruns of the Jim Perry version aired in syndication between 1982 and 1984 (some pairing it with Perry's Sale of the Century
), and later began airing on the CBN network (which is now known as ABC Family) from 1984 to 1985. Reruns of all versions except the 2001 revival currently air on GSN.

In 2006 the series will be among one of the seven game shows being used in the upcoming CBS series "Game Show Marathon." Ricki Lake will serve as host for this seven week series in which she'll also serve as emcee for this portion of this program as well.

Other on-air personalities

Gene Wood was the principal announcer of all three 70s-80s versions, with Johnny Olson, Jack Narz, Bob Hilton, Charlie O'Donnell, Johnny Gilbert, and Jay Stewart taking turns filling in for Wood on occasion. Gary Kroeger announced the 2001 version.

The dealers on Card Sharks were Janice Baker, Lois Areno, Ann Pennington and Markie Post (who later appeared on NBC's Night Court) on the NBC version. Lacey Pemberton and Susannah Williams were the dealers on the CBS and syndicated versions. Tami Roman (aka Tami Anderson) dealt the cards on the 2001 syndicated version.

Misc. Show Information

For the 1978-81 version with Perry, Wood's voice was heard over the opening visuals reading a poem: :Ace is high, deuce is low :Call them right and win the dough :Onnnnn... Card Sharks!

That custom was soon changed to having Wood intone a poem that changed daily -- one submitted by the viewers. For example:

:Shuffle, deal, cut and play :Someone's going to WIN today :Onnnnn... Card Sharks!

Other poems were: Aces and deuces, Kings and threes, you can win with cards like these.

An ace shall be called lower, a deuce shall be called higher, call them right and you may retire!

A six, seven or eight, can be very bad, but get them double, and you'll be sad.

Aces and deuces, are all first-rate, but when they come up double, they're not so great.

High cards, low cards, get the calling properly, then you go home happy.

A board game based on Card Sharks was made by Endless Games in 2004. Although it used the logo of the 2001 revival, the rules were the same as those of the 1980s version.

The music to the 1978 version was composed by Score Productions, who had used the theme for an earlier show (the 1976-1977 version of Double Dare). The 1986 theme was composed by Edd Kalehoff.

The main game

Two contestants competed, each with a row of cards, one for each contestant.Each contestant had a standard 52-card deck (no jokers); the ace ranked highest and the deuce (two) ranked lowest. On the syndicated version, five special "prize" cards were shuffled into the deck.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Card Sharks ]

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