Stop the lights! Our favourite TV quizzes
Ireland’s longest-running television quiz programme was QUICKSILVER. Hosted by Bunny Carr it ran from 1965 until 1981 and it was broadcast from a different Irish town each week. Contestants were tested on their ability to answer questions quickly and the longer they took the more lights on a chequerboard of 30 lights went on. When they didn’t know the answer contestants could say ‘stop the lights’ and as a result they got the chance to answer more questions for prizes worth between 10p to £5.
BLACKBOARD JUNGLE was hosted by Ray D’Arcy on RTÉ and it ran three times a week for six years from 1991-1997.
Each episode featured two teams of three secondary school students competing against each other.
WHERE IN THE WORLD? ran from 1987 until 1996 and each week featured two families competing against each other on geography-type questions.
The original presenter was Marty Whelan and he was succeeded on the programme by Theresa Lowe.
WHO WANTS TO BE A MILLIONAIRE? was on Irish screens from 2000 to 2002, hosted by Gay Byrne. The format had already been a huge success in the UK.
The top prize fell from IR£1m to €1m after the euro changeover at the beginning of 2002. The highest prize won on the show was £250,000. There was no ‘coughing major’-type scandal in Ireland although there was controversy over one question, In June, 2001, Shane O’Doherty was asked, for £250,000, which part of the body held the lunula.
He phoned a physician, who told him ‘the heart’. But the answer wasn’t accepted and his winnings fell back from IR£250,000 to IR£32,000.
It turned out that a lunula could be part of a fingernail or of the heart valves. O’Doherty said that since both answers were correct, he should have been awarded the prize. He threatened to sue Tyrone Productions, but was let return to the show and he ended up with
IR£125,000 in winnings.