Should You Buzz In For Talk Show The Game Show?

What Is This Thing?

What if guests on talk shows could earn points for hitting all the traditional tropes that define panel interviews? It would be Talk Show The Game Show.

When Is It On?

Wednesdays at 10 PM ET on truTV, starting April 5.

Why Was It Made Now?

Billy On The Street has primed viewers for loosely formatted game shows hosted by loud gay men with very strong opinions about pop culture.

What's Its Pedigree?

Host Guy Branum originally mounted "Talk Show The Game Show" as a recurring stage production at L.A.'s Nerdist Showroom, and he returns to host the televised edition as well; Branum is a standup comic who's also written on The Mindy Project and Awkward. He's joined on camera by "judge" Karen Kilgariff (also a producer on the show); a fellow comic, Kilgariff is half of Girls' Guitar Club, and an alumna of the writing staff on Ellen: The Ellen DeGeneres Show. Wanda Sykes, who appears as a guest in the second episode, is also credited as an Executive Producer.

...And?

A show about assigning points over the course of a talk show interview might seem complicated and high-concept, but when "game play" actually begins, the simple genius of the idea becomes clear pretty quickly. There are certain marks guests are expected to hit: plugging, name-dropping, telling precisely timed anecdotes. At this point, there's honestly no need for any network to launch a new panel-style talk show; game-ifying the format is a silly/clever way of reinventing it -- and, as a host, Branum is warm, affable, relaxed, and goofy -- just what you want for someone in that role.

Also: each of the two first episodes features a guest coming out to her seat with her adorable pet.

Frankly, this should be mandatory for all guests on all talk shows.

...But?

It's not that I don't enjoy the closing lightning round, in which Branum asks the two highest-scoring guests a series of questions like "You cannot snore and dream at the same time: what does Kevin James aspire to?" But coming up with subjective answers that line up with the host's opinion and/or amuse him is very similar to the final round of Billy On The Street's Quizzed In The Face. Googling hasn't brought me to a firm answer as to when Branum started the live version of TSTGS, but the earliest instance seems to be 2013 -- two years into Billy's run on Fuse. Given the other common elements the two shows share, I would have liked the premise of the lightning round here to be more distinct.

A far bigger problem is Casey Schreiner. While Kilgariff's role is to judge guests' performances on artistic merit, Schreiner -- also a comic, though not one with any IMDb credits, apparently -- is there to judge strategy. Even though the guests' points pop up on screen as they earn them...

...we also hear Schreiner's voice awarding them -- the camera also cuts to him -- which is distracting and unnecessary. And look, I understand the impulse to get very granular about "game shows" that are mostly just for entertainment purposes, as my co-hosting of a certain Hollywood Game Night podcast proves, but Schreiner's wonky, overly serious manner feels like it's at odds with the show's ethos.

One critique no one but me could possibly care about: in the first episode, lead guest John Salley earned callback points during the segment with second guest Tiffany Haddish. But every time we revisited the point standings after that, those callback points had not been added to his total. Spoiler alert: it wouldn't change the outcome of the game if they had, besides which the points barely count anyway and the winner just gets a prize that seems to be worth around $500. But still!

Finally:

That's not her name. (To be fair, it's possible that both the point discrepancy and the Ray/Rae issue were solved between the release of the screeners and the final air versions; if you watch, let me know!)

...So?

Like Hip Hop Squares, Talk Show The Game Show is a vague approximation of a game show that's not-so-secretly actually just a comedy showcase for its stars. If Branum's sense of humour wins you over in the first few minutes, you'll enjoy spending a half-hour with him.