Instant Recall Premiered on GSN with Wink Martindale; It's like Candid Camera "Going" Game Show

Instant Recall premiered Thursday night on GSN with host Wink Martindale, and has the feel of the old Candid Camera show with Allen Funt. This program uses funky music and a loud-colored set that are reminiscent of late 1960s, early 1970s game shows. Here's more about the latest game show effort of Wink Martindale called Instant Recall. The program even employs retro-acting game show models. The network has put on a show that has great potential. It features two different games per half hour episode. I participate in GSN.com/GSN Live contests, but any opinions expressed in this article have been written freely by me.

Instant Recall Premiered on GSN with Host Wink Martindale: Candid Camera "Goes" Game Show

My fondest memories of the host, who is 75, came during his hosting of the game show Tic Tac Dough from 1978-1985. He had a friendly, yet engaging manner about him. Martindale is only the second personality to host at least 15 game shows, according to his Wikipedia biography.

In the opening game, hidden cameras were set up for a phony love seminar that was full of actors playing along. 21 year old Marcelle and 25 year old Deon attended to hear Derek Petro talk about his book on dating called How You Doin? The contestants had to do some strange things with ice like walk on it and squeeze it in order to "understand" love better. Petro's pretend kid, who acted like a brat, came in twice to bug his pretend father. But as things were starting to get out of hand, Instant Recall host Wink Martindale popped out and told them they were on a game show. The contestants then had to recall the skit they participated in, getting prizes and money for remembering such things like what the kid and book cover looked like.

In the next segment, only one contestant appeared in the Instant Recall game. A dating coach named Robbie was set up by his belly warmer Allison to go to a surprise party for Renee. So he thought. Instead, he and Allison found themselves in the middle of an intervention for the person he thought he was going to surprise. The actors confront Renee about her supposed shopping addiction. All during the process, Robbie feels really uncomfortable, especially since he doesn't know her, and is especially uncomfortable whenever he has to participate directly. That is, until Wink Martindale pops out and then has Robbie recall details for money on that funky-looking set that's late 60s, early 70s loud green, yellow, and orange.

Instant Recall with Host Wink Martindale Has Promise

At the end of the program, Wink Martindale tells viewers that he may be coming to their area, so just like Candid Camera, people had better be on the look out for being involved in bizarre circumstances. The fast pace, the positively sassy way of Wink Martindale, and retro feel in modern day 2010 are a winning combination.

Sources:

Premiere, Instant Recall, original airdate March 4, 2010, GSN, Mountain Time feed

Wink Martindale: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wink_Martindale, Wikipedia