No, it’s not the sequel to Unman, Wittering and Zigo, merely a collection of linguistic oddities as served up in the TV panel game Call My Bluff. This brilliantly simple TV show, which ran from 1965 to 2004, has, for no apparent reason, been dusted off by BBC4 who are currently showing vintage episodes from the mid 70s on Monday evenings.
Unlike many other word games, Call My Bluff did not require erudition or an Oxbridge degree on the part of the viewer. Anyone could play. Each of the two teams would take it in turns to offer up three alternative definitions of obscure words from the Oxford English Dictionary, while the opposing team would attempt to deduce which of them was true and which a bluff. This simplicity and accessibility goes a long way to explain the show’s longevity.
I don’t when or why I took to watching Call My Bluff, but it was sometime in the early to mid 70s, an era which might be considered the programme’s high watermark, and from which the BBC4 episodes have been drawn. It’s unlikely that much survives in the archive: to date we’ve seen episodes from 1974, 75 and 76, and one rather suspects these to be the sole surviving examples from three complete series (a series might comprise as many as 26 episodes). A typical example, transmitted on 3 March 1975 featured a guest line-up comprising Edward Woodward, Judy Geeson, Joan Bakewell and, somewhat surprisingly, Noel Edmonds. The two regular ‘team captains’ were Frank Muir and Patrick Campbell, and the whole shebang was presided over by Robert Robinson, possessor of one of the most famous combovers on television. Robinson was familiar to me as the presenter of Points of View (in both senior and junior incarnations) and as the host of BBC1’s upper middle class quiz Ask the Family. Frank Muir was also known to me from various appearances on Jackanory, where he often read his own tales of a dog named Whatamess. His genial demeanour and distinctive bow tie made him stand out, a genuine personality in an era when people on television were still allowed to be slightly eccentric, and middle-aged. His opposing team captain I’d never seen before (or indeed in any other context ever). Patrick Campbell, AKA the 3rd Baron Glenavy, was a humorist and man of letters, but is probably best known for his appearances on the show, where his natural stammer added a highly idiosyncratic edge to the proceedings: he often made fun of himself when he was unable to get a word out.
This was, as I’ve said, the ‘classic’ era of Call My Bluff, and the line-up endured until Campbell’s death, aged 67, in 1980. He was replaced by Arthur Marshall, whom Wikipedia describes as a writer and raconteur. Whilst he made an agreeable substitute for Campbell, I always felt the show was never quite the same again: I’d found the stammering Campbell an endearing personality, and his friendly sparring with Frank Muir and his team was always entertaining. Watching the episodes again, it’s splendid to see how much good natured gamesmanship was on display, with each side mildly taunting the other as to the veracity of their definitions. Muir is cock-a-hoop when he gets a particularly tricky word right: one almost expects his bow-tie to light up and commence to rotate at such moments.
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| Frank Muir gets one right! |
There has been one slightly discomforting aspect to these repeats, in as much as I last saw them in my teens, when Muir and Campbell were in their mid 50s and early 60s respectively. Watching in 2024, at the age of 63, Muir, in his fifties, is now a comparative youngster, while Campbell is the same age as myself. Sobering...
The Radio Times, somewhat perversely, insisted on describing Call My Bluff as ‘a duel of words and wit’ which may well have deterred some viewers, expecting a highbrow panel game that would go way above their heads. That’s probably how I thought of it myself before I first tuned in. Was it at the behest of a teacher, or a school friend with superior taste? The earliest entry I can find in my diary is on Monday 21 October 1974, on which edition the guests comprised Sheila Tracy, Charles Osborne, Madeline Smith and Peter Sallis. This may well have been my introduction to the series, although I have no recollection of the episode. I did, however, retain a strong visual memory of the show with its simplistic sets – a pastel coloured geometric background behind the teams and a basic display board behind Robinson on which the words would be presented and the score kept. Robinson summoned up each new word with a ping of a small hotel lobby-style bell, and the word would duly appear behind him, clearly rotated into position by a couple of unseen stage hands. In one of the BBC4 episodes, he is amused to find one of the words already in postion before his summons: ‘Why ring the bell, it’s already there! Thanks, lads!’ The distinctive theme tune (with its three staccato beats spelling out the title) was in fact a library piece, Ciccolino, by composer and producer Norrie Paramor.
Call My Bluff wasn’t the kind of programme I typically mentioned in my diaries, but I certainly watched it week after week (assuming it didn’t clash with one of the other channels), and aside from that glancing reference in 1974, there are few entries. On Friday 29 April 1977 I did give it a mention – it was back for a new series and Joanna Lumley was one of the guests. I also spelled Patrick Campbell’s name with twelve letter ‘P’s. What a wit…
Watching the series now, its old school, low-budget presentation makes for a stark contrast against modern programming where visuals and sets are slicker and shinier in appearance. Call My Bluff is simply lit, mostly beige in tonality, and edited in the most straightforward manner imaginable. The studio format where two teams of three are ranged around a central compere, is as old as television itself, yet endures in the likes of Have I Got News for You and QI. I’m sure there are enough lingustic oddities remaining in the OED to keep any revival of the series on air indefinitely, but I don’t expect it to happen. If it was made today, it would be demoted to radio.
If, as I suspect, these random editions are all that remains of the show’s mid-70s run, then it’s a shame; but a series like this would never have been a prime candidate for archiving, especially in an era when the BBC couldn’t even manage to keep some of their classic sitcoms intact; and we should probably be thankful that any of it has survived at all. Either way, it may be with us for a few weeks yet: there is a further episode scheduled for this coming Monday, and the four shown to date can be found on iPlayer. I’m keeping copies myself, in anticipation of this being potentially the show’s last hurrah. If 1970s television and obscure words are your thing, then catch it while you can.
And the next word is...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m0022nph/call-my-bluff-13051976
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