Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? is an international television game show franchise of British origin, created by David Briggs, Mike Whitehill and Steven Knight. In its format, currently owned and licensed by Sony Pictures Television, contestants tackle a series of multiple-choice questions to win large cash prizes in a format that twists on many game show genre conventions – only one contestant plays at a time, similar to radio quizzes; contestants are given the question before deciding whether to answer, and have no time limit to answer questions; and the amount offered increases as they tackle questions that become increasingly difficult. The maximum cash prize offered in most versions of the format is an aspirational value in local currency, such as £1 million in the UK or ₹75 million (₹7.5 crore) in India.
For other uses, see Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (disambiguation).Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
- David Briggs
- Mike Whitehill
- Steven Knight
- Celador (1998–2007)
- 2waytraffic (2007–present, in-name-only unit of Sony Pictures Television)
- Sony Pictures Television (2008–present)
1998–present
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (see International versions)
Scores composed by Keith and Matthew Strachan
4 September 1998
The original British version debuted on 4 September 1998 on the ITV network, hosted by Chris Tarrant, who presented his final episode on 11 February 2014 after which the show was discontinued. A revived series of seven episodes to commemorate its 20th anniversary aired from 5 to 11 May 2018, hosted by Jeremy Clarkson. The revival received mostly positive reviews from critics and fans, as well as high viewing figures, leading ITV to renew the show for several more series. Since its debut, international variants of the game show have been aired in around 160 countries, making it the best-selling TV format in television history,[2] and is credited by some as paving the way for the boom in the popularity of reality television.[3][4]
History[edit]
The format of the show was created by David Briggs, Mike Whitehill and Steven Knight, who had earlier created a number of the promotional games for Tarrant's morning show on Capital FM radio, such as the bong game. Tentatively known as Cash Mountain,[3] the show took its finalised title from a song written by Cole Porter for the 1956 film High Society, starring Frank Sinatra and Celeste Holm. Since the original version launched, several individuals have claimed that they originated the format and that Celador had breached their copyright. While many pursued litigation, they were all unsuccessful, and each claim was later settled out-of-court on an agreement/settlement.[5][6][7]
In March 2006, original producer Celador announced that it was seeking to sell the worldwide rights to Millionaire, together with the rest of its British programme library, as the first phase of a sell-off of the company's format and production divisions.
British television producer Paul Smith first had the idea to franchise the UK programme internationally. He developed a series of standards for international variants that ensured they mirrored the British original closely. For example, all hosts were required to appear on-screen wearing Armani suits, as Tarrant did in the UK; producers were forbidden from hiring local composers to create original music, instead using the same music cues used by the British version; and the lighting system and set design were to adhere faithfully to the way they were presented on the British version.[8] Some of Smith's rules have been slightly relaxed over the years as the franchise's development has progressed.
Dutch company 2waytraffic ultimately acquired Millionaire and all of Celador's other programmes. Two years later, Sony Pictures Entertainment purchased 2waytraffic for £137.5 million.[9] Sony Pictures Television currently owns and licences the show's format.
Gameplay[edit]
Rules[edit]
A group of contestants on each episode play a preliminary round called "Fastest Finger First". All are given a question by the host and four answers which must be placed within a particular order; in the first season of the original version (1998) and the first four seasons of the Australian version (1999–2002), contestants have to answer a multiple-choice question. If any contestants are visually impaired, the host reads the question and four choices all at once, then repeats the choices after the music for the round begins. The contestant who answers correctly in the fastest time goes on to play the main game. In the event that no one gets the question right, another question is given; if two or more contestants answer correctly and with the same time, they are given a tie-breaker to determine who will make a start into the game. This round is only used when a new contestant is being chosen to play the main round, and can be played more than once in an episode among those remaining within the group seeking to play the main game. In celebrity editions, the round is not used; celebrities automatically take part in the main game.
Once a contestant enters the main game, they are asked increasingly difficult general knowledge questions by the host. Each features four possible answers, to which the contestant must give the correct answer. Doing so wins them a certain amount of money, with tackling more difficult questions increasing their prize fund. During their game, the player has a set of lifelines that they may use only once to help them with a question, as well as two "safety nets" – if a contestant gets a question wrong, but had reached a designated cash value during their game, they will leave with that amount as their prize. While the first few questions are generally easy, subsequent ones might prompt the host to ask if the answer they gave is their "final answer" – if it is, then it is locked in and cannot be changed. If a contestant feels unsure about an answer and does not wish to play on, they can walk away with the money they have won, to which the host will ask them to confirm this as their final decision; in such cases, the host will usually ask them to state what answer they would have gone for, and reveal if it would have been correct or incorrect.
Hallmarks[edit]
Music[edit]
The musical score most commonly associated with the franchise was composed by father-and-son duo Keith and Matthew Strachan. The Strachans' score provides drama and tension, and unlike older game show musical scores, Millionaire's musical score was created to feature music playing almost throughout the entire show. The Strachans' main Millionaire theme song takes inspiration from the "Mars" movement of Gustav Holst's The Planets, and their cues from the 6th/3rd to 10th/7th question, and then from the 11th/8th question onwards, take the pitch up a semitone for each subsequent question, in order to increase tension as the contestant progressed through the game.[88] On Game Show Network (GSN)'s Gameshow Hall of Fame special, the narrator described the Strachan tracks as "mimicking the sound of a beating heart", and stated that as the contestant works their way up the money ladder, the music is "perfectly in tune with their ever-increasing pulse".[3]
The Strachans' Millionaire soundtrack was honoured by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers with numerous awards, the earliest of them awarded in 2000.[88] A British album of the musical stings was released in 2000, while a remix of the theme tune became a UK chart hit the same year.[89] The original music cues were given minor rearrangements for the US version's clock format in 2008; for example, the question cues were synced to the "ticking" sounds of the game clock. Even later, the Strachan score was removed from the US version altogether for the introduction of the "shuffle format" in 2010, in favour of a new musical score with cues written by Jeff Lippencott and Mark T. Williams, co-founders of the Los Angeles-based company Ah2 Music.[90]
Other media[edit]
Merchandise[edit]
Three board game adaptations of the UK Millionaire were released by Upstarts in 1998, and a junior edition recommended for younger players was introduced in 2001. The US version also saw two board games of its own, released by Pressman Toy Corporation in 2000.[105][106] Other Millionaire board games have included a game based on the Australian version's Hot Seat format, which was released by UGames;[107] a game based on the Italian version released by Hasbro;[108] and a game based on the French version which was released by TF1's games division.[109]
An electronic tabletop version of the game was released by Tiger Electronics in 2000.[110] Six different DVD games based on the UK Millionaire, featuring Tarrant's likeness and voice, were released by Zoo Digital Publishing[111] and Universal Studios Home Entertainment between 2002 and 2008. In 2008, Imagination Games released a DVD game based on the US version, based on the 2004–2008 format and coming complete with Vieira's likeness and voice,[112] as well as a quiz book[113] and a 2009 desktop calendar.[114]
Video game adaptations[edit]
The UK Millionaire saw five video game adaptations for personal computers and Sony's PlayStation and Sega's Dreamcast consoles, as well as Nintendo's Game Boy Advance, produced by Hothouse Creations and Eidos Interactive. Between 1999 and 2001, Jellyvision produced five games based on the US network version for PCs and the PlayStation, all of them featuring Philbin's likeness and voice. The first of these adaptations – Who Wants to Be a Millionaire – was published by Disney Interactive, while the later four were published by Buena Vista Interactive which had just been spun off from DI when it reestablished itself in attempts to diversify its portfolio. Of the five games, three featured general trivia questions,[115][116][117] one was sports-themed,[118] and another was a "Kids Edition" featuring easier questions.[119] Eurocom ported the game to the Game Boy Color for the second edition. Two additional US Millionaire games were released by Ludia in conjunction with Ubisoft in 2010 and 2011; the first of these was a game for Nintendo's Wii console and DS handheld system, as well as a PlayStation 3 port of the Wii version, based on the 2008–2010 clock format,[120] with the Wii version offered on the show as a consolation prize to audience contestants during the 2010–2011 season. The second, for Microsoft's Xbox 360, was based on the "shuffle format"[121] and was offered as a consolation prize during the next season (2011–2012).
Ludia also made a Facebook game based on Millionaire available to players in North America from 2011 to 2016. This game featured an altered version of the "shuffle format", condensing the number of questions to twelve – eight in round one and four in round two. Contestants competed against eight other Millionaire fans in round one, with the top three playing round two alone. There was no "final answer" rule; the contestant's responses were automatically locked in. Answering a question correctly earned a contestant the value of that question, multiplied by the number of people who responded incorrectly. Contestants were allowed to use two of their Facebook friends as "Jump the Question" lifelines in round one, and to use the "Ask the Audience" lifeline in round two to invite up to 50 such friends of theirs to answer a question for a portion of the prize money of the current question.[122]
On 29 October 2020, Microids published a video game under the same name and released it on Steam, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch.[123]
Scrapped animated spin-off[edit]
In September 2001, Celador signed a deal with DIC Entertainment to produce a cartoon based on the show titled The Adventures of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? – The Animated Series.[124][125] The series was to follow fictional winners of the show, who would have used their prize money to take trips to various exotic locations, while the fictional host would keep in touch with them through the Millionaire Command Center.
The series was planned to be shown off at MIPCOM that year, however nothing else was confirmed for the series, and was silently scrapped without a formal announcement.