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Hello all, and welcome to the FIRST $50,000 Pyramid page! This reincarnation of the Pyramid
series was the shortest lived, and has gotten a bad wrap over the years. And it is a shame,
because I personally thought the show had great potential. This shrine of the $50k Pyramid has
pictures, and information about this very short-lived revival. (Please Note: William Padron recently gave me LOTS of information about
the $50,000 Pyramid that I thought would be useful, so I just wanted to give him credit for the
additional knowledge.)
First, some basic information about the broadcast history. The $50,000 Pyramid debuted on Monday,
January 26, 1981. On the premiere episodes, the celebrities were JoAnne Worley and Sal Viscuso.
But what many people don't know, is that the premiere episode wasn't supposed to be the actual
premiere. Production began on January 11, 1981. The REAL debut guests were Didi Conn and Brian
Patrick-Clarke. The second week shows were supposed to be Nipsey Russell and Lois Nettleton.
The second week eps were tapes on January 12. In the end, The TV watcher that watched the premeire week eps were watching episodes that were supposed to air on the 3rd week. The final
first run episode of this series run was on Friday, May 29, 1981. However, reruns of the show
continued until the first week of September 4, 1981. It was on in reruns for a short time on
CBN in I think 1982, but I am not totally sure. If you can confirm or reject it, let me
know, please.
Now, for some information about the game play. (You need to know that, wouldn't you? hehe :-) You could say that The $50,000 Pyramid ($50k Pyramid) was much like the Bill Cullen version of the
$25,000 Pyramid, with prizes that were scaled down dramatically. The structure was pretty
much the same. If the contestant wins one maingame, they tryed for $5,000. The second time at
the Winners Circle, they tried for $10,000. To be eligable for the $50,000 grand prize, the
player would have to go on to become what was called "The Player Of The Week". To acheive this,
contestants had to get a perfect score of 7 points in the fastest time during the main game.
(That is why the timer in the main game counted up (1-2-3-4-5) instead of down (30-29-28-27-26).
Reguardless to whether a the Player of the Week won a main game or went to the Winner's Circle,
the contestant (after winning a vacation to Europe), played in a special tournament for the
grand $50,000 cash prize. It was a round robin style tornament, not EXACTLY like the $100,000
Pyramid in the mid-1980s, but close enough.
Well, that is about all I can currently do about The $50,000 Pyramid. I hope you liked my little
shrine to it. If you have any episodes from this short lived series, please let me know right
now so we can work out some kind of trade. While I want any episode I don't have, if you have an
ep with a $50,000 win, I would be eternally grateful for it. :-)
But before I go, I thought I'd share with you all something I found. I went to the library on a hunt for $50,000 Pyramid related things, and I was able to find 2 TV Guide advertisements for The $50,000 Pyramid, that I scanned for you.
