Game Show NewsNet - Block Party with Jason Block

Random Thoughts - April 24

A few things have been happening in the world of Game Shows/Reality Shows and I have to put my two cents in.

¦ First off, I would be remiss in not mentioning the passing last week of one Kitty Carlisle Hart. At 96, she was still touring in a one woman show a month before she died. This woman was a tireless champion of the arts, a movie actress, and theater professional.
But most of us, including myself remember her as the woman in the evening gown on "To Tell the Truth". She had appeared on EVERY version of the show. She was on it for 6 decades, one of the few people ever to do that.

She was from a bygone era...where women treated themselves with dignity and class. She presented herself with a sense of decorum that Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears and Paris Hilton could only dream of. With her passing not only does a game show icon leave us but a true legend as well.

Rest in peace, Ms. Hart.

¦ From Ms. Hart we go to Mr. Malakar. Yes, Sanjaya was eliminated this past week and most of the world wept, and a lot of people ears were happy. I watched how he handled himself...and I was reminded of a few things. Yes, he is 17 years old and he can sing...somewhat. He wasn’t talented enough to win the competition, but he wasn’t evil incarnate either.

On Tuesday morning, WPLJ-FM interviewed him on his media tour. And yes, WPLJ-FM has been very harsh in their criticism. But when they interviewed him, they tried to be nice. But Todd Pettengill was incredibly two-faced. While answering one question about his place of elimination, Pettengill said, "You should have been", talking over Sanjaya. Look, the kid stunk. But he didn’t deserve all of the criticism he got. A NY Post cartoon said his singing would be used to break Al-Qaeda terrorists. Did he put himself out there? Yes. Did he make himself look foolish? Yes. But was some of the criticism unwarranted? Yes.

Sanjaya Malakar is a human being. And a pretty classy one at that.

¦ Finally we head to China, where Mark Burnett is planning to base his next Survivor. Burnett, after allowing cheating kids to be on his hit show "Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?" is now taking blood money from a government with numerous human rights violations. Does anyone remember Tiananmen Square of April to June 1989? Basically I do, because I was part of the student protests at George Washington University. Chinese Students actually protested the policies of the Communist Government and wanted....freedom! And what did the government do? Roll them over with tanks. There is a world-famous picture of a man standing in the middle of the road blocking a tank’s progress.

Does Burnett forget the Falun Gong? The Falun Gong have been persecuted since 1999 because Zhang Zemin did not like it’s popularity. Does the money he plans to make ease his conscience? I sure hope so, because if I were him...I would locate the shows somewhere else. It looks bad for him and his production company.

You agree or disagree? Fire me off a letter at jb.regis@verizon.net.