Get Smart. Indiana Jones. Re-making old classics is the latest trend on movies…so why can’t the same technique be applied to TV? I’ll admit - I’m a huge game show fan. Any game, any time, I play along and I usually do quite well. True TV game-players know where the best action can be found: GSN. But in this age of old-is-new, where past ideas are suddenly no longer passé, the classics come alive. In this case, it’s Match Game.

A show with a long history that just got a little bit longer. Match Game originally hit the air in 1962 on NBC, running for seven seasons before cancellation. This is not the most famous version of the show. Match Game didn’t hit its real stride until it found a home on CBS in 1973. The episodes have resulted in some of the most popular programming GSN has ever ran, and for good reason.

I can summon this up for you in just two words: Richard Dawson.

This English-born actor was perhaps best known for this third-tier TV role in Hogan’s Heroes, but in 1973 he found his element in the game show genre. There, he shined and stood out - the consummate ladies’ man, the polished gentleman, the irreverent comedian, the incredibly good game show player. He became the fan favorite and the contestant favorite straightaway, helping to rocket the show into un-dreamed-of success…but not without a few bumps in the Match Game road.

The 1973 CBS version was slightly re-vamped from earlier editions. In this setup, two panelists would face off against each other by trying to match the majority of the six celebrity panelists. All were given leading questions with a blank appearing, to be filled in by all players. The game show was slated for cancellation after a short-lived single season. Somewhat dry questions and a lack of viewer interest were about to relegate this fabulous idea into the land of failed television evermore. Knowing cancellation was a foregone conclusion but with a few episodes left to fill out the contract, the show’s writers threw caution to the wind and began asking much more risqué questions. Since it no longer mattered, they simply did what they wanted, adding very leading double entendres to their blanks.

Spicier questions proved to be the perfect catalyst, and suddenly Match Game was ratings gold. The show was renewed and soon enough, Match Game was showing in homes during daily and nightly programming. Dawson left the show in ‘78 to handle the show’s spinoff - Family Feud. Feud quickly surpassed its parent program, and Match Game fell by the wayside to be canceled in 1979 (tellingly, only one season after Dawson’s disappearance).

But that’s not all! Match Game appeared in syndication for the next 3 years, only to be re-vamped again and brought back to television in 1983. It ran as part of an hour bloc with Hollywood Squares, but after only one season it was back off the air. ABC brought their own version back to television in 1990 to 1991, this time with a mixture of little-known and formerly famous stars, but the show lacked spark. ABC attempted another version of Match Game for 1998 and 1999, but this too met with failure.

None of the re-makes have ever recaptured the naughty pleasure evoked by the original CBS version - again, because each version very dismally lacked the magic of Richard Dawson or even a reasonable facsimile. But that isn’t going to keep any network from trying! GSN turned down a Match Game re-vamp in 2005, but the idea has again re-surfaced and taken root with TBS.

Several stars gathered earlier this week to shoot the pilot, which will be hosted by Andrew Daly. Sarah Silverman, Norm MacDonald, Super Dave Osborne, Scott Thompson (Kids in the Hall), Rashida Jones (The Office) and Niecy Nash (one of the highlights of Reno 911) were also in attendance.

But, it will fail. It will fail. Why? One, TBS isn’t known for game shows. Two, it’s hard to get any kind of shock value with one-liners on cable (which is already spicy enough). Three, Richard Dawson. The show has proven, time and again, to fail without Richard sitting front and center (his position for five years). The man even remains, after many casting changes, to be the best-loved and most talked-about host of the Family Feud - even though he departed the show in 1985 (and the show has seen four different hosts and plenty of changes since). No matter what TBS or any network does, there will always be an inevitable comparison. If you don’t have Richard, you don’t have Dick.