The Squares Pilot

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Once a few years ago, on the alt.tv.game-shows newsgroup, there was a "what-if" discussion on what The Hollywood Squares would be like if it had premiered in the 1950s instead of the 1960s.  Well, if you ever get your hands on the unaired pilot (actually taped April 21, 1965), you will get a glimpse at that very scenario.  Most of the stars were popular entertainers of the 1950s, and host Bert Parks was a popular host of shows like Stop the Music and Break the Bank.  One poster in that thread even suggested the erstwhile Robert Q. Lewis as the host...indeed, Lewis is not the host here but he is one of the squares. (Ironically, he's the only "square" in the pilot who never appeared in the actual series.)  Another thing that makes this show more 50's-like: it is shot as a kinescope, in black and white (meaning a film camera was aimed at a studio monitor).   
Most of it was there from the very beginning: the way announcer Kenny Williams introduced the stars (Williams himself for that matter); the original theme song ("The Silly Song"); many of the first regulars--Charley Weaver, Rose Marie, Wally Cox, Abby Dalton, Morey Amsterdam; the giant grid with the slightly elongated x's and o's; the male being the "x" and the female contestant being the "o"...even the phrase Bert Parks shouted at the beginning of the show: "Hello, stars!"  The game was very similar, with each game being worth $250 and the winner getting two out of three matches.  And apparently, even the writers were already at work on the zingers.

The first and most glaring difference is the host.  Bert Parks was clearly no Peter Marshall.  Parks has a hammy, overly dramatic style that appears way out of place in this format.  He is heard to dramatically shout "I ask you Mister X, is that question right or wrong?" and "I'm sorry, that's wrong, circle gets the square!" as if everyone's life depended on it.   It might have worked on a more dramatic game show like Stop the Music but here, Parks just sounds obnoxious, like each contestant was on the verge of being crowned Miss America.

Contrast that to Marshall, who usually read the answer first and then said, "Circle gets the square," almost as a matter-of-fact afterthought.  During the earlier years Marshall also simply said "Right or wrong?" to prompt the contestants, and even that was gone by 1970. His emphasis was to keep the game moving, smoothly.

Another difference came in the humor.  Yes, the zingers were already there, and the humor was very similar to what we all knew and loved.  But there were two differences:  first, the star answered the question straight, then after the contestant's shot, the star then came up with the zinger.  For example:

Bert Parks: A recent biography of Napoleon said that before he went into battle, he always had his horse sprayed. Did he use an insect repellant, perfume, or Napoleon brandy?
Morey Amsterdam: I'd say he sprayed him with brandy.
(after contestant misses)
Morey Amsterdam: The book I read says that he sprayed him with brandy and drank the insecticide!

Sometimes one star would answer the question, then another star would blurt out a zinger ...sometimes Parks would even set them up to do so (making it obvious some of them were scripted).  Here are a couple of examples, which recall the way things happened on The Celebrity Game:

Bert Parks: This question is about age...who is older, Dean Martin or Joey Bishop?
Charley Weaver:  I know Dean Martin drinks whiskey that is older than Joey Bishop!
(after contestant misses)
Morey Amsterdam:  Bert, you know, (the TV documentary) Twentieth Century was going to do a story on Dean Martin but they couldn't get a liquor license!

Oh by the way...there also wasn't a Paul Lynde in the pilot.  That very first center square was Jim Backus, who at the time was appearing as Thurston Howell III in Gilligan's Island.  Ernest Borgnine was the first center square when the show made it to the air on October 17, 1966.  Lynde's would permanently occupy that square in the fall of 1968, despite having appeared on the show as early as the second week of broadcast.  Rounding out the grid were actress Vera Miles and singer (and Jack Benny's alleged mistress) Giselle MacKenzie.

Bert Parks: Which of these women were never married to Mickey Rooney: Martha Vickers, Ava Gardner, or Jeanne Crain?
Abby Dalton: By process of elimination, because there were so many, I believe Jeanne Crain was not.
(after contestant gets it)
Jim Backus: I think in Mickey Rooney's case, the only safe one is Marjorie Main!
If the show looked disjointed, there's a reason for it: the E! True Hollywood Story profile of The Hollywood Squares revealed that taping session was riddled with technical and other problems.  Audience members walked out, and producers even handed out ten dollar bills to tourists at the Farmer's Mart to fill the seats.  Taping finally wrapped up at two in the morning.

Looking at the first pilot, it's actually easy to see why CBS and NBC both passed on it at first: Bert Parks' grating style and the meandering attempts at humor were not a good mix.  (There are implications that the pilot might have even been sold, or at least suggested, as a prime time entry, and perhaps no one was looking for such a show at the time.)  Fred Silverman was the head of daytime at CBS back then.  In 1976 he told Game Show Convention Center webmaster Steve Beverly, "Bert Parks was terrible as the host...If they'd offered us Peter Marshall then, I might have changed my mind."  But there were some good things there as well, like the game, the big board (always an eye-pleaser), and just the general idea that a game show could be a spring board of one-liners from multiple stars.   NBC apparently saw enough there to work with to green-light it after a second look, this time with Peter Marshall as host and some minor tweaks with the format. 

Despite opening with the 1960s NBC logo and closing with the network chimes, the pilot has one more little something in its closing credits that we never, ever saw during the Marshall years: the CBS eye.  That's because the pilot was shot at CBS Television City, where, ironically, its Whoopi-centered, Bergeron-hosted descendant would be taped 33 years later.  The show never aired in its entirety, but clips ran during the regular series' anniversary week in the 1970s.
Footnote:  Peter Marshall says in his book Backstage With the Original Hollywood Square that there was a second unaired pilot, this time featuring comedian Sandy Barron.  No word on the celebrity guests from that one, whether it was shot in color, whether it was funny or any better, or whether the tape/kinescope still exists (one source thinks he spotted it on tape in 2005).  Sandy Barron would later serve as a panelist on the Marshall version.