While it's true that Australia perfected the format of this show, it was actually created in America. It debuted in its original format on NBC in September 1969 with Jack Kelly as host. He left the show in August 1971 and was replaced by Joe Garagiola. While the daytime version went off the air in July 1973, it came back in weekly nighttime two months later, and it ran like that for a year. It came back with the perfected format to NBC in January 1983 with Jim Perry as host. His original assistant was Sally Julian, but she was replaced within a few months by Lee Menning. Menning herself left in December 1984, and was replaced by Summer Bartholomew. In addition to the daytime version running until March 1989, there was a daily nighttime version that ran from January 1985-September 1986. It came back to America under "Temptation" with Rossi Morreale as host in September 2007, but it failed miserably, and was off the air by May 2008.
I can remember one of the big prize winners didn't think much of the fact that the BMW had a warning for ice on the road. Not something that is a common problem in Australia.
LOL! I know nothing about Skippy the Bush Kangaroo (who is on the Fame Game board), except that a couple of times recently, a small portion of the opening sequence was played on the American late night talk show "The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson". I've heard that Craig's show runs in Australia on Eleven.
