Quizmania is an Australian phone-in quiz show, based on the British program of the same name, and broadcast on the Nine Network in the late night time slot (post-midnight). The show was produced from Nine's Richmond studios in Melbourne. Its main Director was Rick Maslan.
Quizmania was first broadcast live on Nine Network stations GTV, TCN, QTQ, and NTD, and affiliates NBN and WIN Television on 25 July 2006. The show was unique in that it was broadcast live to South Australia, Western Australia, and Northern Territory with the presenters welcoming SA and NT to the show half an hour after it started, due to those states being thirty minutes behind the Australian east coast, and welcoming WA 2 hours after commencement. Similarly during daylight saving months, Queensland viewers were welcomed an hour later when the broadcast began in that state.
Sometimes due to varying program schedules in each capital city or regional area, some cities and/or areas did not broadcast Quizmania while other cities and/or areas still received the broadcast.
Only contestants aged 18 or over were allowed to participate. Underage callers were a regular occurrence on the show especially during school holidays.
Programme history
When it first aired on Tuesday 25 July 2006, Quizmania was to soon run in direct competition with the established The Up-Late Game Show on Channel Ten, returning a week later on Monday 31 July, after the 2006 Big Brother series had ended with its UpLate late-night show finished. A few days after, Seven Network introduced a similar phone-in quiz show, Midnight Zoo. Both competing programmes soon ceased broadcasting – Midnight Zoo only lasted three months. Quizmania remained on air for the longest period.
During the 2007 Big Brother series, Quizmania faced competition with the return of the UpLate program (see Notable dates).
Hosts
Quizmania originally started out with three hosts, Nikki Osborne, Amy Parks and Brodie Young. In early January 2007, Katrina Conder and Suze Raymond were added to the lineup. On 12 May 2007, Nikki Osborne hosted her last Quizmania show after she announced a few days earlier that she was leaving to work on the new Channel Nine show The Nation with Mick Molloy. Amy now works as a news reporter on Seven News Melbourne.
Two hosts appeared on weekday episodes. On Fridays and Saturdays there were three hosts due to the four-hour running time.
Games
Some of the games played on Quizmania include:
Tower game
This game was created by Quizmania in Britain. It consisted of seven blank spaces increasing in value, ranging from anywhere up to $500. At the top of the tower was either be a phrase with a missing word or a topic to guess. For example, one game could be HOT _, viewers could call in and guess hot weather, hot water, hot pants, etc. Alternatively, the game could be "Boys Names Beginning With T" and viewers could call and guess Trevor, Timothy, Thierry, etc.
Games of this type came under particular criticism because they appeared specifically designed so as not to have any solid 'right or wrong' type answers. For example, the viewers might simply be asked to "name a rock band", while a graphic will appear on screen with 10 spaces to represent the 10 bands that need to be named. The problem with this is that there is no way to verify in advance what bands were actually on the list – it was down to the discretion of the Quizmania team to declare which bands are and are not on the list.
Word Search game
Viewers were to find a certain type of word in a grid. Words were written horizontally, vertically, diagonally or also back-to-front.
Words found in the grid normally won the player $50.
Beat the Break
Before January 2007, a game took place during the ad-breaks, where they gave the viewers a multiple choice question with two silly answers and the correct answer. Viewers then had to call in during the ad-breaks and, if they gave the correct answer, won $50.