The Golden Shot

This long-running Saturday night game show hosted was mainly hosted by Bob Monkhouse with the assistance of The Golden Girls – Carol Dilworth, (Chesney Hawke’s mother) Andrea Lloyd and Anita Richardson initially, all easily out-shone by regular helper Anne Aston.

The show featured contestants selected from home viewers and the studio audience. The contestants had to guide a blindfolded cameraman on the studio ‘tele-bow’ (a crossbow tied to the camera) and instruct him when to fire at picture targets. Home viewers did so by telephone in view of their TV set and studio contestants from a phone booth in the ATV studio watching a monitor. The bow was loaded by the show’s feature character, Bernie the Bolt.

A typical game would commence with the immortal words from Bob, ‘Bernie, the bolt!’ The following inexact instructions from the contestant to the blindfolded cameraman would follow; “Up a bit . . . left a bit . . . right a bit . . . up a bit . . . up a bit . . . down a bit . . .FIRE!”

Successful shots resulted in prizes of increasing value; unsuccessful ones earned fairly derisory consolation prizes. When the programme gained popularity with Bob Monkhouse presenting, Lew Grade moved the show to Sunday afternoons, a traditional graveyard slot in the schedules that would only scrape 2-3 million viewers. The programme transformed the schedules, picking up 16 million at its peak.
Due to the phone-in element the show had to be live and this resulted in numerous gaffes.

One studio contestant managed to knock herself out while on the toilet. A clergyman who had criticised the show for being unsafe was invited to the studio, only to be hit by a bow that ricocheted off the studio lights. Another stray bolt hit a female contestant, who was saved thanks to her shoulder pads. One contestant couple went for a cup of tea during the live show so the hostess had to grab some quick replacements and introduce them to the unknowing host. And on one famous occasion, it was discovered that a phone-in contestant was trying to direct the crossbow from a telephone box and looking across the street into a TV shop.

Trivia
“Bernie, the bolt” Originally it was “Heinz, the bolt” but the original armourer, format inventor Heinz Schmid, went back to his home country. His replacement was a studio technician called Derek, Bob Monkhouse told him to choose a name that made it alliterative with bolt, so he plumped for the pseudonym Bernie.

Hosts
Jackie Rae (original host, 1967)
Bob Monkhouse (1967-71)
Norman Vaughan [*]
Charlie Williams [*] (1973-74)
Bob Monkhouse [*] (again, 1975)

ITV1 Network Saturday 28 April 6:25 PM to 7:30 PM