Secrets Out!!!
Contents |
Host
Johnny Ball (1985)
Mike Smith (1986-87)
Co-hosts
The cast of Grange Hill
Broadcast
BBC 1, 1985-7
Synopsis
A panel consisting of four members of the cast from Grange Hill (a children's school-based soap opera) had to watch a guest or celebrity perform a mime of a particular hobby of theirs.
The panel had to ask the contestant/celebrity various questions to try and guess what he/she was miming, but beware... if the panel mentioned a particular word during the program, they were all gunged from above! If the panel got ten wrong guesses, they lost. Basically another version of What's My Line? (including the contestants winning a certificate if they beat the panel), but still fairly entertaining in its own way. In some series at least, contestants were also given 'Secrets Out' pens and/or sweatshirts.
The answers to each secret was displayed on the screen for a few seconds before each round, and the viewers had the option to look away if they didn't want to know it.
In the lesser-recalled Johnny Ball era, the panellists were unknown stage school kids (some of whom were very irritating). Mentioning the secret word meant that the panellist concerned won a special prize - a Walkman or something like that, brought in by the show's robot, Malcolm.
Here's a sample Radio Times billing:
Friday 10th May 1985
BBC1
4.35 SECRETS OUT!!!
Chairman JOHNNY BALL
A duel to the death (or until someone loses!) between the panel CATHERINE ELCOMBE, ALISON BETTLES, STEPHEN MULLEN and DARREN TRAYNOR and this week's hobbyists.
Can you make heads for tails of these cryptic clues?
- quite clear to start, cloudy later
- all plain sailing in the end
- gives him a kick in his goodyear
- one foot above another
Designer ROCHELLE SELWYN
Producer IAN OLIVER
Key moments
Inevitable "host gets gunged on last show of the series" moment when the gunge word was "goodbye". Anne Robinson take note.
Probably the most surprising celebrity-hobby revealed on the programme was that of Geoff Capes - he bred budgies!
Trivia
And yes, it really did have an unnecessarily urgent three exclamation marks in the title.
