Noel's House Party

Noel's House Party
Show title card (1991–96)
Format	Live entertainment
Created by	BBC
Written by	Malcolm Williamson Noel Edmonds Charlie Adams Garry Chambers Richard Lewis Stuart Silver Louis Robinson
Directed by	Guy Freeman Duncan Cooper Michael Leggo Phil Chilvers
Presented by	Noel Edmonds
Country of origin	United Kingdom
No. of series	8
No. of episodes	169
Production
Executive producer(s)	Michael Leggo
Producer(s)	Mike Brosnan Jonathan Beazley
Editor(s)	John Sillito
Running time	60 Mins
Broadcast
Original channel	BBC One
Picture format	4:3 (1991–98) 16:9 (1998–99)
Original run	23 November 1991 – 20 March 1999
Chronology
Preceded by	Noel's Saturday Roadshow (1988–90)

Noel's House Party was a BBC television light entertainment show hosted by Noel Edmonds that was broadcast live on Saturday evenings throughout the 1990s. It was set in a large house in the fictional village of Crinkley Bottom, leading to much innuendo. The show was broadcast during the autumn-spring season (October/November - March). It was the successor show to Noel's Saturday Roadshow, and carried over some of its regular features such as the Gunge Tank, the Gotcha Oscar and Wait 'Till I Get You Home.

The show had many regular guests posing as fictional villagers, including Frank Thornton and Vicki Michelle. The show gave birth to Mr. Blobby in the Gotcha segment. The character became well known, ruining the premise of the segment, but Blobby still made appearances. There was also a contrived rivalry between Noel and Tony Blackburn. In addition, many episodes featured one-off guest stars, including Michael Crawford as Frank Spencer, who came in to find the whole audience dressed as Frank, and Ken Dodd in a highwayman's outfit - 'Going cheap at the Maxwell sale' - as Noel's long lost 'twin', Berasent.

It won a Bronze Rose of Montreux in 1994.

Regular features

Gotcha

Originally called the "Gotcha Oscars" until the threat of legal action from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (which also prompted a redesign of the award)^{[citation needed]}, hidden camera practical jokes were played on celebrities. Notable victims were Barbara Windsor, Carol Vorderman, Jill Dando, Dave Lee Travis, Richard Whiteley, Eddie Large, Samantha Janus, Yvette Fielding, Status Quo and the Queens Park Rangers football club, although in the final series Dale Winton turned the tables on Edmonds with a surprise challenge which ended with a gunging. Another notable victim was Annabel Giles, who was the first victim who managed to spot the hidden camera, which had been placed in the back of a car, which meant the prank backfired.

Wait 'til I Get You Home

Parents watch pre-recorded footage of their children being interviewed by Noel, where they try to guess the answers they gave. A similar slot, The Secret World of the Teenager, replaced Wait 'til I Get You Home in later series.

The Lyric Game

In early series, celebrity duos competed against one another to complete songs after being given the first line.

Grab a Grand

A phone-in competition where a viewer would choose from three currencies (aiming to select the one of the greatest value of money), and a celebrity (usually a sports star) would collect as many notes as possible from a box that blew the money around. Noel asked the caller three questions based on the week's news and each correct answer gave the celebrity 20 seconds in the money box, up to a total of 60 seconds. The game was changed in later series and included variations such as "Grab A Granny", "Grab A Grand Piano" and "Grab A Grand National" with bouncing kings and queens with bungee cords, used in the 100th episode. The competition was replaced by Cash for Questions towards the end of the show's run.

Cash for Questions

Similar to Grab a Grand, a celebrity goes into the pitch black 'basement', and the winning caller would direct the celebrity to the bags of money with help of an infrared camera. Named after a political scandal.

NTV

A camera would be hidden in the home of a member of the public, so that they would be on-air at the specified moment, and Noel would talk to them.^[1]

Sofa Soccer

From the final season of the series a similar idea to Bernie the Bolt in The Golden Shot, a viewer from home would attempt to score goals by manoeuvring the machine firing the huge football ("left", "right", "shoot"). The jingle music to this game was based on Crazy Horses by The Osmonds.

The Big Pork Pie

A member of the studio audience has their embarrassing secrets revealed. Seated in a large prop pork pie, the victim would be connected to a lie detector machine (although in reality, this too was a prop). The victim had been set up by their friends or family who had provided the secrets.

The Gunge Tank

Carried over from Noel's Saturday Roadshow, this was put to various uses, usually gunging celebrities or unpopular members of the public after a phone vote which was carried out during the duration of the show - the gunging usually being the final item before the closing credits. Celebrities include Anthea Turner, Jenni Hull, Carol Vorderman, Edwina Currie, Gloria Hunniford, Jeremy Clarkson, Samantha Janus, Anneka Rice (twice), Annabel Giles and Ulrika Jonsson.

The 'gunge' was in fact a food thickening agent called Natrasol, coloured with various food dyes.^[2] The gunge tank got progressively more sophisticated in subsequent seasons - the Season 1 version of the gunge tank was effectively the same as in Saturday Roadshow. However for Season 2, the tank also pumped foam from underneath the chair before the gunge was released. For Season 3, the chair holding the victim was on a conveyor device which would take the victim through revolving car wash brushes before the actual gunging. In Seasons 4 & 5, it was developed into the "Trip Around The Great House", where the victim would be placed on a miniature railway that journeyed through the studio set, finishing up in the Giant Fireplace where the gunge would finally be released.

For the final seasons, a selected member of the audience would be gunged by a tank lowered from the studio rafters or a retracting chair which would lower into the undercroft of the studio, gunge the victim and then elevate back up into the audience position. Edmonds was himself usually gunged once a series - usually in the final episode of the season.

Number Cruncher

A modified phonebox (with gungetank and LCD screen) was placed somewhere in Britain. The number to get into the box was given, and the first person to get into the box got to play the game. Once in, they had 45 seconds to rearrange the code given on the LCD screen to get out. If a contestant won the game, they then had an opportunity to take the "gamble". By pulling the handle, they could either double their money, have random objects dropped on them, or receive "a surprise" which resulted in the player getting gunged. However, if they ran out of time, the player got gunged. People kept on pressing '9' to try and earn a lot of money, and people had to bring a stupid object.

Beat Your Neighbour

Neighbours would choose what prizes they wanted from each other's house, for every question answered, they were put on a tray. Then each family were asked questions alternately, if the question was right the belongings were pushed to their side. Controversial because of the two-second delay in the video link.

My Little Friend

Children from the public of Primary school age were led into a room with hidden cameras and two puppets set up to initially appear dormant in the room, one voiced by Edmonds. The puppets would 'awaken' and hold improvised conversations with the children.

The Hot House

Members of the public and sports celebrities would compete against each other on exercise machines, which were hooked up to gunge tanks.

Mr Blobby

Main article: Mr Blobby

In 1992 during series 2 of NHP, Mr Blobby started as a tool for Noel Edmonds to play Gotcha practical jokes on celebrities, but soon became popular and made appearances in many shows. His popularity soon resulted in him having his own TV show.

Demise

After several changes, the show's initially huge popularity declined. The theme tune changed in 1996, and set redesigns followed. Noel pulled the show in 1998 after apparent disagreements with the BBC producers and claiming it wasn't good enough. He returned for one final series.

It's an overworked expression when people say it's the end of an era but for BBC Television, for the Entertainment Department, for me and possibly you, it really is the end of an era. I hope your memory will be very kind to us. After 169 [shows]... bye.

- Noel Edmonds' final words on the last ever House Party (1999) before he got foamed from a fire extinguisher by Freddie Starr.

Transmissions

Series	Start date	End date	Episodes
1	23 November 1991	28 March 1992	18
2	24 October 1992	13 March 1993	21
3	23 October 1993	26 March 1994	23
4	22 October 1994	25 March 1995	21
5	21 October 1995	30 March 1996	21
6	19 October 1996	29 March 1997	22
7	18 October 1997	21 March 1998	21
8	17 October 1998	20 March 1999	18

References

1. ^ Palmer, Gareth (2003). Discipline and liberty: television and governance. Manchester University Press. p. 149. ISBN 9780719066931. 
2. ^ Judy Rumbold, "Crinkly twinkly cuddly nutcase", The Guardian, 21 December 1992.

External links

• Noel's House Party at the Internet Movie Database
• Noel's House Party at BFI
• Noel's Garden Party at BFI
• Noel's House Party at UKGameshows.com