I've watched several episodes of Match Game and Match Game PM recently, and I noticed that no one ever refers to Charles
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jhowerton-2 — 20 years ago(December 28, 2005 10:05 PM)
Watch more Match Game! It's never stated, but CNR's sexuality is slyly alluded to often on the show, usually for laughs. I do remember one episode where Gene Rayburn asked Charles if he would like to comment on Anita Bryant. Charles delined. And when Charles would do his "butch" voice, the gag of course was that CNR wasn't particularly butch. Most gay jokes on Match Game was good natured, like when Brett Somers would call Charles "Mary." But there are a few uncomfortable moments. I loved Richard Dawson on the show, but often his jabs at Brett and Charles came across as mean spirited.
CNR would sometimes play with gay humor on his5b4 many Tonight Show appearances. I remember one sketch where Johnny Carson was trying to purchase a last minute airplane ticket. Charles played the ticketing agent, and the gag was that he kept asking Johnny increasingly more ridiculous questions - smoking or non-smoking, vegetarian or non-vegetarian, married or single, etc - causing Johnny to miss his flight. At one point he asks, "gay section or straight section," apparently an ad-lib because Johnny fell apart.
So while Charles wasn't exactly out in the seventies, he wasn't completely in the closet either.
-Jay -
NYJETSJUNKIE42 — 20 years ago(February 24, 2006 12:17 AM)
i just recently saw a match game episode ,where the question was about charles ,i cant remmber how it went but it was something like charles was a blank .. most of the panel put the word fairy .. they knew he was gay .
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unhappyfunball — 19 years ago(January 16, 2007 02:14 PM)
Just saw that episode today: The question was
"Charles wanted to wear a disguise at Halloween so he went as "BLANK" "
The contestant answered "Brett"
Brett said "a fairy"
Charles said "Brett&5b4quot;
and Richard said "a Queen Fairy" After insulting Brett by saying that there is no need to dress as her since she thinks its Halloween everday.
It was very funny, and obvious that those close to him knew he was gay.
I remember watching this show as a kid and thinking to myself, that guy is a gay. It never seemed like he was trying to hide it. -
mrjoanofarc — 20 years ago(March 25, 2006 08:32 AM)
Wow, thanks for the Johnny Carson story! I was too young to remember his late-night show (I'm 20 now), so it's not my fault, but I'm really sad to have missed moments like that with Mr. Reilly. That sounded hilarious!!! I wonder that clip is on DVD somewhere
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Will-35 — 20 years ago(March 26, 2006 12:47 PM)
The world was a different place back then.. CNR was about as out as anyone could have been without being fired. He was trying to walk that thin line between being "out" (which wasn't even a word we used back then) and being "employed"
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princess_kaya — 19 years ago(April 21, 2006 06:12 PM)
While this doesn't really mean whether Charles was "out" or not, one of my favorite lines of the entire show and got both Brett and Gene pretty much rolling:
Charles: What's the biggest fruit you can get, present company excluded?
"Blood is simply the soul's tear" -
vexner — 19 years ago(August 14, 2006 11:11 PM)
I've noticed that in some episodes Charles is really "up" and funny and that's when some of the jokes betw Brett, Gene & Charles veer as close towards gay humor as you were going to get in 70s daytime TV, but in other episodes Charles is more subdued and perhaps not in such a good mood, and his friends seem to pick up on it and stay away from the gay innuendos for the time being.
Anyway, I always figured that it must have been quite frustrating to be someone who is so naturally funny and entertaining and silly, but to have to restrain oneself so much in order to conform to the restrictive guidelines of broadcast TV (and society in general) of the times in which this series was being made.
All I know is that if CNR is on any given
Match Game
episode, we definitely stick around and watch it, but if he's away for the day, well, then, we just might skip it.
btw:
non-judgement day is near -
ninjajo1 — 19 years ago(December 28, 2006 02:10 PM)
The most obvious one I remember is when the question was:
"You may not know this, but I heard that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid are BLANK."
The contestant answers "Gay". While the audience's laughter is dying down, Brett leans over to Charles and says, "Some people ARE, you know!"
So rofl-worthy. -
NicelyMalicious — 18 years ago(May 29, 2007 02:25 PM)
Did that incident with Fannie Flagg really happen? See, I don't like Brett Somers. She always comes across as being genuinely mean-spirited. I usually just try to ignore her and watch the panelists I do like, especially my favourite: Charles Nelson Reilly.
Every episode I've seen has contained a lot of innuendo - at least half of which comes from CNR himself - about his sexuality. I think I've just always recognised that he was gay because of
Match Game
.
He definitely did rock, and he will definitely be missed! -
tbx5959 — 12 years ago(November 20, 2013 12:07 PM)
It always b68is a fine line, a strip that folds back on itself, between flaming gay guy and ladies man - they really act and behave similar. I guess since it's mostly peacocking. The majority of men gay and straight don't behave like that.
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trav23-1 — 19 years ago(December 29, 2006 10:21 PM)
one of the episodes that was on tonight, brett said she changed her mind as she was writing a second card. two questions later, as gene was headed back towards the contestants, charles says "i changed my mind" and gene answered "well, that's a woman's perogative."
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BlackJack_B — 19 years ago(March 09, 2007 03:56 PM)
I have to agree with the comment of the poster who said Richard Dawson could deliver a convincing stereotypical gay persona on occasion for laughs. He did it often in his prime years on Match Game. I think he did a better job than even CNR. Of course, he started cutting it out when he started hosting Family Feud on the side. Watch GSN on occasion and you might see Dawson's dead-on portrayal.
CNR had that dead giveaway grin on his face that didn't hide anything.