Roy Castle: now you mention it, I think he did fill-in actually.
He did indeed, in November 1975, and when he died they showed clips from it on the tribute show they did for him, with Brucie saying how good he was. I've actually seen the whole show and he is really good at it.
What seems a bit bizarre from a modern perspective is that the Gen Game - both in the seventies and also during Brucie's nineties run - was usually recorded in the week of transmission. I remember in that 1994 series, as well as the episode presented by Davidson, there was also another episode in the middle of the run that was a clip show, with Brucie coming on at the start to say they thought that as it was his last series they'd like to take a look back at the entire run, although I recall reading it was a very late substitute for a proper show. Indeed I remember in the papers at the time they reported on that and the Davidson episode by saying the production team were all very concerned because he was getting so old and ill. Just the two decades early.
That said, there used to be an episode from the seventies on YouTube where Brucie was ill so Anthea and Arthur Negus, who was presumably there to be a guest, came on to apologise and introduce a repeat.
Those original titles from that era seem a lot more like something you'd expect to see from a day time show of the time.
Also I always thought it was odd how similar the set was to the National Lottery Live set.
That set was bloody awful, and they could never do anything on it either because the neon sign and the stairs got in the way, it's no surprise that the following series featured a much simpler set. The titles are indeed quite nicely done - although the logo reveal at the end is a bit awkward - but the theme certainly isn't very dynamic for a Saturday night.
That first series also included the WORST ever attempt at a catchphrase before the conveyor belt when Jim would say "If you don't know what's happening now..." and the audience would have to shout "you're already dead!". No surprise they dropped that one sharpish. Quite a lot of the frippery was dropped from series two, when Guy Freeman and Jonathan Beazley swapped jobs with Freeman going to produce Noel's House Party and Beazley to the Gen Game. And, I think, the House Party was never as good when Freeman took over.
