7. Once, Twice, Three Times a Kennedy! (Password Plus)
Making a blunder once on national television is embarrassing, making a blunder twice on national television is really embarrassing, but making a blunder three times on national television is extremely embarrassing.
Enter Jim Narz, A.K.A Tom Kennedy, the legendary game show host who emceed such shows as Name That Tune, Split Second and You Don't Say! In 1980, Tom Kennedy took over the hosting duties of Password Plus after the late, great Allen Ludden once again became ill and sadly passed away. He is one of the best game show hosts to ever grace the television screen, and just from seeing his smile when he walked out during his introduction, you knew Tom was going to have just as much fun hosting the show as the audience was going to have watching it.
It turns out on three occasions, Tom Kennedy was having so much fun hosting Password Plus that it seemed like he wanted to be a contestant and actually play the game. For his first blunder, Kennedy had the pleasure of not being the only game show host on the stage. Both celebrity guest players were legendary hosts in their own rights as Tic-Tac-Dough host Wink Martindale and Match Game host Gene Rayburn played role reversal for a week's worth of shows. It's one thing to mess up in front of celebrity guests, but it's another to mess up in front of your game show emcee friends.
During the password "shriveled," Tom got ahead of himself and thought each pair had already given their two clues for the word and nobody guessed it. Usually, when a word is not guessed, Tom will say a clue he might have given for the password. Well, that's what Tom did for the word "shriveled." The only problem was, Gene Rayburn and his partner still had one more chance to give a clue and guess the password. Tom was always a good sport when it came to making fun of his mistakes. He'd be the first one to laugh at himself and to smile at the scenario he caused. In this instance, Rayburn provided some added humor when he asked Kennedy if he was "ever going to learn how to do this show" followed by making Tom sit in his seat while he stood behind the podium. It's fun to watch game show hosts be celebrity guests on other game shows, and this is a reason why.
Tom Kennedy blunders number two and three go hand-in-hand with each other. Later on in this list, you'll see Super Password host Bert Convy commit the same game show hosting crime, but for now, it's Tom Kennedy's turn to sit in the blunder seat.
Password Plus was unique from the original game of Password in that each of the passwords became a clue to a puzzle and each of the passwords were supposed to guide the guessers to the person, place or thing answer. This ultimately means that there was more room for error in the accidentally giving something away category. For blunder number two, Kennedy instinctively said a clue to the word "spark" since neither team guessed it. His clue was "flint." Unfortunately, Tom ended up hearing the dreaded voice from off-camera because "Flint" was, in fact, the answer to the "Password Puzzle."
Just like for blooper number one, Kennedy was a good sport by laughing at his mistake and asking celebrity guest Marcia Wallace, "Now do you know why I get the big bucks!?"
Blooper three is slightly different than blooper two but with the same results. Instead of flat out giving a clue that ended up being the answer to the puzzle, Tom made reference to the answer when talking about a clue given. The answer to the "Password Puzzle" was famous radio star Arthur Godfrey and Kennedy was talking about the clue Haleloke that was given by one of the contestants for the word "ukulele." Haleloke was a famous ukulele player who appeared on the variety series Arthur Godfrey and His Friends back in the early days of television. Kennedy just wanted to make sure Haleloke was one word and slipped by mentioning Arthur Godfrey's name. Thankfully, although he got three blooper strikes on Password Plus, Tom still continued to host game shows throughout the '80s.
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