When readers have asked about what’s been the secret to my farm parents’ long lives, vitality and sharp minds while living to their mid-90s, my number one answer is always their routine of reading newspapers daily (and working the puzzles), followed by the second close-ranking reason, which is faithfully watching “The Price is Right” game show for a half century.
Dad passed last December at age 96, while Mom is continuing their same healthy and active habits.
“The Price is Right,” the perennial CBS game show favorite, will celebrate its 55th anniversary next year, since its debut on Sept. 4, 1972. The show keeps minds engaged and especially aware of the prices of today’s world, even if you’re not still regularly booking vacation trips, shopping for new cars or strolling grocery aisles to find out the price of Turtle Wax or Rice-A-Roni (the San Francisco treat!).
Even if the path of our daily lives never takes us to Television City Studios in Hollywood where the original game show is taped (although Dad’s older sister, my late Aunt Judy, once wore one of those signature price tag name stickers as a studio audience member), there’s a much closer travel opportunity to be part of the excitement.
“The Price is Right Live” is making its first visit to the stage space at 7 p.m. Oct. 17 at Hard Rock Casino Northern Indiana.
It’s not the televised show version with host Drew Carey. But it’s the same licensed venture with all of the favorite pricing games surrounded by the oh-so-familiar set and studio look, and even the same recognizable theme music.
For years, this touring game show franchise was a sold-out favorite at Star Plaza Theatre in Merrillville, making its debut in 2012 with traveling game show host Todd Newton, and then returning in 2013 with Newton and even a third time in 2015, the latter with Marc Summers stepping in as the smiling host. In more recent years, “The Price is Right Live” tour has played the performance stage at The Venue at Horseshoe Casino in Hammond in 2018 and 2025.
Emmy Award-winning game show host Newton, 56, hosted the Las Vegas incarnation, which was anchored from 2006 to 2013 at the former Bally’s Casino and Hotel property along the famed strip. Newton, originally from St. Louis and then Los Angeles before moving to Scottsdale, Arizona, and now based in Key West, Florida, is a familiar face from his TV hosting duties on “Family Game Night.”
“It’s just like everything you see on TV, only without all of the television cameras and commercial delays,” Newton said.
“The stage version is the creation of the same production company that has done the TV game show for all these decades.”
While the classic set used for the Bally’s location was an actual “retired” set from the CBS daytime television run when it was replaced for an update years ago, Newton said the traveling set recreation resembles everything seen by viewers today who tune in for favorite challenges.
“We bring all of the favorite games, which we rotate from night to night, like Plinko, Cliff Hangers, complete with the yodeling mountain-climber, the Shell Game, all waiting for audiences to win using their pricing knowledge,” Newton said.
“And of course, we bring The Big Wheel and all of the usual Showcase Showdown elements. Over the years, there’s been more new pricing games added to the TV version. I think they are up to 115 games now. But our tour brings all the favorites, just a bit scaled down to fit in our 18-wheeler semi to transport the set. For example, our ‘big wheel’ is just about 85% to scale of the wheel you see on TV.”
More Top Picks Best Japanese Tumblers
All guests, with audience members invited to arrive early starting at 5 p.m. to register before the show’s 7 p.m. start, even wear the game show’s trademark “giant price tag” name tag contestant stickers. Guests are eligible to be called “on down” to “contestants’ row” by scanning a QR code set up in the theater lobby.
He said the only slight difference is the advantage that more contestants, as many as 20 at a time, are allowed to be called to “come on down” to contestants’ row with the hopes of making it on stage to play pricing games.
As for the prizes, the valuable winnings mimic everything from the TV show, from cash and appliances to vacations, and even cars.
Newton said when he began his hosting position for the stage version a decade ago, the one-and-only Bob Barker, who died at age 99 in August 2023, trained him to always be “game-ready.”
“Bob Barker mentored me, not just with ‘The Price Is Right,’ but how to be a prepared game show host,” Newton said.
“I feel so fortunate I’ve gotten to meet and know quite a few of the game show host greats, like Bob Eubanks of ‘The Newlywed Game,’ who’s 88 now, and Peter Marshall, who we just lost at age 98 in August 2024. I never got to meet Richard Dawson from ‘Family Feud.’ “
Newton said one game show host he met as a colleague turned out to be in a situation that made for an awkward introduction as competitors auditioning for hosting duties.
“Peter Tomarken was a nice guy and the host of the original version of the game show ‘Press Your Luck’ with the whammy characters that steal contestants’ money,” Newton recounted.
“Well, years after the original run, cable’s Game Show Network decided to resurrect the game show in 2002 and call it ‘Whammy! The All-New Press Your Luck.’ They narrowed the hosting auditions down to two people, myself and Peter Tomarken, who was the original show host. They shot TV pilots with both of us as the host and showed it to a focus group, and they opted to select me. That was a little uncomfortable.”
Peter Tomarken died at age 63 in 2006.
Tickets for “The Price is Right Live” at Hard Rock Casino start at $40.35, and the show is all reserved seating for ages 21 and older. Tickets are available in person from the box office, at www.ticketmaster.com/event/05006483C9B2E7DB, by calling 219-228-2383, or at www.hardrockcasinonorthernindiana.com.
Philip Potempa is a journalist, published author and radio show host on WJOB 1230 AM. He can be reached at [email protected].