Description

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Hosted by Tom Kennedy, who had become one of  the "go-to" game show hosts of the 1980's, and later by Jack Berry (which is definitely different from some of the earlier formats hosted by Bert Parks) Break the Bank followed the on-going formula of letting the celebrities answer the questions..

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One of 15 squares would get chosen, and the player who sat to the left, and the player who sat above the chosen square would each give an answer to the question, one correct, and one incorrect.

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If the contestant picked the celebrity who gave the correct answer, they'd win that square and remain in control.

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The goal was to match three connecting money value boxes (100/200/300 (original) and 100/300/500 (syndication)) in a battle of the sexes type competition to win the game and you won 3 times whichever value you linked.

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Also included on the board were "blanks", "wild cards", and "bank" squares. 

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Blanks meant you lost your turn

Wild Cards were worth any value

And if you picked three of the five banks during your game, you won the "Break the Bank" money.

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Bonus Game:  (Syndicated Version Only)

It was basically a game of luck for the bonus game.    The nine stars each had a dollar value ranging from 200 to 1000 dollars, and one had a "BUST".   You picked a star and you'd win that amount of money.  You could then stop at any time, or continue picking stars, utnil you either reached $2000 (and won) or hit "BUST" and lost everything.

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Much like Peter Marshall, Tom Kennedy always seemed to have a great connection wiht the guests, and was probably the best thing about the show.   The Jack Berry version... eh, not so much.

 

But considering a board could be won with a $300 prize, the game seemed to lack that "big money" audience; however, they tried to make up for this by having as many boards as they could fit in a 30-minute time frame between the two contestants.

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And like other 'celebrity' games, there were some average stars and some great stars were usually fun to listen to when they went for their comedic answers (Avery Schrieber, Jimmie Walker,  and Ron Palilo ("Welcome Back Kotter") always seemd to be among my favorites.

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Unfortuantely ABC decided that the soap-opera audience was a better draw, and this show only lasted about 15 weeks.