Who saw Cecil’s Straight Dope TV show, which aired on the Arts & Entertainment cable network on Sunday nights way back when?
I did. It was pretty good. I think was just a bit ahead of its time. With shows like Mythbusters, I think it’d be a good time for a comeback.
When did it air? Was Cecil as sexy as Phil in Amazing Race?
It aired in 1996.
Mike Lucas was the host.
Starring “Dopers with Webcams”! 
The one ep I saw wasn’t particularly impressive. The host was reading one of Cecil’s columns practically word for word. I suppose that might be downright fascinating for someone unfamiliar with Cecil’s work; less so for fans.
That’s what brought me here. I’d never seen the column or a Straight Dope book. I miss it, still.
Goodness gracious! Not my image of Cecil at all. If only his amanuensis Ed Zotti - a handsome devil if ever I’ve seen one - had been able to front up. He would have been able to bring so much more authenticity to the part of Cecil.
Poor Ed will never get the respect he deserves. That Cecil is such an attention whore.
No one played the part of Cecil. Lucas mentioned Cecil in the program, but the Master was never seen on camera.
I was on it!
Details.
I did. It’s how Cheez_Whia and I learned of the Dope.
Approached on the street by a guy with microphone, said he was taping a man-on-the-street segment for the Straight Dope TV show. He asked me a Straight Dope type question; obscure and esoteric and a bit twisted. Can’t for the LIFE of me remember the question, but it was one that I just happened to know the answer to.
Never saw the show.
I did. I made all of my friends and family watch it with me and they all enjoyed it. I even got a few of them to read a couple of the books after they saw the show and liked it.
The show is what made me search “the straight dope” online, thus finding this place.
I watched every show but remember very little. It was kind of dorky cool. I liked it.
Watched it but it was a pale imitation of the books.
LOVE the “Dopers with webcams” idea!
Henry and I watched it. That’s why I’m here too.
I saw it. It was dreadful. Here’s why, IMO:
- It played up the whole “Cecil Adams is God” thing way, way too much.
- The scripts basically parrotted the columns, sometimes word-for-word, IIRC. Now, I think the SD columns are *masterfully * written, but TV writing needs to be much more economical than newspaper writing and no one seemed to bother to convert one to the other.
- The host was mediocre. He was not so witty or watchable to carry the whole show himself, which he basically had to do because…
- The show seldom left the crappy, lonely, uninspired little set that was supposed to be the host’s dwelling – an unfinished basement room, IIRC. All of today’s reality shows get outside to interact with the world and other people for a good reason.
- They tried to get cutesy with some animated little stick figure man that would walk around the frame of the screen and do or write things. I forget exactly what his role was except that he was annoying as all hell – like Microsoft’s old paperclip assistant thingee was.
On the whole I found the show cheap and tedious. It had the stink of a public access TV show.
I saw it and was not impressed. I was put off by the fact that, as mentioned above, Mike tended to recite the columns word for word. Had it dealt with different topics that hadn’t already appeared in the column it might have been better.