Call My Bluff is a British panel game show based on the short-lived US version of the same name. It was originally hosted by Robin Ray and later, most notably, by Robert Robinson. Its most prominent panellist was Frank Muir. The theme music for the show was "Ciccolino" by Norrie Paramor.

Format The game comprised two teams of three (a captain and two guests) who would compete to earn points by identifying the correct definitions of obscure words. The teams took turns to give three definitions, one true and two bluffs, while the other team attempted to determine which was correct. If the correct choice was made the team earned one point, if not, the bluffing team earned one point. Both teams took turns bluffing and determining definitions.

Examples of words used in the show, taken from a 1972 book published in connection with it, include queach, strongle, ablewhacket, hickboo, jargoon, zurf, morepork, and jirble. The word queach was defined by the contestants as "a malicious caricature", "a cross between a quince and a peach" and "a mini-jungle of mixed vegetation" (with the last definition being the true one).

Broadcast history Call My Bluff originally aired on BBC2 from 17 October 1965 to 22 December 1988.

Robert Morley and Frank Muir captained the teams. Morley was later succeeded by Patrick Campbell, and Arthur Marshall took over in 1980. Various celebrities also stood in as team captains, including Kenneth Horne, Kenneth Williams and Alan Melville. The original series finished after Marshall's death, although a general change in the tone and atmosphere of broadcasting at the time may also have affected its temporary demise. For the majority of this run (from 1967 onwards) the host was Robert Robinson.

The show was resurrected in 1996 after an eight-year rest (apart from one special edition on 16 April 1994 for BBC Two's thirtieth birthday, which still featured Robert Robinson, but this time with Joanna Lumley as a team captain opposite Frank Muir), now as a daytime series on BBC1. It began airing on 13 May 1996 with Alan Coren and Sandi Toksvig as the team captains and Bob Holness replacing Robinson as chairman.

In 2003, Toksvig was replaced by the journalist Rod Liddle, and newsreader Fiona Bruce took the chair. The series finished again on 17 July 2005.

Call My Bluff returned for a special during the BBC's 24 Hour Panel People in aid of Comic Relief 2011, with Alex Horne, Roisin Conaty, Russell Tovey, Tim Key, Sarah Cawood and David Walliams participating. The host was Angus Deayton.

Transmissions BBC2 Series Start date End date Episodes 1 17 October 1965 29 June 1966 37 2 2 October 1966 14 April 1967 26 3 1 October 1967 7 July 1968 39 4 24 April 1969 28 May 1970 59 5 14 September 1970 25 January 1971 20 6 14 June 1971 7 February 1972 34 7 13 November 1972 7 May 1973 26 8 3 September 1973 28 January 1974 22 9 30 September 1974 24 March 1975 26 10 29 April 1976 12 August 1976 16 11 29 April 1977 12 August 1977 16 12 22 March 1978 2 August 1978 18 13 2 January 1979 15 May 1979 20 14 13 January 1980 30 March 1980 12 15 3 July 1980 4 September 1980 10 16 13 February 1981 26 July 1981 20 17 28 January 1982 17 June 1982 20 18 11 April 1983 4 September 1983 20 19 23 January 1984 20 August 1984 29 20 19 October 1984 21 December 1984 10 21 29 October 1985 31 December 1985 10 22 8 January 1987 28 May 1987 20 23 10 September 1987 10 December 1987 14 24 14 April 1988 16 June 1988 9 25 26 October 1988 22 December 1988 8 One-off 16 April 1994 1

BBC1 Series Start date End date Episodes 1 13 May 1996 31 May 1996 14 2 2 September 1996 10 January 1997 80 3 1 April 1997 16 July 1997 58 4 2 September 1997 3 April 1998 131 5 5 January 1999 1 April 1999 65 23 May 2000 6 6 September 1999 17 December 1999 75 22 May 2000 7 24 May 2000 30 May 2002 77 8 19 May 2003 1 July 2003 30 9 1 June 2004 17 July 2005 20

Season 4 was due to premiere on 1 September 1997, but was postponed due to the death of Diana, Princess of Wales the night before. It was replaced by a delayed Going for a Song.

Book Call my Bluff by Frank Muir and Patrick Campbell, published by Eyre Methuen, London, 1972.

Reception Critical response Jon E. Lewis and Penny Stempel described Call My Bluff as a "civilised panel game" built on "verbal deception", with teams offering "plausible but false definitions".

References in other works

An episode of the early-1980s LWT sketch-comedy series End of Part One parodied the show as Scrape My Barrel, where panelists had to figure out the meaning of the word working class. The show (and in particular its host, Robert Robinson) was the subject of a sketch by Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie in the second series of A Bit of Fry and Laurie. In the "Europe" episode of QI (series E), a segment was featured entitled "Call My Euro Bluff", featuring stories about laws in the EU. The panel then had to decide whether each story was true or a "bløff" (Stephen Fry pronounced it "blerff"). Fry frequently drops into the impersonation of Robinson that he used in the sketch from A Bit of Fry and Laurie. In the Doctor Who episode "Bad Wolf" Call My Bluff is mentioned as one of the games hosted in the game station. In May 2014 the quirks of the show were lampooned by Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse in BBC Two's satirical Harry and Paul's Story of the Twos, where the show was given the name "Speech Impediment" and the word chosen for the panel was paedophile.

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