I’m taking a break from the YouTube Game Show Classics “tradition” here to showcase a few well-known shows because a bunch of rare behind-the-scenes footage has popped up, some of it quaint and some fascinating.

This 8-mm movie (the author disabled embedding, so you’ll have to click the link to view the video) shot by an audience member at a 1979 Dick Clark $20,000 Pyramid taping is a little dizzying, but I love that opening shot of the marquee at ABC TV-15, also known as the Elysee Theatre, formerly of 202 W. 58th Street. Sets typically look smaller and cheaper in person than they do on TV, and indeed Pyramid seems pretty chintzy from this balcony view. Of course, even on TV the original Pyramid set came off as something like a basement rec room. The show’s creator and producer, Bob Stewart, was notorious for cutting corners on production costs (although the set used for Pyramid later in the 1980s was gorgeous and remains a gold standard).

Nice to have a little face time with the late, bird-flipping Ray Combs in this brief backstage look at Family Feud. I’ve always wanted to see the enormous Feud trilon from behind, and the video comes so tantalizingly close.

A 1982 local-news feature on The Price is Right is the best behind-the-scenes featurette I’ve ever seen for the show. One of the disappointing things about modern-day Price is how sloppy the crew has become. The direction isn’t as quick or reliable, the timing of the sound effects is off, the camera work is swishy. In 1982, the Mark Goodson crew, led by director Marc Breslow, ran a tight ship. That didn’t mean everything ran perfectly. I love the way they handle a malfunction on the game “Any Number”: If it screws up again, just give her the damn car and get on with it.

My favorite behind-the-scenes look, though, is this Match Game tape that includes the director’s track. The voice on the recording is the aforementioned Breslow, and I find it so engrossing to listen to Breslow’s rat-a-tat chatter. Having done the show for years, he has an instinct for the supposedly unpredictable shows and always has the cameras in the right position when the action gets a little loopy. Here are links to part two and part three.