History and Gameplay
Raise the Roof was one of the first game shows to exploit the lifting of the Independent Broadcasting Authority's prize limits, by giving away a large, valuable house as the star prize. The show debuted on 2 September 1995 and lasted twelve episodes, with the final broadcast on 13 January 1996. The format featured several rounds of questions which progressively whittled the contestant pool from six to one. The final round offered the house as the grand prize, with cash amounts awarded as consolation prizes at each stage of the competition.
The program made little impact with the public and was not recommissioned. A typical audience was 6.1 million viewers as opposed to 13.8 million for BBC One's Casualty. Raise the Roof has since been described as the last example of the era when it was seen as "vulgar" to give away large sums of money and more appropriate to give away prizes of the same value instead. Another criticism was that the questions were too easy to generate real suspense, and the pacing was too slow to keep viewers interested.
Read more about this topic: Raise The Roof (game Show)
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