I recently found out that this show was on radio and TV at the same time and there is a video of the radio show (not sponsored by DeSoto) online at http://www.solie.org/ClassicTV/YouBetYourLife_Name.html with the secret word of "name." It's interesting to compare the radio and TV versions with this unedited radio version where we could see what was going on around the action. The more of these I watch, or hear, the more I think Groucho was a very kind man poking gentle, if risqué fun, at the people around him. His support on his show of the couple who adopted multiracial kids (The Family Nobody Wanted) was boldly liberal for his time but then he knew about discrimination based on his being Jewish even when he was rich and famous. Sadly the racism of the time was so vicious that the couple's own family and friends, I read, prevented them from adopting an African American baby. But Groucho wanted them to win the money and leapt on the right answers if he heard them hesitantly spoken, admitting what he was doing. He openly rooted for people who could put the money to charitable use. He was a chiseler but an honest one. :) (I looked up the prize amounts on the inflation calculator to get an idea of what sort of money they could take home. One 1955 dollar equals about eight dollars now.)
Review of You Bet Your Life
