Body Language was a television game show which aired from June 4, 1984, until January 3, 1986, on CBS. Tom Kennedy hosted this Mark Goodson production. Johnny Olson announced until his death in 1985; Gene Wood and Bob Hilton shared the announcing duties afterward.

The premise of the show centered around the party game charades. The idea was that two teams of two players each worked to solve puzzles by solving individual clues - which had to be acted, rather than spoken out. Each team consisted of one contestant and one celebrity player.

Main game

Round One
Each team gets to play one puzzle in each round. The celebrity with the new player starts the game. The player goes to the guessing area, and the celebrity to the acting pit. In 60 seconds, the celebrity tries to convey up to five different words or phrases. The celebrity may not talk (the round ends if he/she does). The celebrity may pass anytime, and come back if time remains. After all five items are guessed, or time expires, attention is turned to the puzzle.

Any items that were guessed in the acting portion go into the puzzle. The puzzle is a sentence with seven blanks in it; that describes a person, place or thing. The blanks are filled, and the player tries to guess the identity. A right guess earns $100. A wrong guess means the other player enters the game. He chooses a blank to fill, and offers a guess. The process goes back and forth until someone solves the puzzle.


Round Two
Round two swaps roles meaning that the contestants give and the celebrities receive. (After a year on the air, a $500 bonus was awarded if the team could get all five in the 60 seconds.) Puzzles in this round are worth $250; and the first team to reach $500 or more wins the game.


Playoff
If neither team gets to $500 after four puzzles (two puzzles in both rounds), a playoff puzzle is played. The contestants are shown a shorter puzzle with no acting involved, and the players take turns picking blanks to fill in. This puzzle is also worth $250, and the first player to solve the puzzle wins the game.


Sweepstakes
The winning team chose who would give clues, and who would receive in the bonus game. The team has 60 more seconds to guess up to ten words at $100 each.

The player could turn those hundreds into thousands by getting three more words in 20 seconds. Failing to do so still kept the money won in the first stage.

The maximum total in this round is $10,000.

Players stayed on the show until they won the game six times, or lost twice.


Notes
The show was based on another Goodson-Todman game show in 1975 called Showoffs with the late Bobby Van as the host (originally Larry Blyden was going to be the host, but was replaced by Bobby after Larry died). The show was similar to Body Language but it had no puzzles.

Later in the main game in the show's run, parenthesis were added to the two words that wern't acted out. For the first several weeks, all words were not in parenthesis making this confusing at times. Also players stay on the show until they won five games or lost once.

In the summer of 1985, Body Language had a month-long Teen Week. The teens played the standard game, and each won a minimum of $2,500, anything over that amount went into a bond that matured on the player's 18th birthday. (If the player didn't win $2,500 through the game, the total was raised to that amount.)

The show used the same sound effects that can be heard on The Price is Right. Included were the ubiquitous "Ding!" which was used for correct answers and (repeatedly) when the player won his/her game, and also the "groan" buzzer (also known as "Mrrp," named after the sound it made) indicating that the time had run out (this sound is also used in similar situations on The Price is Right).