RTVE is getting nostalgic, and after the success of Grand Prix del verano, it has decided to bring back another old program for the autumn schedule: Cifras y letras. The 2 of the public channel will once again broadcast this contest that premiered on February 18, 1991 and that remained on the air for five years. Unlike Grand Prix, which has recovered the program and its presenter, Ramón García, at the head of Cifras y letras Elisenda Roca will not return, now to Saber y ganar together with the incombustible Jordi Hurtado, but Aitor Albizua.
According to El Confidencial Digital, RTVE and the current production company of Cifras y letras (Producciones Quart), which also produces Saber y ganar, have reached an agreement to bring the historic contest back to life. It will be broadcast on La 2 from Monday to Thursday at 9.30pm. The new presenter, Aitor Albizua, had been left without El comodín, after the public corporation did not renew his contract and after deciding that in the evening contest there will be a magazine to fight against Ana Rosa’s new program Quintana, in the afternoons of Telecinco.
Cifras y letras will compete directly with El hormiguero, presented by Pablo Motos, on Antena 3, which is the leading program in this time slot. It seems that the rest of the channels have made it their goal for the new season to fight for this time slot. Telecinco plans a program with Jorge Javier Vázquez after the disappearance of Sálvame. La 1 maintains the series 4 stars, and now La 2 recovers this contest.
Cifras y letras is a quiz based on the French show Des chiffres et des lettres. In Spain, after moving to TVE’s La 2, it was broadcast on several autonomous television stations between 2002 and 2013. If the five years that the program was on air on La 2, the only presenter was Elisenda Roca, when moving to the autonomous regions was presented, among others, by Paco Lodeiro, Goyo González and Paola Bontenpí.
The mechanics of the show are as follows: two contestants compete alternately, the new contestant starts and the champion from the previous show continues. This turn determines who takes the points in the event of a tie in each test. In the version that was broadcast on La 2 almost 20 years ago, there were ten tests that were alternating.
As for numbers, the first test had to obtain an integer from 101 to 999 using arithmetic operations of six numbers. The winner of an exact number was awarded with eight points. If there was no exact number, whoever came closest received six points.
As for the letters, the winner got as many points as the letters in his word. In the event of an error by the contestant, the points he would have obtained were awarded directly to his opponent.
Cifras y letras lived through two stages, a first on public television that began in 1991 and ended in 1996, and a second, which began in 2002 and ended in 2013 in the autonomous regions. An unexpected and undeserved end to such a legendary contest. The program concluded its broadcasts after the production company, Vamos a ver TV, entered bankruptcy. When it was declared, it was revealed that the competition had not paid the prizes to the contestants for two years.
50 people did not collect their prizes. The production company blamed Telemadrid and Canal Sur. The last program was broadcast on Galician television, TvG, which did pay the contestants.
Grand prix del verano and Cifras y letras are not the only programs returning to television. Private chains have also recovered some successes from other times. At the beginning of July, Mediaset recovered ¡Allà tu! , the box competition presented by Jesús Vázquez. Antena 3, for its part, opted for Password, with Cristina Pedroche as master of ceremonies.
