Sentry 152
Saturday, April 30, 2005
TSK, TSK...
Finalfuckaly, with a lot less fanfare and Filipinos than General MacArthur, I have returned.
A pause for applause...
Hmm...finally an answer to that question: What is the sound of one hand clapping?
Years ago, I asked Pee Wee Herman that question and you know what he said?
"I dunno, but I know the sound of one hand slapping. Ha-HA!"
I never did finish that shit I wrote about Millionaire. Here's how it ended, peoples:
I DIDN'T GET ON WWTBAM. MEREDITH VIERA SUCKS!
Finalfuckaly, with a lot less fanfare and Filipinos than General MacArthur, I have returned.
A pause for applause...
Hmm...finally an answer to that question: What is the sound of one hand clapping?
Years ago, I asked Pee Wee Herman that question and you know what he said?
"I dunno, but I know the sound of one hand slapping. Ha-HA!"
I never did finish that shit I wrote about Millionaire. Here's how it ended, peoples:
I DIDN'T GET ON WWTBAM. MEREDITH VIERA SUCKS!
THE END
P.S. I shall return. I'm gonna audition again and this time, I'm gonna get on the show because I'm gonna to act like a typical moronic suckass contestant. Have a nice day and shit.
Wednesday, September 15, 2004
MILLIONAIRE, PART II
(I am interviewed by The Rock)
Well, I coulda been a contender, but--o, fuck it; let’s cut to the chase already:
“103!” A man at one of the little tables calls out.
I stand up.
“Good luck!” the guys at my table say.
“Thanks.”
I walk shakily toward the big Millionaire interview.
“Hi.” I look down at the stone-faced man in front of me.
“Laura?”
“Yes,” I say, sitting down.
I hand him my Polaroid. He opens the folder in front of him and pulls out the Millionaire application I’d filled out earlier.
“Why do you write horror?” he asks, disinterestedly.
Not that question. Ech.
Why is the sky blue? That’s what I probably should have said.
“It’s, um, a great metaphor for life.”
Is that the best I can do? I try to read his face. It’s like looking at a blue screen. There’s nothing there. Shit, the bread basket or the food court or whatever the hell they call the middle of the country ain’t gonna like that. Too negative.
“I mean, not that life is a horror, ha…”
I should’ve gone with a jokey answer.
“Why do you want to be on “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”
“I want money.”
It’s honest, but maybe that’s too crass. I try to think of something smarmy someone on TV might say.
“I’m a fan of Meredith Vieira’s. She seems very nice. She’s a great host.”
The guy doesn’t look impressed.
“What would you do with the million dollars?”
Doesn’t this guy know any good questions?
“Well,” I say, “after I got up from the floor…”
I pause to cringe and see if he thinks that’s funny. I might as well be looking at asphalt. Millionaire likes corny jokes, right? Meredith’s always cracking bad jokes on the show.
“I’d pay some bills, get a car. A house.”
I try to think of what the usual Millionaire contestant might say.
“I’d go on vacation.”
A faint flicker of emotion registers on the rock man’s face.
“You’d have to, wouldn’t you?” he says, almost smiling.
“Yeah. It’s like a requirement.”
He looks down again at my application.
“Did you grow up in Quincy?”
“No, Queens.”
I should’ve lied. The show’s taped in NY. They probably have way too many native New Yorkers already. I should’ve played the rube. They like that on TV.
“Was it difficult for you to get to New York?”
“Naw, I just hopped on the bus. Four hours. I do it all the time when I visit my folks.”
Wrong answer! What I should’ve said: Ever hear of the Donner party, Rocky?
“Okay,” the stone-faced man says. “That’s all.”
That’s a little curt, isn’t it?
“Ah, okay, thanks,” I say, getting up.
“Nice meeting you,” I tell him, hoping manners might matter.
“Uh-huh,” the guy looks bored.
He turns to the next application.
I walk away from the table, not feeling too good. My mother’s sitting alone at one of the tables. I wave to her.
She looks much more enthusiastic than I feel. I can’t let that guy get me down.
“Congratulations!” My mother says.
She hands me a WWTBAM pencil.
“I stole it from one of the tables. It’s for luck.”
“Thanks,” I say.
The pencil cheers me up.
“I have a good feeling about this,” My mother tells me.
She didn’t see the cyborg who interviewed me.
I look down at the pencil. It’s a sign, right? I still have a chance.
I gotta...
(I am interviewed by The Rock)
Well, I coulda been a contender, but--o, fuck it; let’s cut to the chase already:
“103!” A man at one of the little tables calls out.
I stand up.
“Good luck!” the guys at my table say.
“Thanks.”
I walk shakily toward the big Millionaire interview.
“Hi.” I look down at the stone-faced man in front of me.
“Laura?”
“Yes,” I say, sitting down.
I hand him my Polaroid. He opens the folder in front of him and pulls out the Millionaire application I’d filled out earlier.
“Why do you write horror?” he asks, disinterestedly.
Not that question. Ech.
Why is the sky blue? That’s what I probably should have said.
“It’s, um, a great metaphor for life.”
Is that the best I can do? I try to read his face. It’s like looking at a blue screen. There’s nothing there. Shit, the bread basket or the food court or whatever the hell they call the middle of the country ain’t gonna like that. Too negative.
“I mean, not that life is a horror, ha…”
I should’ve gone with a jokey answer.
“Why do you want to be on “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”
“I want money.”
It’s honest, but maybe that’s too crass. I try to think of something smarmy someone on TV might say.
“I’m a fan of Meredith Vieira’s. She seems very nice. She’s a great host.”
The guy doesn’t look impressed.
“What would you do with the million dollars?”
Doesn’t this guy know any good questions?
“Well,” I say, “after I got up from the floor…”
I pause to cringe and see if he thinks that’s funny. I might as well be looking at asphalt. Millionaire likes corny jokes, right? Meredith’s always cracking bad jokes on the show.
“I’d pay some bills, get a car. A house.”
I try to think of what the usual Millionaire contestant might say.
“I’d go on vacation.”
A faint flicker of emotion registers on the rock man’s face.
“You’d have to, wouldn’t you?” he says, almost smiling.
“Yeah. It’s like a requirement.”
He looks down again at my application.
“Did you grow up in Quincy?”
“No, Queens.”
I should’ve lied. The show’s taped in NY. They probably have way too many native New Yorkers already. I should’ve played the rube. They like that on TV.
“Was it difficult for you to get to New York?”
“Naw, I just hopped on the bus. Four hours. I do it all the time when I visit my folks.”
Wrong answer! What I should’ve said: Ever hear of the Donner party, Rocky?
“Okay,” the stone-faced man says. “That’s all.”
That’s a little curt, isn’t it?
“Ah, okay, thanks,” I say, getting up.
“Nice meeting you,” I tell him, hoping manners might matter.
“Uh-huh,” the guy looks bored.
He turns to the next application.
I walk away from the table, not feeling too good. My mother’s sitting alone at one of the tables. I wave to her.
She looks much more enthusiastic than I feel. I can’t let that guy get me down.
“Congratulations!” My mother says.
She hands me a WWTBAM pencil.
“I stole it from one of the tables. It’s for luck.”
“Thanks,” I say.
The pencil cheers me up.
“I have a good feeling about this,” My mother tells me.
She didn’t see the cyborg who interviewed me.
I look down at the pencil. It’s a sign, right? I still have a chance.
I gotta...
Friday, September 10, 2004
The Dream Is Over...
I got my Millionaire post card in the mail yesterday. No, not the one that requires you to FedEx a thousand dollars to a P.O. Box in Israel--it's the one that tells you whether or not you've been judged good enough to sit across from ex-journalist and current coffee klatcher cum gossip-monger talk show/game show whore, err...I mean host, Meredith Vieira.
And, yes, you've correctly guessed that I didn't make the cut. What clued you in? Hey, you'd be bitter too after waiting and waiting and waiting for over four weeks for some damn post card they told you you'd get in three, only to one day open your mail box and read this:
Thank you for your interest in being a contestant on "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." You have not been selected to be a potential contestant. We appreciate your continued interest in the show and thank you for taking the time to audition with us.
Blah, Blah Blah...you ain't fooling no one with this crap! We all know you TV show phonies don't give a rat's ass about anything except your precious little ratings and whether or not Miss Vieira's latte is the correct temperature. What about the fifty bucks I spent on a round trip to NYC? Huh? Who's going reimburse me for that? Yeah, okay, my Dad did. But what about the 8 hours I lost traveling back and forth from Boston to NY? What about when I picked up my suitcase from the bus floor and found it soaked with some unknown brown liquid that wasn't there when the trip began? What about that, huh? How about when I got home and opened up my suitcase and found that my clothes were stained with this same mysterious brown water? Any ideas how that one could have happened, Meredith?
It all began, as they say, so promisingly. I filled out the online application at the Millionaire website and selected my audition date; I got an e-mail telling me the time and place of my audition along an attached questionnaire that I was to fill out and bring with me to the audition (Sample Question: What would Meredith Vieira find most interesting about you?).
I remember my audition like it was four and a half weeks ago. Me, my mother and about 150 other Millionaire hopefuls lined up outside of 30 West 67th street between Central Park West and Columbus Ave. The woman behind us was eating an ice-cream cone and I was hoping she wouldn't drip any of it on my new white shirt (the one that later got covered in brown bus sludge). She told us that her brother had auditioned a few weeks ago and was in the contestant pool. We pretended to be impressed and then I asked her what I really wanted to know: "How long does this thing take?"
She told us the whole audition process lasted about thirty minutes. First, you have ten minutes to answer 34 multiple choice questions. Then you wait while they score the test. Everyone who doesnt pass, has to leave the ABC cafeteria immediately. Everyone else goes on the second phase: The Millionaire Interview. Then you have to wait three weeks for a post card telling you whether or not you passed the interview.
The woman told us that she was a trivia expert and then she corrected me for saying "libel" instead of "slander." I don't remember what I was talking about, just that her correction annoyed me.
"Slander is spoken, libel is written," She smugly informed me.
Then the line started moving and we walked around the ABC building to the cafeteria entrance.
"Millionaire contestants only," The security guard warned.
"Can I come in?" My mother asked. "I'm her mother."
The guard hesitated, then nodded. All "guests" of Millionaire auditioners were told to sit at the side tables. Bye, Ma! Everyone else sat at the big tables in the center of the room. On the tables, next to each chair there were manilla envelopes, each with a unique number hand-written in black magic marker and a small rectangular-shaped card with SAT style fill in the blank ovals, along with an official "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" logo pencil.
A man who looked like a younger thinner version of the comedian Chris Elliot warned us not to open the envelopes until we were told to.
"Those are your tests," he said. "You'll have 10 minutes to answer 34 multiple choice questions"
The woman who'd been behind me in line smiled knowingly. She offered everyone at the table a piece of gum. I coldly declined.
"Chris Elliot"made some dull speech about WWTBAM. The only thing from it I recall is the part where the guy said that they "couldn't reveal" the score required to pass the test. Veeery mysterious!
Then he told us to take out our test sheets from the envelope. He told us to put our name on the answer card and then write the number that was on our envelope next to our name. "If you pass the test, we call out your number, so make sure you memorize it."
Was this a game show or bad sci-fi TV? My number was 103. I repeated it over in my head several times, until I knew it by heart.
"Chris Elliot" told us not to start until he gave the word. "This is a timed test," he said.
We waited with our pencils poised over the test. He hit the stopwatch. "Start now!" he shouted.
The test wasn't very hard. It covered a very broad knowledge base, but nothing that was very difficult. There was a question about what color such and such a shade was (tip: WWTBAM loves color questions), it asked about a celebrity bio, a human body part, there was a little bit on history, a little politics, food, some science and then the buzzer went off and we were instructed to put down our WWTBAM pencils. Ten minutes was more than enough time to answer all the questions. I was on my second recheck when the buzzer sounded.
A WWTBAM lackey came and collected the question sheets and answer cards. He even took our WWTBAM pencils. Hey!
"Chris" told us to sit and wait while they scored our tests. The people at my table began discussing the test questions. What color is cyan? Who was Ford's VP? What's cruddite? I was relieved to see that I seemed to have gotten even the questions I'd only guessed at correct.
After about 15 minutes, "Chris Elliot" returned and told us the tests were scored and he was going to call out the numbers of the people who'd passed. He told us that if our number was called, we had to go to the front of the room and someone would take a Polaroid of us and then we'd take the picture and sit down at a table near the front and wait to be interviewed. Eveyone else would have to leave the cafeteria immediately. The gum lady smiled and nodded.
"I hope everyone remembers their number," he said.
103, 103, 103! Ha! A man at the table whispered that only ten percent of people usually pass. I looked a him in disbelief. That couldn't be true!
He read off the first number, "Seven." Everyone clapped. He read off another number. We clapped again. He read out a few more numbers. Clap! Clap! Clap! Nobody at my table was getting up.
Then he called out, "103!"
I stood up and everyone at my table clapped. I looked over at gum lady and smiled. Libel, smible.
I walked to the front of the room and smiled stupidly as an intern took my picture and then handed it to me. I sat down at an empty table. I was soon joined by a middle-aged man in a suit.
"Congratulations," he said.
"Same to you," replied.
Another guy came and sat down across from me. That was it. I looked around and saw that out of 150 people only about 15 were sitting at the front tables. Ten percent! The rest were trailing out the front door of the ABC TV Cafeteria. I looked around for gum lady. She was gone.
The well-dressed man told me that he'd flown in from LA for the audition.
"Did you come here on vacation?" I asked.
"Nope, just came into town for the audition," he said.
"Wow," I said. "I thought it was a big deal coming from Massachusetts."
"Where you from?" I asked the guy across from me.
"Brooklyn."
"At least you didn't have to travel far," I said.
We watched as three people who we were told were WWTBAM production assistants, came out. Each sat at a little table with two chairs.
"When it's your turn to be interviewed one of the PAs will call out your number and you will take a seat across from them."
To Be Continued...
I got my Millionaire post card in the mail yesterday. No, not the one that requires you to FedEx a thousand dollars to a P.O. Box in Israel--it's the one that tells you whether or not you've been judged good enough to sit across from ex-journalist and current coffee klatcher cum gossip-monger talk show/game show whore, err...I mean host, Meredith Vieira.
And, yes, you've correctly guessed that I didn't make the cut. What clued you in? Hey, you'd be bitter too after waiting and waiting and waiting for over four weeks for some damn post card they told you you'd get in three, only to one day open your mail box and read this:
Thank you for your interest in being a contestant on "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." You have not been selected to be a potential contestant. We appreciate your continued interest in the show and thank you for taking the time to audition with us.
Blah, Blah Blah...you ain't fooling no one with this crap! We all know you TV show phonies don't give a rat's ass about anything except your precious little ratings and whether or not Miss Vieira's latte is the correct temperature. What about the fifty bucks I spent on a round trip to NYC? Huh? Who's going reimburse me for that? Yeah, okay, my Dad did. But what about the 8 hours I lost traveling back and forth from Boston to NY? What about when I picked up my suitcase from the bus floor and found it soaked with some unknown brown liquid that wasn't there when the trip began? What about that, huh? How about when I got home and opened up my suitcase and found that my clothes were stained with this same mysterious brown water? Any ideas how that one could have happened, Meredith?
It all began, as they say, so promisingly. I filled out the online application at the Millionaire website and selected my audition date; I got an e-mail telling me the time and place of my audition along an attached questionnaire that I was to fill out and bring with me to the audition (Sample Question: What would Meredith Vieira find most interesting about you?).
I remember my audition like it was four and a half weeks ago. Me, my mother and about 150 other Millionaire hopefuls lined up outside of 30 West 67th street between Central Park West and Columbus Ave. The woman behind us was eating an ice-cream cone and I was hoping she wouldn't drip any of it on my new white shirt (the one that later got covered in brown bus sludge). She told us that her brother had auditioned a few weeks ago and was in the contestant pool. We pretended to be impressed and then I asked her what I really wanted to know: "How long does this thing take?"
She told us the whole audition process lasted about thirty minutes. First, you have ten minutes to answer 34 multiple choice questions. Then you wait while they score the test. Everyone who doesnt pass, has to leave the ABC cafeteria immediately. Everyone else goes on the second phase: The Millionaire Interview. Then you have to wait three weeks for a post card telling you whether or not you passed the interview.
The woman told us that she was a trivia expert and then she corrected me for saying "libel" instead of "slander." I don't remember what I was talking about, just that her correction annoyed me.
"Slander is spoken, libel is written," She smugly informed me.
Then the line started moving and we walked around the ABC building to the cafeteria entrance.
"Millionaire contestants only," The security guard warned.
"Can I come in?" My mother asked. "I'm her mother."
The guard hesitated, then nodded. All "guests" of Millionaire auditioners were told to sit at the side tables. Bye, Ma! Everyone else sat at the big tables in the center of the room. On the tables, next to each chair there were manilla envelopes, each with a unique number hand-written in black magic marker and a small rectangular-shaped card with SAT style fill in the blank ovals, along with an official "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" logo pencil.
A man who looked like a younger thinner version of the comedian Chris Elliot warned us not to open the envelopes until we were told to.
"Those are your tests," he said. "You'll have 10 minutes to answer 34 multiple choice questions"
The woman who'd been behind me in line smiled knowingly. She offered everyone at the table a piece of gum. I coldly declined.
"Chris Elliot"made some dull speech about WWTBAM. The only thing from it I recall is the part where the guy said that they "couldn't reveal" the score required to pass the test. Veeery mysterious!
Then he told us to take out our test sheets from the envelope. He told us to put our name on the answer card and then write the number that was on our envelope next to our name. "If you pass the test, we call out your number, so make sure you memorize it."
Was this a game show or bad sci-fi TV? My number was 103. I repeated it over in my head several times, until I knew it by heart.
"Chris Elliot" told us not to start until he gave the word. "This is a timed test," he said.
We waited with our pencils poised over the test. He hit the stopwatch. "Start now!" he shouted.
The test wasn't very hard. It covered a very broad knowledge base, but nothing that was very difficult. There was a question about what color such and such a shade was (tip: WWTBAM loves color questions), it asked about a celebrity bio, a human body part, there was a little bit on history, a little politics, food, some science and then the buzzer went off and we were instructed to put down our WWTBAM pencils. Ten minutes was more than enough time to answer all the questions. I was on my second recheck when the buzzer sounded.
A WWTBAM lackey came and collected the question sheets and answer cards. He even took our WWTBAM pencils. Hey!
"Chris" told us to sit and wait while they scored our tests. The people at my table began discussing the test questions. What color is cyan? Who was Ford's VP? What's cruddite? I was relieved to see that I seemed to have gotten even the questions I'd only guessed at correct.
After about 15 minutes, "Chris Elliot" returned and told us the tests were scored and he was going to call out the numbers of the people who'd passed. He told us that if our number was called, we had to go to the front of the room and someone would take a Polaroid of us and then we'd take the picture and sit down at a table near the front and wait to be interviewed. Eveyone else would have to leave the cafeteria immediately. The gum lady smiled and nodded.
"I hope everyone remembers their number," he said.
103, 103, 103! Ha! A man at the table whispered that only ten percent of people usually pass. I looked a him in disbelief. That couldn't be true!
He read off the first number, "Seven." Everyone clapped. He read off another number. We clapped again. He read out a few more numbers. Clap! Clap! Clap! Nobody at my table was getting up.
Then he called out, "103!"
I stood up and everyone at my table clapped. I looked over at gum lady and smiled. Libel, smible.
I walked to the front of the room and smiled stupidly as an intern took my picture and then handed it to me. I sat down at an empty table. I was soon joined by a middle-aged man in a suit.
"Congratulations," he said.
"Same to you," replied.
Another guy came and sat down across from me. That was it. I looked around and saw that out of 150 people only about 15 were sitting at the front tables. Ten percent! The rest were trailing out the front door of the ABC TV Cafeteria. I looked around for gum lady. She was gone.
The well-dressed man told me that he'd flown in from LA for the audition.
"Did you come here on vacation?" I asked.
"Nope, just came into town for the audition," he said.
"Wow," I said. "I thought it was a big deal coming from Massachusetts."
"Where you from?" I asked the guy across from me.
"Brooklyn."
"At least you didn't have to travel far," I said.
We watched as three people who we were told were WWTBAM production assistants, came out. Each sat at a little table with two chairs.
"When it's your turn to be interviewed one of the PAs will call out your number and you will take a seat across from them."
To Be Continued...
