I Lost on Jeopardy

So last weekend I got to attend a taping of Celebrity Jeopardy at Radio City Music Hall. I watch the show pretty faithfully (for my daughter's sake, of course--it's educational), so I was pretty happy when my stepfather-in-law informed us that he'd gotten tickets.

I don't claim to be an expert at how game shows are taped, but I'm fairly certain that this was a pretty big audience. Then again, Wheel of Fortune (or, as I like to think of it, anti-Jeopardy) doesn't seem to have any problem filling stadiums with folks who find its =ahem= simplicity enjoyable.

About half an hour after people found their seats, Johnny Gilbert, the show's announcer, gave us the rundown: a rehearsal with the stars (except Alex), then live to tape. Our stars this time 'round were: Steve Schirripa, Miguel Ferrer and...Harry Smith. Once that was done, they waited a few minutes to get set and then it was game time.

What was most interesting about the taping was the fact that it unfolds pretty much as you see it on the tube. During the breaks, Trebeck would take questions from the audience (His most embarrassing moment? Accidentally giving away the "question."), and there was only one instance where they had to reshoot (Mr. Smith evidently had some problems staying put on his mark) so the whole shebang was done in less than an hour.

Some other random bits:

--One of the audience members asked Mr. Gilbert whether the answers were less difficult for celebrities. He replied with some hoo-ha that it's tough to get stars to come on the show and how they don't want to look foolish and blah blah blah. So the simple answer: yes. And while I wouldn't deign to assess the intelligence of that evening's contestants based on their peformance, let me put it this way: they didn't get through all the questions in either round.

--The closest I got to a celebrity was walking past a member of the Clue Crew, who I later saw help a disabled woman out of the hall. Give that woman a raise!

--Curiously, the sound out to the audience was spotty. Guess they only had so many monitors to point out at the seats.

--Since I was seated far stage right, I couldn't actually see the board. Luckily, they had video screens the size of trucks strung from the ceiling.

--Y'know the music that they play over the credits? That song is actually about three or four minutes long. It's hard to keep keep clapping for that long.

Who won? You'll just have to wait until November to find out.