MDS Trip Report Part 3 of 3 – Feb. 12 Late Taping – Airing March 7
As soon as the early taping ended, I rushed out of the studio to get back in line for the later taping after Rich announced there was room in the later taping. I wasn’t sure how much room there was, but since I didn’t know, I rushed out to try and get back in line as soon as possible. It seemed like the pages weren’t ready for us to come out and get back in line – as it took about 5 minutes for them to seat us with the people already in line. I am surprised that I receive contestant card #134 for the 2nd taping - they are seriously going to be short on filling this taping even with most of the 1st audience coming back to see the 2nd show. Even Stan was completely shocked there were only 130 people in line that hadn’t gone to the first taping.
While getting processed, guest relations manager Karen Winchell comes up to me in line and says that I have to sit in the back again – I ask why, but all I’m given is that she’s the messenger and not the person who called for it. Unfortunately, I guess this means that they don’t want me to help, and therefore probably don’t want me on stage as a contestant. My interview with Stan pretty much confirmed that thought – it went something like this “HiVoltairewelcomebacktotheshowHiAndrew” (Andrew was the person next to me in line).
With Contestant card #134, I would expect to be seated somewhere in the middle section or near the front by Rich, but instead I’m seated all the way in the back by the sound mixer, where they normally seat the paid audience members. As they fill up the studio, I realize they’re going to be very short, and there’s going to be no less than 50 paid audience members... that number was probably closer to 60 though, since they did have Scott Robinson as a seat filler on several segments. Heck, they even brought Chuck Dukas who arranges for paid audience members to sit in with us – in fact, he sat next to Josh and I. We also met up with Vic, the animal impersonator I met at the tapings I went to in January. Since I knew I wasn’t “allowed” to help, I decided to just have fun with it – and just enjoy the show just like I was watching it on TV. I was hoping they would go 6/6 and give away $2,000,000 just so that I can say that I didn’t help and they still gave away everything.
Any Number: I didn't like that they had the camping equipment behind Door #1, because Susan had to walk off the turntable just to see it... would've preferred to see the Spa in door #1 and the camping equipment in Door #3. I have never rooted more for a contestant than Susan to win the car – Everyone in the audience was pulling for her to win that car especially when she said she was a cancer survivor.
Plinko: I knew this would end up being a $1M game but didn’t know how they would make it happen… This one was probably just as impossible as Range Game was the previous week, as you basically needed to win enough chips (they weren’t gimmes), actually get 3 in the $20k slot then you’d get one more chip where you’d need the $20k again to get the $1M. 4 out of 6 is certainly better odds than 5 out of 5, but still that’s pretty distant odds that it’s not gonna happen.
Race Game: There was no way I would’ve thought the computer thing would be $3399, so I don’t blame her for being indecisive with those price tags.
Lucky $even: AGAIN? Did they just not have any other car games they wanted to play? Drew spoiled this game during the stopdown when he was given some money from Roger and someone in the audience asked if they could have it – and Drew responded it was only $7. This was tough with 4 high numbers, but I don’t think it was as evil as the 32591 from the earlier taping.
It’s In the Bag: Didn’t notice the Dom casual font on the bags right away- but I knew he had lost fairly quickly when he picked the oxi-clean on the 2nd bag.
Squeeze Play: This was a toss up between the 3 and the 5, and unfortunately she picked wrong. So after hoping they’d go 6/6 they go 0/6… but there’s always the showcases…
Showcases: Since I obviously was not going to help anyone in the showcase being so far back, I decided to just play along just like I was watching at home playing CSS, and in fact we got two paid audience members to join us, Vic and Julie, who made bids along with Chuck, Josh, and I. The CSS Chart below shows how we did – and I feel quite embarrassed I lost to someone who was paid $9 to be there. Since I had hoped for 6/6 and $2M and had seen a skunking, I had just hoped someone would win the $1,000,000 anyway… and when they rolled out the confetti cannons during the stopdown I nearly fell out of my chair laughing since I knew they had given away another $1,000,000. It’s interesting to note that it was the 2nd showcase was DSW friendly with the $80,xxx. I did like that they used the hand-held camera for Michael’s reaction to winning $1,000,000, but they were VERY slow with the confetti cannons, as you can see that the Confetti was digitally added when Michael was running towards door #1 after it was revealed that he had won the million.
After the show, there were some re-takes of prizes in the showcases, and one of the cameramen accidentally stepped on one of the chasing light bulbs on the edges of the stage – the light bulb burst and someone in sitting in the first row on the right side of the stage got hit by the glass shards. They had to call medics, but I heard she was OK.
Also after the show, there were a couple of people trying out the Segways they just offered on the show – I don’t know who they were but they were probably staffers from the show or stagehands from CBS Television City. Either way, it seemed like they were getting in the way of people leaving the studio.
Once the show was over, PriceFanArmadillo, FPGWillyT, Josh24, Chuck, and I all went to dinner at Cheesecake Factory next door to CBS – and we ran into Clarise who had won two wave runners on the earlier MDS (The one that aired last week). We all discussed what we liked and didn’t like about the MDS and the show in general, until it was time for me to rush to the airport and make it in time for my flight home. In 3 weeks, I had seen 8 tapings, traveled 12,000 miles, and cost the show more than $1.2 million in prizes… quite a journey that I can’t wait to go on again and hopefully get my chance to “Come on Down!”
