One of the must-do's on my Disney itinerary was the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Play it! attraction at Disney-MGM. The set is very similar to the one used for the real show, but the theater is much larger and accommodates many more people. The lighting is also different-- the spotlights that raise and lower at the start of each question are missing-- and the hotseat chair and monitors are less streamlined. But the differences are minor, and being in the audience feels very much like being at a taping of the show-- except that every audience member plays along with each question and can be the next person in the hotseat.
Basically, you score points for answering questions correctly and bonus points for fast answers. When the hotseat frees up, the player with the highest score becomes the next contestant and all scores reset. At the $1,000 and $32,000 plateaus everyone sees the top 10 scores. I blew a question about porcupines being rodents (I went with marsupial) during the first player's tenure, so was out of the running, but I rocked during the 2nd player's run. Unfortunately, time ran out before he tanked. Before sending the audience away they showed the top 10 scores, and I was at #1! Argh! I just missed getting into the hotseat.
When my nieces wanted to see the Playhouse Disney attraction, I begged off to do Millionaire again. I was #2 after the 1,000 point question, and at 32,000 the contestant asked the audience for the Broadway show featuring There's No Business Like Show Business. Almost 50% thought it was Showboat, but I knew it was Annie Get Your Gun. The contestant tanked, they showed the top 10, and BAM-- I was #1 and got into the hotseat. I was excited, but bummed that my family wasn't there to cheer me on because they'd really have enjoyed it.
Since the stakes are so much lower-- getting to 1,000,000 points wins a Disney cruise-- I was much more relaxed than I was sitting across from Meredith, and I played fairly loose. I got to 32,000 with all my lifelines intact, then asked the audience for help with the kind of business Hugh Grant ran in Notting Hill (a book store). Then I tanked on the 125,000 question, asking for the originator of the line "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may." I 50/50'd down to Shakespeare and Robert Herrick. Having never heard of the latter, I went with Shakespeare. In retrospect, the Play It! attraction's 50/50 is probably using the old model where the answers are pre-selected. Had I known that, I'd have gone with Herrick.
Glad you enjoyed Play It! Living relatively close to Disney's California Adventure, I bought an Annual Pass this summer (hmm, what can I do with some extra discretionary funds I now have at my disposal). This past weekend I had great Fastest Finger time of 2.6 seconds, but was beat out by a random guesser ("Nintendo kid" is what we call them on the KABC Board) who clocked in at 1.3 seconds. Like you, I had another show where I was # 1 when the horn sounded, so I didn't make the Hot Seat that trip. I've sat in the chair twice, including the weekend after my show aired in July. One of the "regulars" at Play It! recognized me, and told the stage crew about me being in the real HS recently, but I bombed out on the $32K question before they had a chance to have the host bring it up in the banter. Let me know if you ever make a trip down to LA. We can see if there's some more damage we can inflict on Disney.
Tim
Posted by: Tim Hsieh on November 12, 2003 03:38 PMI've actually got a couple of good friends in the LA area, so a trip down there isn't unlikely. Might be fun to do this spring, in fact, and I'd love to see the California Adventure park. So you're on.
Frankly, if I hadn't made it into the hotseat at MGM, I'd have been perfectly happy to stay at the Millionaire attraction all day. To me, that's a lot of fun. Although I suspect it'd be much less so if I didn't feel like I had a good chance of making it to the hotseat.
Posted by: Peter Sarrett on November 14, 2003 08:44 PM