I woke up at 5:10 AM this morning to act as a phone-a-friend for someone I know. Who Wants to Be a Millionaire is taping at Walt Disney World this week, and apparently their shooting schedule in Florida is a bit different than when they tape in New York. Five freakin' AM! That first call was to make sure my phone number worked and I understood the lifeline procedure. Then I needed to be available from 7 AM to noon (10 to 3 Orlando time) when taping would occur. I'd get a call when the contestant got into the hotseat, then a call from Meredith Vieira if I was used as a lifeline, and then possibly a call to let me know when the contestant left the hotseat.
Except I never got any call at all. And neither did the other phone-a-friends. There's no Fastest Fingers anymore, so our friend was guaranteed a turn in the hotseat. We should have gotten a call when his turn came up. Unless he got the bottom end of the random order and time ran out before he could get a turn.
Still, some kind of phone call to the phone-a-friends would seem appropriate. If can forgive the contestant himself, who might not think of it amidst all the turmoil and disappointment, but not the producers. I don't care how crazy your production schedule is. It would take under 5 minutes for an intern to contact each of a contestant's phone-a-friends and let them know what's happening. It's just good manners.
Posted by Peter at January 16, 2005 11:25 PMOdd ........
Not even the initial call to make sure your number worked and that you were there? If not, I'd have to assume that (1) the taping didn't happen, or (2) your friend didn't show up at the taping. In either of those situations, I think the burden of communicating falls on your friend, not the producers.
Posted by: Mark on January 17, 2005 10:48 AMWe got the initial call from the producer to make sure our number worked and explain how it would all go down. That was at 5:10 AM. We just never got anything after that.
Posted by: Peter on January 17, 2005 11:51 AMIs it possible that your friend failed before he even activated the phone-a-friend? I can sort of understand if they dont want to call you to tell you that has happened, because it would reveal how his game went. How paranoid/strict are they about keeping the game results secret before the TV showing?
Posted by: antkam on January 17, 2005 02:14 PMPeter: You may have heard by now that they fell so far behind they didn't even get through all of the contestants slated for 1/14 by the end of 1/16. They tried to cancel the 1/16 folks, but weren't able to reach all of them before they travelled to WDW. (For those unaware, 1/15 was Walk-In-And-Win Day.)
They will probably bring your friend back sometime next year. This has been done for some other folks left out in the cold at the end of previous seasons.
Posted by: Tim H. on January 18, 2005 12:27 AMI hadn't heard, Tim. Wow, that really stinks. Our tape date was the second-to-last of the first season, and I know how disappointed I'd have been had I not made it into the hotseat.
Thanks for the info.
Posted by: Peter on January 18, 2005 01:51 AM