by Bob Harris
And then I noticed, around him, all the human-sized players. So many I liked. So many so good. Tournament of Champions winner Bob Verini was there. Eric “Powerhouse” Newhouse, winner of both a Teen and a Teen Reunion tournament. Kate Waits, Claudia Perry, Leslie Frates, Leslie Shannon, India Cooper, Babu Srinivasan, accomplished champions all. Jeremy Bate, the alternate, in case one of us dropped dead from nerves. Every name I recognized, every player was good.
To my left stood Chuck Forrest, winner of a Tournament of Champions, laughing with Robin Carroll, winner of a Tournament of Champions and an International Tournament. Behind them were Tournament of Champions winners Rachael Schwartz and Brad Rutter. In one glance, I could see more tournament wins than people.
The last player I glimpsed was perhaps the most skillful: Eddie Timanus, the show’s only blind five-time champion. The greatest Jedi of all. Anyone who doubts you can win without looking at the Go Lights needs only to have seen Eddie’s first five games.
The show gave him a braille card with the names of the categories. After that, he was flying solo. And Eddie soared, timing the Go Lights exquisitely. Which is all the more amazing, because he had no way to read ahead in the clue, so he couldn’t anticipate which word was the end. Alex would stop, and he’d just hear it and feel it and still beat his opponents and then out came the answers. His thumb seemed to work on its own.
He’s the Yoda of timing, the Obi-Wan of the buzzer. Watching him play is pure joy.
Also, I’m told, he will crush you in poker.
I don’t belong here, I thought to myself. But Jane had given me one last extra present.
She couldn’t make the trip, but I wanted something small to hang on to, something to remind me of what really matters.
Jane had an old $1 token from the Luxor casino from some Vegas trip of many years earlier. (The Luxor delighted her because her knowledge of hieroglyphs meant she could fact-check the walls. She was pleased with the glyphs they got right—the headboard proclaimed “Cleopatra,” in fact—but more amused by complete random nonsense. The Luxor, seen clearly, is a transcendent work of art, a compendium of ultimate Dada poetry, unknowingly composed across entire continents and ages.) The coin was a worthless old token, in a box on a shelf in the back of a closet, but it seemed exactly right for the need.
It was just a token, not wealth. Just like excess money itself.
All its symbols were of civilizations long gone. So our time here is borrowed. It’s each moment that counts.
And as she gave it, she kissed me, with a promise to kiss me again on its return. So what mattered was already in my life, no matter what.
Just play each moment. Let go of outcome.
Jane and her token told me this three different ways.
I don’t belong here, I thought several times. And then I’d turn the coin in my hand, quietly, and relax, and stop worrying, and remember what mattered.
We were alive. This was a very good day.
Susanne, the head wrangler, and old compadre Glenn were grinning at our group, all twitchy and eager and already buzzing like kids on their first day at camp. So were two fellows named Tony and Bob, whom I hadn’t yet met, and a sweet, smiling woman named Maggie. (Wrangler Grant was still with the show, but in some other capacity. I think he’s the guy who says p-TING! now.)
We were all joined together, all twenty of us, in something so novel we knew we’d remember it as long as we lived. The only question now was what those memories would be.
So we packed into a shuttle bus and rode across town. The bus itself trembled with nervous delight. There was no competition, no battle of egos, no staking of territory. Just smiles and introductions and sporting mutual encouragement. And then we all filed through the stage entrance to Radio City Music Hall. The birthplace of Jeopardy! 340itself.
In all the years I was a comedian, I never got near this. How do you get to Broadway? I mused to myself. Practice Jeopardy!
We wound through the hallways and climbed up back stairwells. The walls were all covered in photos of singers and dancers and Rockettes, decades of glorious kick-lines. Each step cast an echo of footfalls in spangles, the excitement of youth and the knowledge of age, seeking fulfillment on a stage before thousands.
Every atom here bounced with excitement.
The green room was strangely familiar, even routine. We’d all done tournaments like this before. Next would come waiting and listening for our names to be called, small talk and nerves and a tick-tocking clock, a day passing too quickly and too slowly at once.
Alex came by and said encouraging words to the group. He looked eager and nervous himself, and why not? A big Broadway debut, his face on the cover of Playbill. (The rest of us were all listed inside, like a cast.) I was proud for him. This was a long way from Sudbury.
Harry Friedman, the boss, and others popped in. They’d invested millions in this. Not just in prizes, but special lighting and cameras, transport and housing, the design and creation of an entire grand stage. Every player could see in the producers’ wide eyes that the games to be played meant as much to the show as to us.
I thought many times about Dan and Kim and Grace and the others. I wanted to make them look good by extension.
And then came the thought: I could let the show itself down. I could make them look foolish for choosing me.
I knew this was almost pathologically extra, a burden no one else would have put on me. It wouldn’t help me. It wouldn’t help Jane. But there it was. I felt what I felt. I didn’t know why I was there, but I wanted dearly to live up to the honor.
I sank into a cushion and wondered whom I would play, or whom I would even want to. A wild card slot was the only real target.
The format was exactly like the earlier tournament. Five games in the first round, with five winners and four wild cards advancing. The rest I would worry about later.
After squeaking through against Grace and Wes, I’d researched other tournaments, curious what my odds with $3200 had been. Virtually zero, I learned. So my presence in New York was miraculous.
I had hoped for a miracle on the day I was sick backstage. Fair enough.
The show had doubled the value of each clue, so any score below $10000 would have almost no shot. A $20000 score virtually assured one of seeing the semis, unless something truly odd happened again. So I aimed for $20000 and hoped for the best.
The math of the situation was hardly encouraging. A miracle wasn’t necessary now. Near-perfection was.
As you already know, there are sixty clues in a game. With three Daily Doubles on which nobody buzzes, there are fifty-seven buzzer decisions to make. With difficult clues, I’d be lucky to know two-thirds of the responses. That would be thirty-eight clues. But everyone here had the skills of a Jedi, so I could only expect to win on the buzzer one time in three.
This meant in a game I’d get perhaps thirteen responses. Thirteen times Alex would say “Bob!” and I’d speak.
If I was right every time—every single time—with an average clue value of $900, my projected score entering Final Jeopardy would be $11700. Still in the game. All I’d need after that would be a big bet in the Final.
A small slip on a cheap clue might be tolerable, but that’s all. Just one mistake on a high-dollar clue—just one—could be crippling. (An incorrect $2000 response would knock the projected score down to $7700. Even an all-in bet in the final would still leave less than a fifty-fifty chance of survival.)
So I’d focus instead not on responses, but on making fifty-seven good buzzer decisions. No mistakes. Ring only when certain. Just playing each moment. This was the way to survive.
One perfect game. Just one. And then Harry would smile, Dan would be proud, my family would clap, and Jane would make up a dozen new dances.
Just one perfect game.
And then the waiting began. I was prepared for a long day.
Susanne entered, calling out the first round of names:
“Frank Spangenberg! Racha
el Schwartz! Bob Harris!”
Oh. OK. Well. That was certainly fast.
If I lost, I’d be out in the very first game. The whole trip would be over already.
Frank Spangenberg, I thought. In almost twenty years and four thousand shows, no one had ever broken his five-day record for winnings. He was still considered possibly the best player ever to pick up a buzzer. I’m playing Frank Spangenberg.
As we stood, my eyes came up to Frank’s armpit. Just don’t eat me, I thought, feeling ever more like a pudu.
And then: I’m playing Frank Spangenberg at Radio City Music Hall. Facing him. As equals, almost, at least for this moment backstage. I could scarcely believe I was here.
I looked at Rachael, remembering her defeating all contenders in her year. Her smile was genuine, but her eyes were busy with thought. She was focusing, readying, already playing ahead in the pre-game game.
The wranglers led us downstairs through an electrical labyrinth, where we meandered until reaching the stage. Taking our places, we were wired for sound. My forehead was de-chromed by courageous professionals. This last touch was familiar, an odd little comfort amid so much excited strangeness. I had been placed, I should add, at the champion’s podium, the one nearest center stage. I do not know why.
Rachael and I were given small boxes to stand on, to raise our heads level with Frank’s. Somebody checked how this looked, and they gave us both a few more. I was teetering higher than ever before.
To my right was the opening through which Alex would enter. Perhaps there were technical people making last-minute fixes, but it sounded like someone tall from a snowy working-class town in Ontario was pacing back there.
I placed Jane’s Luxor token on the podium near the buzzer. I didn’t want it out of my sight.
We were still behind Radio City’s grand curtain, still safe in our glamorous cave. Beyond, there was hubbub from great pregnant masses. All around us, dashing bodies made last-minute adjustments, calling urgent instructions in hushed rapid tones. The electronical doojobbies all gossiped and thrummed. The air itself glowed.
I had to close my eyes and shut out the murmur of six thousand people, hidden just beyond the large fabric mountain. Snapping my fingers, again, snappity-snappity-snappity-snappity, like a member of a dancing gang in New York. Which, in a sense, I had finally become.
This is not a podium. It’s a low bookshelf. This is not a buzzer. It is a roll of masking tape wrapped around an old ballpoint pen, the one Jane recognized in exactly one glance…
I can hear, in the distance, the floor director, John Lauderdale.
“Quiet, please,” he says quietly. And the mass starts to settle.
“Quiet, please,” John repeats softly. Bringing Middle East peace.
But it’s not quite silence enough.
“Quiet…please,” John says a third time, a tiny edge in his usual hush.
And then molecules stop.
Music plays. Johnny Gilbert’s voice booms through the cavern.
The multi-ton curtain slowly starts rising. I smile at Rachael. She’s edgy, but beaming. Frank glances our way, just as excited. We are in this together, all together, for one bewildering moment.
And revealed to us now, throbbing and golden and sparkling in light, are nearly six thousand people, bodies and motion to the very last balcony, applause coming so hard that it makes the stage throb, cheers echoing off the back walls.
I’ve been on stages for most of my career. This is the biggest and best. The greatest one I might see.
But this is only a stage. One, in a sense, I’ve been on all my life.
This is Wisconsin. This is Ohio. This is a strip joint in Arkansas, a Mexican biker bar. This is the place where I’ve worked many years.
It is actually calming to be here at last.
And in this moment, surprised, I understand why I’m here.
I will give the producers their show.
CHAPTER
22
ATTACK OF THE PUDU
Also, I Get Lost in Africa
Alex strides out, all smooth reassurance, commanding the room just by projecting a sense of comfort. But I know his voice by now. There’s a tremor, barely present. I’ve never before seen Alex even mildly ruffled. But he’s smart enough to acknowledge the fact.
“Understandably, we’re all very nervous. Myself included,” he says. The four of us, dwarfed, take a tiny deep breath. “But I think the best way to break the tension is to play the game.”
We turn to the board. The crowd disappears.
I brace myself, remembering the clues will be a bit esoteric. And so we begin, as the six categories for the first round are revealed.
LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY(OK. Not a strength. But OK.)
WATER TRANSPORTS(Hmm. How many of those are there?)
WAX MUSEUMS(Hmm again. And how many of THOSE are there?)
AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS
Wait. Hold on. You’re kidding me.
AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS
is an actual Jeopardy! category? Be serious. But there it is:
AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS
it says. I’m standing here with six thousand people in the audience, playing the biggest game of my life. And Alex says
AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS
is one of the categories.
Connie, I love you, and I am so sorry for your years of great pain. But, just this once, I am almost glad to know Marvin so well.
Now everybody just stand the hell back. Pudu coming through.
The other two categories,
LET THEM EAT CAKE
AW, SO YOU’RE THE “SMART” ONE, EH?
barely even register. But I’m at the champion’s podium, so Alex will give me first choice. I’ll want to think ahead in the first three categories if possible, and I’d like to save my tribute to Connie. But with my years of performing, I finally realize, I’m probably the least nervous of the three of us. I might have an early timing advantage. I choose the SMART category—general knowledge, relatively easy, since half of the answer is already provided—as a simple buzzer contest. This will be the best time to try it.
Naturally, Frank wins on the buzzer on the first clue. I’m a hair early. (Reviewing the tape, this hair is exactly three frames wide. A tenth of a second.)
I take another deep breath and go back to my apartment. Not a podium. Not a buzzer. Radio City Music Living Room.
My timing kicks in, hitting three straight clues under SMART:
What is Get Smart?
What’s the “smart money”?
And this, still stuck in my head twenty years after I first read about it in college, thanks to the dark irony of calling a solid ton of explosive “smart”:
ONE EXAMPLE IS THE 2000-POUND GBU-24
What’s a “smart bomb”? I ask, and I jump out to an early advantage.
The $1000 clue, however, I know nothing about.
FROM 1914 TO 1923H. L. MENCKEN CO-EDITED THIS SATIRIC MONTHLY WITH GEORGE JEAN NATHAN
I stand down, doing Jeopardy Zen. Rachael grabs the clue immediately. “What is ‘Smart Set’?” she asks. She’s good. I remember just who the hell I’m playing.
Rachael then takes a breath, and takes us straight into AUTOIMMUNE DISORDERS.
OK, Connie. This is for you.
ON “THE WEST WING” JED BARTLET HAS A RELAPSING-REMITTING COURSE OF THIS AUTOIMMUNE DISORDER
When Connie was thought to have this disease, “relapsing-remitting” was the term doctors used to describe the random timing of Marvin’s strange visitations.
What’s multiple sclerosis? I practically shout.
BOTH GRAVES’ DISEASE & HASHIMOTO’S DISEASE ATTACK THIS GLAND
Connie doesn’t have either of these. But she has been diagnosed with hypothyroidism, which I then looked into as a possible co-factor in her symptoms. What’s the thyroid gland? comes out without blinking.
DEFICIENT PRODUCTION OF HORMONES BY THESE ENDOCRINE GLANDS CAUSES ADDISON’S DISEASE
Lupus, Connie’s then-current diagnosis, is often treated with a synthetic version of a steroid produced by these very glands. Their eventual fatigue and failure, known as Addison’s disease, sometimes accompanies lupus.
What are the adrenals? flows out so fast I almost feel like I’m cheating. But another part of me is thrilled at the chance to say this on national TV: See, only sister? I’ve been paying attention. I think of your health every day of my life.
Incidentally, the adrenals also pump out the stress-related glucocorticoids that can impair memory function. So in this moment, I’m trying to keep my own glands from getting too thrilled. I’m not exactly succeeding. Once the category begins, in fact, I know I should bounce out and save my strongest subject for later. But I am too excited by my growing momentum to change the subject.
But the fourth clue, surprisingly, is a disorder I don’t know. I thought Connie and Marvin had encompassed them all.
AKA REGIONAL ENTERITIS, THIS DISEASE, A CHRONIC INFLAMMATION OF THE INTESTINES, BEARS THE NAME OF A U.S. DOCTOR
Frank buzzes in: “What is Crohn’s disease?” he responds.
Twenty years after the red bumps on her legs were first certified as “erythema nodosum,” no one has ever suggested Crohn’s as the major part of her illness.