Your Game Show Of Shows

Transcript

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

Our next two contestants are on stage. Say hello to Yael Granot and Yossi Faber.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: Yael, Yossi, Ophira.

YAEL GRANOT: Hi, Ophira.

EISENBERG: That show just got really Jew-y.

(LAUGHTER)

GRANOT: It's like a reunion.

JONATHAN COULTON, BYLINE: Oy.

EISENBERG: Oy. What do - Yossi, what do you think makes a good game show contestant?

YOSSI FABER: I think optimism. The hope that you can get asked questions you know the answer to will outweigh the questions that make you look like a complete fool.

EISENBERG: I love hope. Yael?

GRANOT: On that same vein, I bet telepathy is pretty good.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: Telepathy, yeah. One of you went for positivity, the other went for a superpower.

GRANOT: We could try it right now and see what happens.

FABER: I knew she was going to say that.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: I can see how this is going to go. Our next game is called Your Game Show of Shows. Jonathan, what is your second-favorite game show?

COULTON: Second-favorite game show?

EISENBERG: Yeah.

COULTON: ASK ME ANOTHER.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: I thought that was your third.

COULTON: No, it's moved up to second.

EISENBERG: Oh, interesting.

COULTON: Yeah, I think we've been doing really well lately.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: As you might have guessed from the title of this game, in this round we want you to mash up the names of famous TV shows with the names of TV game shows to make them more fun because if someone isn't answering trivia questions for a lot of money, frankly, I am not interested.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: Each clue will hint at both the game show and the regular TV series. Puzzle guru Greg Pliska, how about an example?

GREG PLISKA, BYLINE: If we said spin the giant slot machine, get three-of-a-kind and Marlin Perkins will wrestle a live anaconda, you would say the joker's wild kingdom.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: Yeah. Everyone is thinking that should have been Mutual of Omaha's the joker's wild kingdom.

PLISKA: That's true. That's true. So you see what's happening, right? The name of one, a pivot word in the middle, and then the name of the other.

FABER: My optimism ran out.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: Feel free to use your telepathy if that helps. Feel free to talk it out. Sometimes that does help. If you ring and you don't know what you're doing, you can talk through it. And it will also be amusing for us to watch you flounder on stage.

EISENBERG: While we don't help.

COULTON: No. We're not going to help at all. Keep going. All right, here we go. The single ladies of Westoros have lots of questions for bachelors number one, two and three like, when, exactly, is winter coming?

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

COULTON: Yael.

GRANOT: The dating game of thrones.

COULTON: That's correct.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: That is a great premise, by the way. Right?

COULTON: It's a much more interesting show.

EISENBERG: It's fun. Bachelor number two, if you were to murder my entire family...

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: ...What would you call it?

COULTON: Archie Bunker, his wife Edith, Meathead and Gloria need another relative to name the top five answers on the board.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

COULTON: Yossi.

FABER: All in the family feud.

COULTON: You got it.

(APPLAUSE)

COULTON: Trauma ward physicians Dr. Doug Ross and Dr. John Carter compete, with the help of 10-year-olds, to see who remembers more about their elementary school education.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

COULTON: Yael.

GRANOT: ER you smarter than a fifth grader.

COULTON: Yeah. That's right.

(APPLAUSE)

COULTON: I have to say, nobody thought anybody was going to get that one.

EISENBERG: Yeah. We battled about that one. We're just like, oh well.

COULTON: Somebody's going to fall on this grenade.

EISENBERG: Exactly.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: David Gregory must have landed on a whammy when he was replaced by Chuck Todd on this Sunday NBC news institution meets 1980's game show.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: You made the clue sound impossible.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

COULTON: I made it sound more complicated than it is. Yossi.

FABER: Joker's wild world of sports.

COULTON: That's a good guess but it's incorrect.

FABER: Well, A for effort.

COULTON: Well, unfortunately we don't grade that way here on this game.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: You're in my heart. Yael, do you have a guess?

GRANOT: I've got nothing.

EISENBERG: Whammies? Do you remember no whammies?

GRANOT: Sorry, no.

EISENBERG: No? That's OK. That means you did things.

COULTON: All right, who knows the answer out there?

AUDIENCE: Meet the press your luck.

(APPLAUSE)

COULTON: The medical staff of St. Eligius hospital better brush up on their geography if they expect to find an elusive crook somewhere on the globe. And I hope they like rockapella.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

COULTON: Yossi.

FABER: Saint elsewhere in the world is Carmen Sandiego?

COULTON: That's right.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: Yael, you, like, gave it up for that one.

GRANOT: I was awed. That was amazing.

(LAUGHTER)

FABER: They were really cheering for "St. Elsewhere."

EISENBERG: Me and her, we're more like Hill Street blues clues people.

(LAUGHTER)

COULTON: All right, this your last question. It's game show meets game show as Monty Hall's contestants have to pick not from three doors, but from Howie Mandel's 26 briefcases.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

COULTON: Yael.

GRANOT: Let's make a deal or no deal?

COULTON: You got it.

(APPLAUSE)

COULTON: Greg, how did our contestants do on that one?

PLISKA: Well, it was a very close game, Jonathan, but Yael emerges the victor and will go on to our final round. Thank you both.

(MUSIC)

EISENBERG: Coming up, I get the sense that our VIP comedian Lewis Black might have a few things on his mind, and he's not happy about them. So stick around. I'm Ophira Eisenberg and this is NPR's ASK ME ANOTHER.

(APPLAUSE) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.