Need Millionaire Tips!

[Xenalyte]

I just got the call - I'm going to NYC next week to tape Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?. I'm looking for tips or strategy from the ever-intelligent FReeper audience - frankly, I've only watched the show a few times. Many many thanks!

[ThePoetsRaven]

Good luck. Keep us posted.

[Revolting cat!]

I've only seen this show once or twice, but are these questions Googleable? If so, pick dial-in-friends who are good at googling and quick at translating such questions into Google queries.

[kevkrom]

You probably think that wrassling is fixed

No more so than roller derby... ;)

[TADSLOS]

stomp the people's feet on either side of you during the fast finger question ; )

[UB355]

Stay away from Ground Zero. Members of my fire department (WI) were there last weekend and took some close-up pictures, it's shocking.

[TexasNative2000]

The key strategy is obvious... burn whatever lifelines you have to to get to that $32k mark. Trust the audience on "pop culture" questions, but nothing else. Ask for your 50/50 before you say anything else regarding the current question, otherwise they'll narrow it down to what you've already narrowed it down to.

Excellent strategy. In addition, if you have been given a question about which you have no immediate knowledge, use logic.

Example: Monday night had a question which asked "Gabrielle is the real first name for which of these women?" The contestant used 50/50 and narrowed it down to Babe Zaharius (the athlete of the 1920's) and Coco Chanel. He didn't know the answer so he walked. Well, DUH! Gabrielle is French - as is Chanel. He walked away on the $250,000 question because he didn't use simple logic to associate a French first name with a French last name.

BTW, good luck. I've been trying to get on since the show premiered. I've gotten to the call back stage often, but have never been called.

[MomwithHope]

Have your phone a friend have a group of smart people over. Have him repeat the question a few words at a time as you speak it. Also have your phone a friend have paper and pencil in hand. An atlas wouldn't hurt and a dictionary. Good luck and plug FreeRepublic!!

[SoothingDave]

The first four questions, up to $1000 are supposed to be easy. If Regis pauses during one of them and asks if you want to use a lifeline or something, wants to make sure that your answer is "final" that's a clue that you've picked the wrong answer.

If there's a question that should be common knowledge, but you're too young to know cause you weren't alive, call your mom. I can't believe the young kids I've seen call their college roommate or someone who is also young.

SD

[Freemyland]

Yes, plug FR. If not that, how about coming up with some kind of Freeper gesture to make when they announce your name?

Do you know when your episode will air?

[jlogajan]

I don't have many useful tips on earning a million, but I have plenty of tips on spending it. Let me know. :-)

[Xenalyte]

FReeper gesture - what an excellent idea! Thoughts? (I don't want to make any hand movements that would get Crips or Bloods after me.)

[DouglasKC]

Have a friend for the "call a friend" option standing by with his web browser ready. Point the browser to www.google.com, and whatever the question is, a good search-engine user can prolly find your answer in 30 seconds.

Excellent!

[Focault's Pendulum]

I sincerely hope you win, but...if the worst happens, and you get offed early on, there is an easy way to wipe the smirk off of Regis's face. Ask when he's going back to work at Club Bene'.

I performed with him there several times and he hated the place.....tell him Tommy B was asking about him. FYI his nightclub talent runs the gamut from A to B!

[Revolting cat!]

The show is taped, isn't it, so the call-in-friend cannot see the questions ahead of time on his telebision? In that case, have a friend in the audience with a teliphone or a walkie talkie and another friend outside capturing the questions on his own teliphone or walkie talkie and then passing them on to the call-in friend. CAution: the friend in the audience and his friend on the outside mus both have the same type of device: teliphone or walkie talkie, or else the scheme won't work.

Or else do what I did during one of my final examinations. Ask to go to the bathroom where you've stored ahead of time a full set of Encyclopedia Britannica. Guaranteed to work, just ask my patients, the degree certificate on the wall of my office is the proof of that!

[thesharkboy]

FReeper gesture - what an excellent idea! Thoughts? (I don't want to make any hand movements that would get Crips or Bloods after me.)

How about putting your right hand out, palm toward the camera, thumb down, and first two fingers out (in the shape of an "F")?

[Scally Wag]

Here in the UK, some of the contestants have taken over 30 minutes to answer a question, (it's edited for TV).

The is an ongoing case at the moment of an Army Major who alledgedly used signals from the audience to obtain the correct answer. (He won the million)

It was reported here in the press that someone in the audience had an open line on a mobile phone and was getting the answers and then coughing at the correct moment when the contestant read the answers out aloud.

Good luck.

[beaubazzoo]

Read the question to a friend fairly quickly and the four answers fairly slowly so that they they have time to sink in. If necessary, repeat the four answers but not the question.

[LibWhacker]

Try to laugh at Regis' jokes. He hates it when his jokes bomb. If you're not sure, laugh anyway, even everytime he says something. Really get into it. Maybe something like this. (Hey, just kidding . . . Best of luck to 'ya, Xenalyte! Here's hoping 'ya win a mil!)

[surfer]

Slip anyone and everyone on the show a 20-spot and tell them your a friend of x42(i)(d) - shoe in to win that way!

[Orbiter]

I caught one episode where the contestant used the "Phone-a-Friend" option...some question about an obscure, ancient Egyptian pharoh or some such. I suspected immediately the "friend" had used the internet/search engine because he not only identified correctly the answer, but went on and on citing intricate detail -- as if reading from a book.