Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

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Kevin Thurlow
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by Kevin Thurlow » Sat Jan 15, 2022 11:14 pm

"I mentioned that people were forming syndicates and reaping millions that way. But whether or not that constitutes cheating is still moot.
Celador were well aware of the syndicates but couldn´t be arsed to do anything about it."

Yes - that's what I meant. It seems unfair to the ordinary viewer who fancies a go, but I agree that it isn't actually cheating. But it might look bad if you later made a career of being on another quiz show.

It has to be remembered (generally speaking of quiz shows) that the programme makers want a programme that people will want to watch, and I get the impression that the contestants are sometimes viewed as a necessary evil. You have to "play the game" at the auditions. Some shows want people with lively personalities, some don't care as long as you can appear clever.

I also think some contestants are favoured. It happens in the so-called talent shows as well. It is somewhat appalling that apparently "X-Factor" used "auto-tune" to help some contestants...

James Plaskett
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by James Plaskett » Sun Jan 16, 2022 11:10 am

Indeed.
In the final chapter "The Backdrop to the Myth" I mention how James Sorrie would often reach the last hundred but fail by a slender margin to get close enough to the qualifying figure to get amongst the ten Fastest Finger First contestants. And when he did make it on it would be by the slenderest of margins.
That was because Celador were unguarded enough to be using no more than two to three hundred "Closest To" Questions and "Mrs Big" were keeping records of those and telling their hired guns the correct figures when they got a Call Back.
Celador were well aware of this (there were perhaps as many as EIGHT syndicates) but shrugged their shoulders.
Eventually Sorrie got so pissed off he just abandoned his efforts to get on the show.
Sorrie tod me he thinks Celador ought to be brought before OFCOM because of this.

I read that Celador got their audience of two hundred brought in by a company they had hired. BUT they would also allow people who had played (and often done well) to seat themselves amongst that audience.
Somewhat unguarded, don´t you think?
Sorrie recounted to me an instance when he was a waiting contestant and saw two quizzers of rank - each had won a six figure sum on the show - seat themselves directly behind Tarrant. Sorrie told the FFF contestant next to him to watch out for those guys making unusual arm movements.
I myself heard of this via quizzing.co.uk when, some fifteen or so years ago - an ´editorial´ went up there speaking of this practice.

On May 14th 2020, Mark Labbett (a director of quizzing.co.uk) went further in an article I read in the Mail where he said he even knows the names of such people.

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John Clarke
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by John Clarke » Tue Jan 18, 2022 2:59 am

James Plaskett wrote:
Sat Jan 15, 2022 2:12 pm
One of the elements of that ´programe´ was to act thick at rehearsal.
That, and acting thick at audition, probably goes on all the time. I knew of one lad who'd done quite well in this part of the world, then went to the UK and got on to one of the shows there, partly through being careful not to get too many of the test questions right. He cleaned up big (or what passed for it, back in those days). It's harder than you'd think, though, adjusting your mental level down. So many questions where your reaction is: how could anyone not know that?
"The chess-board is the world ..... the player on the other side is hidden from us ..... he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance."
(He doesn't let you resign and start again, either.)

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John Clarke
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by John Clarke » Tue Jan 18, 2022 3:29 am

Kevin Thurlow wrote:
Sat Jan 15, 2022 11:14 pm
You have to "play the game" at the auditions. Some shows want people with lively personalities, some don't care as long as you can appear clever.
Yes, tailor your behaviour at audition to the nature of the target audience. Something a well-known UK champion discovered to his cost after answering 48/50 test questions correctly ....

It helps to have a "story" that's going to appeal to the viewers, such as needing the dough for an otherwise unaffordable family holiday, that kind of thing. And it definitely doesn't help, at least on some shows, to be an obviously quick-witted 40+ white male.
Kevin Thurlow wrote:
Sat Jan 15, 2022 11:14 pm
I also think some contestants are favoured.
Oh no doubt about that. Seen it for myself, both in the studio and when viewing at home. There was one show where a youngish lad was on his final programme, going for the big 'un, at a time when I was on the panel of potential contestants. All they could dig up by way of opposition for him was a couple of fifty-something drongoes who barely got a look-in all night. They could have made it a bit less obvious.

Sometimes you get disfavouring of contestants. Bad enough in itself, but when others get caught up in the "conflict overspill" ... This happened to me. There was one sort of question where you got a series of clues to identifying someone or something; first to answer correctly got the points. When it was a person, the birth and death dates would come first. The producers noticed that one of the guys was particularly good at answering just from those dates (and I wasn't bad at it myself). They evidently figured he'd done well enough, and suddenly the exact dates were dropped, with something like "born in the last third of the nineteenth century" substituted. That sorted him out, but of course I was caught in the crossfire as well. What made it particularly blatant was that once he (and incidentally I) was safely out of the way, the exact dates were back in again!
"The chess-board is the world ..... the player on the other side is hidden from us ..... he never overlooks a mistake, or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance."
(He doesn't let you resign and start again, either.)

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MJMcCready
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by MJMcCready » Wed Feb 09, 2022 8:38 pm

James Plaskett wrote:
Sun Jan 16, 2022 11:10 am
Indeed.

I read that...watch out for those guys making unusual arm movements.
I read about another scandal about Who wants to be a millionaire once involving a contestant who used to be quite good at chess except for when he made 'unusual arm movements which left a bishop en prise against Dave Reumens during blitz, and then made another unusual arm movement involving a steering wheel whilst driving which nearly got me run over!

James Plaskett
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!

Post by James Plaskett » Mon May 29, 2023 4:40 pm

Mr McCready, what the bloody hell are you on!?

A large amount of the stuff you post on here - especially apropos me - is just diarrhoea.

I never drove my motor vehicle anywhere near you so much as once.

You headcase.

James Plaskett
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by James Plaskett » Mon May 29, 2023 5:12 pm

Anyways, after this Lockdown inanity (qua diabetic and over sixty I am twofold classifiable in the high risk group. And yet a total Lockdown sceptic and signatory of the Great Barrington Declaration...) the show´s back on the road this September!

https://theatreweekly.com/rory-bremner- ... play-quiz/

Rory hasn´t told me who´s to play the Ingrams yet.

Although it would seem He has been assigned a truly Divine manifestation!! :lol: :wink:

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MJMcCready
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Re: !

Post by MJMcCready » Mon May 29, 2023 5:21 pm

James Plaskett wrote:
Mon May 29, 2023 4:40 pm
Mr McCready, what the bloody hell are you on!?

A large amount of the stuff you post on here - especially apropos me - is just diarrhoea.

I never drove my motor vehicle anywhere near you so much as once.

You headcase.
I'm just playful James, and as previously mentioned, in the early 90s you did nearly drive into me once, that was in Luton, downs road.

Just interpret it as admiration. I like all who participated in the Beds. league and went onto do very well for themselves and please bear in mind that I have played many of your former mentors and some of your former playing partners.

James Plaskett
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by James Plaskett » Mon May 29, 2023 10:16 pm

I NEVER drove a car in Downs Road, Luton.

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MJMcCready
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by MJMcCready » Tue May 30, 2023 1:55 am

Well then sincere apologies if that is so. Let's conclude you either have a doppelganger or false memory is in play. This was the early 90s, so it's some time ago. Apologies, if I come across as mildly irritating at times. I shall fix that.

James Plaskett
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by James Plaskett » Sat Sep 23, 2023 11:31 pm

Two days ago, after all this Covid Lockdown madness, the nationwide tour of QUIZ the play recommenced - https://www.cft.org.uk/news/this-story- ... x-years-on

This time it´s Rory Bremner who plays Tarrant https://uk.news.yahoo.com/rory-bremner- ... 00496.html and Mark Benton is to portray Paddy Spooner.

Paddy, along with another old hand of Millionaire?, Keith Burgess, ran one of perhaps as many as eight syndicates who funnelled strong quizzers on to the show by paying for their telephone calls to get on whilst taking a healthy % of their prize money.

Indeed, Paddy and Keith co-authored a book about their scam published in 2021 called Quiz, the Consortium, the Truth.
https://www.amazon.com/Quiz-Consortium- ... B098W78J28

The title is obviously a piss-take of the book I co-authored with the late Bob Woffinden: Bad Show, the Cough, the Millionaire Major.

James Plaskett
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by James Plaskett » Sun Oct 01, 2023 9:46 pm

A review of James Graham's play QUIZ. https://www.theguardian.com/.../quiz-re ... ry-bremner...

I accepted an invite to its Press Night on September 29th in Chichester at the start of a nationwide tour, due to my having co-authored the book upon which the play is based: Bad Show https://www.amazon.co.uk/Bad.../dp/0993 ... ref=sr_1_1...

At the end we were asked to vote and voted them ´Not Guilty´.

At the meal and piss-up afterwards I chatted at length with James Graham OBE and Rory Bremner. James and I went over the production and I pointed out one or two tiny areas where it needed to be tweaked whilst also drawing his attention to several other points omitted from Bad Show but now extant in my own subsequent book:
Bread and the Circus -
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Brea.../dp/B09 ... ref=sr_1_2...
To my great surprise, James told me he was also familiar with my book, Coincidences! I mentioned some coincidences in the first chapter of Bread and the Circus itself, and he seemed very taken with those too.

As I shook Rory Bremner´s hand before leaving he told me he thought, "This is far from over."

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Chris Goodall
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by Chris Goodall » Mon Oct 02, 2023 8:07 pm

James Plaskett wrote:
Sun Oct 01, 2023 9:46 pm
As I shook Rory Bremner´s hand before leaving he told me he thought, "This is far from over."
I'm sure with you on the case, he is quite right.
Donate to Sabrina's fundraiser at https://gofund.me/aeae42c7 to support victims of sexual abuse in the chess world.

Northumberland webmaster, Jesmond CC something-or-other. Views mine. Definitely below the Goodall Line.


James Plaskett
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Re: Millionaire Major Coughing Scandal

Post by James Plaskett » Wed Feb 21, 2024 8:18 am

https://www.thearticle.com/reasonable-d ... most_rated

All VOTES and comments from ECForum members most welcomed. 8)

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