“I was on Let’s Make a Deal back in 2016, where I actually won a new car! That was beyond perfect timing, because my old car was on its last legs, and I had been saving for a new one. Once I won the car, the money I had saved up paid for any of the random fees I came across in the process. I won the car in August, but I didn’t actually receive the car until November, when the episode actually aired. The producers drove the car to my apartment and had me sign some documents. It was all pretty painless. I had always heard horror stories throughout my life about people winning big on game shows, being hidden fees or karma coming back to get them, or stuff like that. But this process was thankfully worthwhile, and I would so recommend it to everyone!
Here is a tip: if you ever go on one of these game shows that pick contestants out of the audience, they will have a producer interview literally everyone, usually in a group setting in advance. AS long as you can be enthusiastic without being theatrical, and you aren’t completely bizarre, you have a really excellent shot at being picked. When the producer was interview the group of twenty potential audience members I was in, he asked everyone their name, what they did, and one interesting fact about themselves. There was this one random guy who was so desperate to be on television. He started flopping onto the floor and doing the worm in front of everyone. You could immediately see on the producer’s face what he thought. The producer was forcing out some laughter, but there was no way he wanted to put this man on television. Loose cannons are a big no-no for these shows.
For my fun fact, I told the producer that I had just moved from New York City, where I worked on writing musicals. One of my shows was actually about to be transferred to a Broadway run. The producer just so happened to be a big fan of musical theater, so we ended up talking about musicals for a couple of extra minutes. He had to rush through the next few interviews, so I took that as a really positive sign for my chances. After the entire episode was taped, my wife saw that guy who did the worm leaving the studio in an angry huff. It must have taken a lot of energy to do the worm, and it was all for nothing!”
