But back when Chris Tarrant ruled the bastard child of Double Your Money and Mastermind, a million pounds was serious dosh. And the scandal of the “Coughing Major” who was convicted of cheating his way to the big cheque in 2003 was international news.
James Graham’s play Quiz has transferred from a successful run at Chichester Festival Theatre. The first half is a kind of potted history of TV gameshows with a plot attached as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? is pitched to sceptical TV executives then transmitted with great success.
The Ingram family, particularly pub quiz obsessive Diana (Stephanie Street), see an opportunity to make big bucks and they take turns to get on the show.
Diana’s husband Charles (Gavin Spokes) is a British Army major, primed for the quiz by his ambitious wife and assisted by mysterious Welsh nerd Tecwen Whittock (Mark Meadows) who coughs to guide Charles to the correct answers.
The second half focuses on the subsequent court case and the audience is invited to vote on whether Charles is innocent or guilty even as the facts become increasingly uncertain.
Daniel Evans’ production is part-gameshow and part-trial and skips along merrily enough as it attempts to tie all the elements together. However it is looking a little faded.
The TV studio set with its garish neon and huge screens was trounced by the National Theatre’s production of Network.
The audience-as-jury, in which we are given electronic keypads to vote guilty or innocent, is an overused device (last year’s Terror at the Lyric Hammersmith did it far more effectively).
And the reliance on a comprehensive knowledge of pop culture from the golden age of gameshows such as Take Your Pick, Bullseye and The Price Is Right is a fundamental weakness.
Who under the age of 60 will identify Leslie Crowther or Des O’Connor, however amusingly Keir Charles impersonates them?
The Coughing Major scandal is a prism through which we examine British society and its values, political manipulation, the legal system and even the nature of theatre itself.
How can we distinguish between truth and lies, fact and fiction?
Given the current concerns over fake news and with social media under the microscope, Quiz is so timely that it seems more penetrating than it is.
