Calling America

6 November 2007

Tom Bog TV: A Walk-Around Quiz Show

Posted under places beginning with: S; Saint Peter; Minnesota .

It is often from within a state of confinement that the most fruitful ideas emerge, and in this case the confinement of campus life in a small Minnesota town was the ingredient that led to the creation of Tom Bog TV. This story comes to us from photographer, Joe Lencioni. Visit Joe’s site for a delectable visual experience.

Throughout college I was marooned in a small town with few attractions, so I had to be inventive with my time. My friend Dave was the perfect accomplice sophomore year—he was witty and very tall. While I thought I was intelligent at the time, I could pull off the slightly dopey college kid image so no one was the wiser. Standing next to Dave, I was just a silly, Italian midget. Suffice it to say, we had a slight Penn and Teller dynamic working in our favor.

Fortunately, Dave and I rode on the same humor-wave that year. We were able to get into a mode where things would naturally flow, and as a result we did a number of unusual and zany things for fun: we wrote edgy, satirical, and possibly offensive articles for the student newspaper; we hosted a radio show called Kissing Joe and Dave, where we invited our listeners come to the booth and kiss us live on the air; and we occasionally played a game we invented called Tom Bog TV. I loved playing this game.

Tom Bog TV was the perfect blend of street theatre, improvisation, and quiz show. It was as if Andy Kauffman and Alex Trebek got together and decided to have a little fun. We used a variety of different games for our quiz show; “buckets or boxes,” “will it stick,” (both borrowed from The Tom Green Show) “artistic music or interpretive dance,” “this or that,” and “what is the difference between a duck” were some of our favorites. These games were difficult for most contestants because they actually didn’t have any logically correct answers. In fact, the whole point of the show was that the answers were entirely arbitrary–watching people’s reactions was the fun part.

Typically, Dave would play the host with a set of “official” note cards and I would play the assistant with a pillow case full of “prizes.” My pillow case was loaded with inherently funny things such as Armour Potted Meat Product, microwavable pork rinds, and a banana. Additionally, Dave would carry about twenty dollars in one dollar bills to entice prospective contestants. And, we recorded the show under the guise of shooting a pilot for FOX, MTV, or Playboy channel.

We would always play Tom Bog TV in the freshman dorm because they were still scared about college, didn’t really know what was going on, and liked to do things in groups. Most encounters would go something like this:

[Dave knocks on prospective contestant’s door.]

Contestant: Yes?

[Dave takes out a wad of cash and throws it into the middle of the room.]

Dave: Hello, we are doing Tom Bog TV, a walk-around quiz show where you can win prizes, money, and maybe even a little self-respect. Do you want to play?

Contestant: Uh… sure… ?

Dave: Great! Well then, we’ll start you off with an easy one.

Me: This first round will get you warmed up and won’t actually count toward your final points.

Dave: Are you ready?

Contestant: Ok.

Dave: Is it… buckets or boxes?

[Long pause]

Contestant: What?

Dave: Is it buckets or boxes?

Contestant: Boxes, I guess.

Dave: Oooh. I’m sorry, but that’s incorrect. The correct answer was “buckets.”

Me: But that’s okay, because that was just a warm-up question. Normally, that would have counted for 40%. This next question is 60%.

Dave [at contestant]: Will it stick?

[Pause]

Contestant: Sure.

Dave: That is… [looking at his note cards] correct!

Me: That was just practice. Are you ready for the first round to begin?

Contestant: Yeah, sure.

Dave: What is the difference between a duck?

Contestant: [puzzled look] Um, what?

Dave: That is correct! We would have accepted: “what,” “yes,” or “is.” For this next part, we’ll need you to stand on this chair.

[Contestant awkwardly looks around and stands on the chair]

Dave: Now you have to choose which category you would like to play. Do you want “artistic music or interpretive dance” or “this or that?”

Contestant: I’ll take the music one.

Dave: Great. For this category, you can either supply the artistic music or the interpretive dance and Joe will provide the other. So do you choose to give us some artistic music or do an interpretive dance?

Contestant: I guess I’ll do the music.

Dave: Okay, so go ahead…

[Contestant starts to beat-box while I dance around in a mystified fashion. After a minute or two, Dave interrupts.]

Dave: –okay, great. Well, as it turns out, you have been disqualified. Thank you for playing Tom Bog TV.

[We gather up our pile of money and move on to find our next victims.]

Occasionally, when we found good contestants, we would break from our game show pattern and improvise a little further. This kept things more interesting for us. For instance, we came across a guy who looked exactly like Scott Stapp, the lead singer of Creed. We asked him to do impressions and then continued by interviewing him and his buddy for twenty minutes about their sex lives in front of a growing crowd. The interview was based on long, awkward pauses and odd innuendo, so it drew out and built to a beautiful climax. At the end, we received a standing ovation from the crowd.

After having a laugh, we would depart the freshman dorm–to our delight, it seemed as though young college kids will do most anything as long as other people are doing it. We would glow in the realization that the most important transformation that can happen in college is to finally think for yourself.

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