My Journey to Culver City & The Wheel

Wheel Mobile Event: May 9, 2015
It’s hard to believe that a full year has gone by since this whole experience started! Last April, I was watching Wheel, when I saw a commercial (“Hey Denver! We’re coming to you!”) for the Wheel Mobile event! I was excited, but had no idea what to expect. The Wheel Mobile picked one of the rainier springs in recent memory to visit the Mile High City. (1 week after the WM, Pat & Vanna visited the city… that’s why there were so many clouds in all of the exterior shots, versus the “300 days of sunshine” Jared referred to in his intro during Denver week!) Due to the fact the weather wasn’t the greatest, the Wheel Mobile event was planned to be held indoors at the Stock Show center in Denver. My friend & I decided to go down on a fluke (of course I wanted to try out for the show, but I was skeptic… how the heck would I get a chance out of so many people?!) About 3000 people or so had shown up for the Saturday event. At that point, the gate to the first show had already opened, so we filled out the little applications on the spot & submitted them, and went into the venue.

I think the one thing I’ll remember most from this day was the fact that, right before the show started, they played the “Puzzle Reveal” cue (Bah dah bah dah!) And immediately, people began to lose their minds. I just thought to myself, upon hearing that reaction, “These are my people!” Ha!

The first show came and went. I remember being slightly disheartened at seeing the huge drum up there and thinking to myself “There’s no way… There’s just no way!” When the last round contestants had been picked, they said we could line up for the second show… which the entire crowd then proceeded to do haha. My friend & I stayed and watched the last round up close to the stage (since we were at the back of the crowd before), and after it ended, got in line again.

The second show started & I wasn’t called. It was towards the end of the second or third round that I thought to myself “I’m hungry! Probably won’t get called this show anyway.” So I went and bought a huge bag of popcorn since that was one of three foods they had at the center. Right as I have a huge mouthful of popcorn in my mouth, I heard my name called. What happened next was sort of ridiculous. I remember jumping into the air, sort of screaming with my mouth full, and shoving the bag of popcorn at my friend (which of course flew all over the place. Oops). My friend after the fact said that the people around us were laughing, to which she responded “Uh, he’s just a little bit excited,” but who cares! It was way too exciting a moment, and besides, Marty had told us to react big, that our audition starts when they call our name! He said something to the effect of “Oh, this guy’s excited!” or something like that.

I then proceeded to attempt to suck the popcorn kernels from out of my mouth as I went to the front of the room. We had to take a picture, and take a seat with our other round contestants. Little did I know that I would be playing with Eugene!

We get onstage, and I remember thinking I needed to do something that would make me stand out. I gave a shout out to my school when it was my turn (I was I believe the 5th person out of 6), and then sang a bit of “La Bamba” for the crowd. Given that I am a Spanish teacher, I wanted to do a song that everyone would recognize, and would also tie in to representing myself! My friend has a video of this but I have not asked to see it… I’m sure it’s incredibly awkward haha.

Anyway, we then proceeded into our Speed Up round. The category was EVENT. I remember thinking I wanted to call an RST or N… and of course all of those were taken before the turn got to me. Panicking (since Marty said we needed to be fast), I called out my first Wheel letter: “D!” (D?! WTF?! L WAS STILL THERE YOU DUMMY!) There was no D. Nobody gets it, so we all got another turn… so then I proceed to call what I thought was a good letter: “L!” Yep, no L. So then everyone is lined up to get another turn… and Eugene calls an A. There were 5 of them… “HAWAIIAN VACATION!” Eugene solved with a ton of enthusiasm! I gave him a high five; I just remember thinking as we left the stage “Well, that guy is going to get through!” The folks at Wheel told us that we could hear back from them in 3-4 months. Oy… what a wait! In the meantime, I ended up climbing Kilimanjaro, but for the whole summer, heard nothing from Wheel. Then at some point mid-August (after the school year had started back up for teachers), I got a generic “Hey Denver fans! Submit a video to be considered for an audition!” I figured since I hadn’t heard from the Wheel Mobile audition, I may as well pursue every option available to me, so I recorded a video at the top of a 14er, since I am a huge fan of the mountains! I figured it’d help me stick out.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z442-Mg5fE4

Two days later, I received an e-mail invitation to attend a final audition on September 1! Awesome! Who knows whether it was the video or the Wheel Mobile event that did it (I’d guess the latter), but either way, I had made it to the next round! So stoked!

Final Audition, September 1, 2015
In between the time I got the final audition email & the audition itself, I did find ten96lt’s thread through Google searches about what to expect at a final audition! It was incredibly helpful, in that I at least had an idea of what to expect before going down there. I had to take a personal day from school (less than 2 weeks into the school year… haha!) since the audition was from 10 until potentially 1 p.m. Got down to Denver early and figured out where I needed to go, then went across the street & had some coffee (which maybe wasn’t a great idea since I was already fired up on adrenaline haha). At any rate, I got down to the audition room about 20 minutes or so beforehand, and a few people had already gathered together. I met Noelani (who I think was on the Cruise week a day or two before Mario)… she was awesome! Just an incredibly kind, highly-energetic woman! Upon meeting her, I had no doubts that she would be on the show. At any rate, the doors eventually opened up, and we were able to sit down. (I was sitting in the second row on the end, in front of the contestant coordinators). Alex came around & made a seating chart so she could reference us & call us when it was our turn. There were no other Paul’s so no last initials were needed! There was a nervous energy in the room, but once everyone was in, it was time to go!

I remember the first puzzle I was standing up for was an OCCUPATION (and someone had just solved the previous puzzle so it was a clean start for me), spun and called a T, bought an E, spun and called N… No N! The irony? I’m a High School SpaNish Teacher… the puzzle was High School Science Teacher. Freaking N! Ha! So I sat back down. After everyone had taken a turn, they called on a few of us again who they didn’t see much of… thankfully, I was called for another turn, this time towards the end of a puzzle. I called a consonant or two, and solved my puzzle (which was a FUN & GAMES puzzle… some of my friends joked after the fact that the category should’ve been “SURVIVAL SKILLS” haha). I remember some of the potential contestants had to be coaxed to have more energy/ excitement/project more… “t.” “LOUDER!” “T.” “LOUDER!” “Tttttt.” I don’t know if that rewrite did the moment any justice but it was somewhat amusing. One other contestant (who ultimately did make the show in Denver week) called a T, then tried to buy a Y (corrected to buy an E), then spun again and tried to buy an M. Oy.

Then we took the test. I’m not sure which of the two colors I had… I think yellow?? At any rate, I didn’t have problems with THINGS or SHOW BIZ… did ok on SAME NAME, but RHYME TIME? I didn’t get one! I filled in partial answers where I could, but oy… Rhyme Time killed me haha. Anyway, the coordinators (who, by the way, are awesome… could you meet any more energetic people in your life?!) left the room and said to be back in around 20-30 minutes. At this point I remember meeting a guy named Robert (sitting one row back), and talking to I think Tammy next to me, and Connie (who was on the Friday episode of Denver week!) We were all geeking out about Wheel & how excited we were… the coordinators came back about 40 minutes later and did ask some of us to leave. However, myself, Robert, Tammy, & Connie were all going to be sticking around for the final round.

This one was a bit more intense, as you all know, in that you have to pretend to spin the Wheel. I was in the third group (of four groups total) of 6 people; I was the 6th in line. The 5th person in my group solved the first puzzle, so I started clean with the second. Called a T, bought an E, called H, called S… and no S! Bummer! (Though Alex made me feel better with “Good strategy, but no!”) Then the play resumed at the start of the group. As the round progressed, I focused in on the first word, which by the time the 5th player had control, looked like this: _O_ER. I remember being convinced that “It’s POWER. It has to be POWER. What else could it be?!” So I get control again and spin and call out “W!!!!!!”……… There was no W. (Though I did notice Jackie turn around to look up at the puzzle board). The first through third players were also puzzled and called some odd letters, but then Tammy got control & put us to shame (It was POKER). Haha! We did our mock Pat chats and I talked about my love of the mountains & doing Kilimanjaro. I didn’t want to stutter so I kept talking, so I ended my chat with this gem. “I met a lot of great people on Kilimanjaro & was happy for that opportunity, and am happy to be here today with you fine people.” OH BROTHER! (Jackie at least said thank you but I’m not sure I could’ve ended that any more awkward). After doing the second-chance callback (I didn’t get called back up), they told us to expect a letter 2 weeks later, and if not, that we should move on with our lives. On my way out, I remember shaking Lee (the firefighter’s) hand & telling him great job, and Noelani coming up to me and saying “I think so.” I felt fairly confident while leaving, however…

As the wait for the letter progressed, I definitely became more doubtful and second-guessed myself a ton. In particular, I was convinced that the W did me in! (One of my colleagues/friends who came with me to LA heard a ton about that W haha)… I was ready to throw in the towel (though several of you on here said to wait it out)… and 25 days later, I got the letter in the mail! I was so stoked! That was easily the worst part of the process; waiting for the letter was a bit painful! Once I had the letter, I had a feeling I may get called for Denver week since they told us they were looking for 15 folks to represent the city that week. And so I passed the following months just watching the show & practicing with the iPhone game.

One thing I want to point out (because I’m a science nerd) is that the day after arriving in LA (I stayed in Culver City for 3 nights; 2 nights leading up to the taping), I went to visit the Space Shuttle Endeavour at the Science Center! A few years ago, I was able to visit the space center in Florida, where I met Barbara Morgan the second “Teacher in Space.” She was Christa McAuliffe’s backup on the Challenger mission… at any rate, about 20 years after the disaster, she herself was able to go up on the Endeavour. It was great to get to speak to her about my experiences teaching, as well as her experiences in the classroom & ultimately with NASA. What a kind person. Anyway, she signed a poster dedicated to my students that’s hanging in one of my classrooms, and so when I found out the Endeavour was in LA, I knew I wanted to visit it! One of my college friends took me to see it… just so awesome to see a huge part of American science & history right in front of my own eyes! Anyway, I was definitely nervous (but very excited as well), and had a bit of trouble falling asleep that night…

THE DAY OF THE TAPING (March 17)
**In advance, sorry for typos here... I just spilled all of this out within a few days after getting back from LA**
I went into the lobby of the Sheraton right about 7:10 and joined the group that was congregated there. Mary immediately was so awesome towards me; she welcomed me right into the group! It was great meeting someone who I had ‘met’ online haha. I also remember meeting Niket and his sister at that point too (Niket was in my same final audition group. Kind of a cool backstory; his sister is the huge fan of the show, and he went to the Wheelmobile to support her… and he got picked! The rest is history).

We all got on the shuttle; the Hilton folks were already onboard. Some of us were talking about the show, what to expect, some of us didn’t say anything. I did have a quick conversation with Steph (I AM BAFFLED) about her experience climbing 14ers… she had done I believe 24 with her husband, which was very cool! There’s definitely a ton of traffic in Los Angeles, even early in the morning; it took us a decent amount of time to get there! I heard Mandi talking about how she was a Denver week alternate as well, and so I introduced myself to her as also being an America’s Game contestant!

Once there, we all piled off the shuttle, and there was the infamous WELCOME TO WHEEL OF FORTUNE sign. Alex was there to greet us while we all went through the metal detector. Once through, we were whisked through the entrance (didn’t get to check out the mini museum dedicated to Wheel) but went into the green room. Jackie & Shannon came in and checked us all in & were greeting us. It was just so exciting to be there.

I was able to see that there were LA based alternates as well. One of the first things they did was decide who was going to play out of the three LA based alternates on the America’s Game show (I knew that this would be my direct competition) Liz drew the ball that signified she would play. The other two (one man one woman) would be the alternates for the day (can’t remember their names, but I’m sure I’ll recognize them next season). The very first thing we did was go through all the legal paperwork with only the lawyer present making sure we were all eligible. The next thing was to go through the contestant form with the contestant coordinators. A few people were getting makeup while we had a short break; Alex was teaching us what to say in our hometown howdy! Once we had done this, we were taken into the set.

It was so surreal. The first thing I saw was the Puzzle Board… it looked way brighter in person I thought. It was also much bigger than I had pictured; I was so used to seeing it on one screen! And of course, they had us all gather around the Wheel. It’s hard to describe the excitement I felt at seeing this thing in person. The thing that I had seen for years as a kid was finally in front of me; it had a really cool glint/sheen to it I thought. At any rate, Jackie was talking to us all about how to spin the Wheel, when all of a sudden someone comes running up and says “Jackie! Jackie! Sorry, can I interrupt really quick?!” I was thinking, “Who the heck is this person interrupting?! We are about to spin the Wheel!” And then she said, “Hi everyone! I’m Vanna!” It was so surreal to see this woman in front of us with no makeup/dress, but still look awesome! She told us all to have fun and wished us all good luck… she ran around the Wheel grabbing our hands saying “Good luck! Good luck! Good luck!” (Though I think Mike was lucky enough to get a hug from her at this point haha). Jackie then showed us how to spin, and we were able to practice spinning the Wheel. It was so cool to actually get to reach down and spin… just so cool. I was one of the first to step up and spin. It was everything I’d want it to be (as cheesy as that sounds). Though my first spin was a Bankrupt. Womp womp ha.

I got to stand on the side and wait and watch everyone else take their first spins. It was so exciting. I’m not sure if I’m getting these things in the right order so please correct me if I’m wrong here, Eugene & Mary.

Alex talked to us about the prizes board, which was where we could see how much we had in each round, if we had any wedges, and our total value (I had to ask for more explanation later because I wasn’t totally sure I knew what was what on the board).

Shannon explained to us what the Used Letter Board was. She gave a HINT HINT that if there is one vowel up there, they’re essentially giving us a letter in the puzzle. Good thing to remember…

We then were taken back into the Green Room for a break. It was fun getting to socialize with my fellow contestants. I told a couple of them that I was sure that HEADLINE would show up for Denver week being “BRONCOS WIN SUPER BOWL” as well as PROPER NAME for “PEYTON MANNING.” I really had to go to the bathroom and tried asking Shannon if I could go into the bathroom (she sort of nodded but held up a finger) and then I realized she was talking to Harry. Great. Haha. When the coordinators came back in, the Denver week folks were divided up into groups, and they picked their show order (I was already show 6). Then we picked our slots for where we were going to stand… I wanted yellow since I thought it was a luckier spot, and I didn’t want blue because it seemed it was a bad luck spot haha… and of course, I was the first to draw, and I drew blue. I pushed the thought out of my mind because I wanted to stay in the game!

Then the coordinators took us through the different wedges, tags, etc., and told us how they worked. Everyone of course was excited to see the Million Dollar wedge. Anyway, Harry came in & introduced himself to us which was pretty cool. Then they took us all through the categories that could show up during the show. They were very specific with the pronunciation and hit their letters hard. My favorite was VIVIEN LEIGH… “Who knows who that is?” Almost nobody raised their hands. Too funny!

I was the last to get called in for makeup as they were going through the prizes & tags for our show. The car of course was a Ford Fiesta. The tag? I don’t remember at all. The wedge though was a shopping spree-- $6,000 for Furniture Outlet.com. I loved the makeup designer’s phrase when I was set: “You are now HD ready!” Haha. She told me that I was in for a “long day” when she found out I was on show 6. She wasn’t lying, but I was happy to be at the end rather than first.

At that point, we received our nametags (awesome!) and went back out to the set. We did our hometown howdies! Alex said I had a good voice & wanted me to go first, so I did. A bit nervewracking! “Hi, I’m Paul from Louisville, watch me play Wheel of Fortune on Fox 31 Denver!” I did it and it was fine… but as the second person was going, Jackie came up and asked me “Where did you say you were from? Is that in Colorado?” I thought I had said something wrong but then I realized she just didn’t know Louisville (not Louisville, KY) is a town in CO! BREATHE, PAUL!

Then we had rehearsal. We had to stand behind our spots. I took a second to touch the set (‘cabin’ look… the stones aren’t real! Haha!) and I was also surprised to see that the big screen was not a digital screen… it was just a screen! For some reason I always thought it was a huge plasma screen behind the contestants haha. (I saw that in the Hometown Howdy but still). Also, the lights at the base of the screen are BRIGHT and HOT. Alex looked into it by accident and had trouble seeing for a minute there!

Anyway, Gary is such a pro! He could easily stand in for Pat! It was fun to see how the contestants did & start getting used to the way the puzzle board looked. Every team got to play a round and get used to spinning, calling letters, buying vowels, etc. When my team got up there, we spun for a bit, but then went into the final spin. Mindy called the H’s… but didn’t solve. I called the P’s and got PROFESSIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER. So cool! Gary told me I was going to the Bonus Round… and so I did! To practice, anyway. On our way over to the bonus wheel, he told me he always appreciated having contestants with a natural enthusiasm & good energy to do the BR, which I really thought was nice. He told me that when I solve the practice round to really show some excitement to get my fellow contestants pumped up for their episodes. I introduced my friends in the audience, and then spun the Wheel, which was filled with fake envelopes. I called out some letters… I think I did CPG and… I think I? I can’t remember… immediately I had WITH CARE but not the first part… and Gary just whispered to me “HANDLE” so I shouted “HANDLE WITH CARE” and was so excited about winning fake money. At any rate, it was a good start to the day. At this point I was able to go up and sit in the audience… where we were instructed not to talk at all to the people behind us! At least we were able to talk to our fellow contestants though; it was nice to have people next to us who knew what the others were going through!

The first three shows taped quick. The first show, Jim did the slate with an Irish brogue… so much fun. It was so exciting to see Pat walk out for the first time; that's when it all became completely real! I remember feeling bad for Tyler in the first show. The first BR—too easy. The second show was fun. Great to see Niket get a last second solve, Mary be an awesome contestant (Freaking Mangos/Mangoes, man!), and Steph pulled off a nice solve in the BR! That was the only bonus round from the Denver Week that I had no clue on. Third show… Eugene was terrific fun (BOOYAH!), Lisa did nice on the Express (though I was surprised she didn’t get that BR), and I felt so bad for Lee. Such a great guy, and it was hard to see him get tough luck.

During the breaks between shows, they would play current songs, one of which was Ex’s and Oh’s. I told my fellow contestants that the song was about a Wheel of Fortune contestant who had a rough day out there by calling duds of X’s and O’s during their game… they laughed; we’re nerds!

Show 4… I don’t remember at all to be honest aside from the BRONCOS puzzle. I do remember though that the slate for the episode included a BOOYAH from Jim! Show 5 was fun because these were the people we had been with the whole day. Connie, Jared, Tameika. For me, it was brutal to see Tameika have one good spin in the PEYTON MANNING round, and then ultimately go to the BR because of it! But that’s the name of the game!

We were taken back downstairs & I had my makeup touched up. I was able to watch the Tameika’s BR from the Green Room… I remember just talking it out with the RSTLNE “Something the best… along the best… AMONG THE BEST!” and got it and Jackie said “YES! Do exactly that; talk it out!” Good feeling going into my show. Shannon then interviewed us like Pat would and we talked to her… she asked for specific pronunciation on Louisville (not like the Kentucky one!) We talked about my love of mountaineering and I asked permission to say “Go Eagles!” to represent my school. So that was fun. Once I got mic’ed up Jackie put double sided tape on my tie so it wouldn’t be flopping all around. Then we went back out onto the stage for some final spin practice. We had to move fast (TIME IS MONEY!), and so we’d spin (LOOK AT YOUR FLIPPER, WHERE IS IT POINTING) and call our letters! (T! R! E! Q! – YES, THERE ARE 15 Q’S NOW WHAT?!) Jackie was our coach essentially for our episode and she was just awesome. She was getting us completely pumped up!

The stage manager/director (not sure which) gave us one final instruction and told us we needed to act like we were seeing Pat & Vanna for the first time that day and smile & be excited when they walked out. We practiced it. I felt SO AWKWARD doing it but I knew I had to smile for it. I forget who said this to who, but between me & Mandi, one of us said “Wow! We are going to look insane!” Hahaha. With one last GOOD LUCK and SMILE reminder, we were on. FROM SONY PICTURES STUDIOS… IT’S AMERICA’S GAME!

Hey, congrats on a great game! I don't know if you saw it but funny enough, I sent you a message earlier in the day asking if you had taped your show because I hadn't seen you yet. Then I got home later that night and started watching the DVRed episode and there you are! Congrats again!