Favorite WWTBAM Moment?

[Minh Dang]

It's a long history for an international phenomenon, a long-running gameshow. I know there is some moment in any version of Millionaire, no matter which format it'll be, or which country is it aired.
As I'm working on an anniversary-related projects, I want to included best moment from the show, but I want to make a category for it.
On the first day I asked, it'll be related to lifelines. 

What's your favorite Millionaire moment(worldwide)that involving these lifelines?




Note: Ask the Expert and Three Wise Man are in a same category. Same case for People Speak and Ask 3 of the Audience.

Here's my favorite moment!

[TheLuckySeven]

50:50 - The first ever jackpot question that I witnessed "live". Paulina Kowalczyk in 2008, she used the 50:50 on the 1 000 000 PLN question. It was a monumental moment for me as a game show fan (I was born in 2000, I didn't remember any previous Polish WWTBAM main prize questions, lol)

Phone-a-friend - Jonh Carpenter, duh

Ask The Audience - Anytime, that it went wrong, i.e. the time when in the UK version people had to vote with paper cards because the voting devices were broken

Ask The Expert - Coming back to the Polish version. If I remember correctly, during the run of Krzysztof Wójcik (the first Polish winner), he used this lifeline for the question about what sauce do the Belgian use for their fries XD

Ask The Host - Three words: I. Hate. Cricket.

For the rest of the lifelines, I have nothing.

[mechamind]

For Switch the Question, a somewhat painful but also funny one - how about Kevin Maroney after his StQ question choices were revealed?

"There's a little known 5th lifeline: Switch the Question Back."

I'm sure there's at least one similar moment from another version.

[kplewisvox]

Jun 2, 2023 16:51:13 GMT -5 TheLuckySeven said:

50:50 - The first ever jackpot question that I witnessed "live". Paulina Kowalczyk in 2008, she used the 50:50 on the 1 000 000 PLN question. It was a monumental moment for me as a game show fan (I was born in 2000, I didn't remember any previous Polish WWTBAM main prize questions, lol)

That's the only time I've ever seen a cut to commercial in the middle of a question too. "We'll use the 50:50 when we come back." Sure there have been commercial breaks following a final answer, but not while a question is still live.

For Phone-a-Friend, I'm gonna avoid saying Carpenter since everyone else has already gone there. I'll go with Mike Pomfrey calling his ex-wife, then explaining that he doesn't fear sabotage because she's getting paid off.

[CycloneBoom]

As TheLuckySeven mentioned, in July 2012, during a live episode of "The People Play" specials here in the UK, I recall a memorable moment featuring Ask The Audience.

As can happen for random unpredictability during live TV broadcasts, there was a malfunction in the voting system for the keypads. It's possible this previously occurred during recorded shows, and production might've fixed the issue and done a re-take. However on this occasion being live, it needed another voting method.

Thus the backup plan had to be initiated, with Chris calmly instructing audience members to hold up coloured A B C D voting cards instead.

Here's a link to the point in the episode showing what happened: Link (YouTube)

And a few snapshots of the sequence in picture form:

It sure made quite the rare sight in a WWTBAM studio. I think this was a really clever and fair way to resolve it, and good thinking by the producers who had this foresight to implement the voting cards. Of course, it's a good thing it also led to the question being answered correctly, with approximately 80% confirming the right answer.

I pick this as one of my favourite moments due to its uniqueness, for something which is unprecedented in the show's history.

Edit: Just an addendum to add...
It seems like this was the only time it occurred based on Chris saying the ATA voting system didn't fail previously since the show first aired in 1998.

[theidentfan]

Here are a few I have from the UK:

50:50: See Phone a Friend, example 2.

Ask the Audience: the time when Krish Hook lost £63,000 because he listened to the audience. (I knew the audience was wrong and knew the answer). This was the same audience that didn't know what a Spanish tortilla was and led to poor John McKenna going away empty-handed. (I actually witnessed them live)

Phone a Friend: many UK moments, but the top three are:

• When Colin Hallett (RIP) spelled out the answers to a question and nearly ran out of time, yet won £32,000 (2001)
  
• Mike Corcoran's Phone-a-friend who said he was true "fifty-fifty"... after having used 50:50! "There's only two in it!" (2008)
  
• Paul Harris's Phone-a-friend ("a nutter from a bar in [The Netherlands]" in the words of Chris Tarrant) who said an answer that wasn't up there (2009)
• Also any "voicemail" moments.

Ask the Host: the ibex moment or the cricket moment.

[theidentfan]

Jun 6, 2023 0:44:11 GMT -5 kplewisvox said:

That's the only time I've ever seen a cut to commercial in the middle of a question too. "We'll use the 50:50 when we come back." Sure there have been commercial breaks following a final answer, but not while a question is still live.

For Phone-a-Friend, I'm gonna avoid saying Carpenter since everyone else has already gone there. I'll go with Mike Pomfrey calling his ex-wife, then explaining that he doesn't fear sabotage because she's getting paid off.

I think I watched an episode live last year that also cut to a break during a question.