Audience Training 101

You are told to be enthusiastic and to clap when the warm-up comedian tells you to, mostly. Ironically, I was never instructed to stay quiet or avoid giving the contestants hints, which seem like the first two things I would instruct my audience members not to do if I were a producer.

When you attend the taping of any show, the staff really just wants you to look happy, clap, yell, and be excited. At Millionaire. there is a warm-up comedian who comes out during the commercial breaks and messes around with the audience. When the game is being played, he stands underneath the giant host screen and silently instructs the audience to react with hand gestures. One thing that everyone on the staff really encourages you to do is to take the audition test. The audition test comes about right before the actual taping, and it takes place right in the studio. During one of the commercial breaks, the warm-up comedian will read off the 1-3 names of people who passed the audition test, and this was a very exciting and tense moment at my taping. Other than that, the experience is very much like the one you have at home watching the show, except it's 100 times more exciting and you get to see the set, Meredith, the contestant, and the lighting effects in action before your eyes. Everyone is very kind and enthusiastic, and it's hard not to have a good time. It's a very fun experience if you can swing a trip to New York.

I attended a taping last August in New York City.

Unfortunately, it's not. Neither the episode nor the audience warm-up segment is on YouTube.