Working on the chain gang (part 6)

After the game

Once Peter and I had had our make-up retouched ready for our post-show interviews, a researcher led us down a corridor and outside into an unprepossessing alleyway behind the studio building, at the end of which was the door to a small room where the interviews would be recorded. At that moment, however, the two-man mobile camera crew were back in the fake green room, shooting the pre-title sequence for the next show of the day. The researcher apologised for keeping us hanging around and went off to fetch a plate of food to keep us going while we waited to be called.

Eventually, Peter was summoned to the interview room and I was left alone – or so I thought. I looked up from munching hungrily on a sausage roll and there, walking grumpily back from her own interview, was the defeated Gail. I felt a momentary flash of unease at finding myself sharing this deserted alley with somebody having an understandable grudge against me. My powers of rational thought quickly reasserted themselves: this wasn’t a crowbar-wielding thug – just a respectable middle-class lady from the Home Counties with a competitive streak. I tried to turn on the charm.

"Hello there," I breezed. "Have you been saying horrible things about me?"

"No," she replied with a tone that suggested her ruffled feathers had settled only slightly since she left the studio. "I simply said that I was furious at not making it to the final, and I thought it was down to tactical voting by you men." Then she went on her way. (What she omitted to mention was that she’d also added, in a coda of lip-quivering disdain, "...and I don’t care who wins.")

After what seemed an age, it was my turn to be ushered into the interview room. This was a tiny space, about eight to ten feet square, with a couple of lights facing a chair and a background cyclorama in Weakest Link livery. A producer sat opposite me and explained that she would prompt me with questions, but that they would be edited out so I would need to reflect the question back in my answers. For example, to the question: "Did you expect to make it to the final?" you have to say something like, "I didn’t expect to make it to the final because..." (instead of simply, "No, because...").

The interview got under way with me explaining that friends watching the show wouldn’t be particularly surprised that I’d done well, because I’m known as a trivia buff, but that they might be surprised – as I was – that I hadn’t been voted off tactically. I would like to have used that point as a springboard to talk about Gail’s blatant attempts to get rid of me, but the interviewer (who seemed rather bored and uninterested) moved on. In retrospect, the interview was a distinct anti-climax; the questions were all so closed, and the time for each answer so limited, that there was little or no opportunity to open things out and try to give some more entertaining personal thoughts on the game.

Eventually, it was time for the last question. "How do you feel about winning Weakest Link?" I said that it felt great, that the whole experience had been wonderful; and added, "...and Anne’s a pussycat" – only to be told rather tetchily, "Can you answer again, but don’t say Anne’s a pussycat because we can’t use it." Once more, I expressed my delight both at being the winner and at the amount of prize money I was taking away, managing to keep it sounding fairly spontaneous and genuine. At the end, I rocked forward in my chair and my left foot hit the floor. The sound man, who was crouched in front of me holding a boom mike, said, "Sorry, can you do that once more – the mike picked up a thump when you stamped your foot."

So I answered the question for a third time – knowing as the words came out of my mouth that this time it sounded false, that the pleasure was contrived and that my face was contorted into a manic grimace. Needless to say, this was the take they used.

The ordeal over, I was escorted back to the green room. I’d imagined that most of the contestants who’d been voted off earlier in the game would be on their way home by now, so I was surprised (and slightly embarrassed) as I walked through the door to be greeted by a round of applause from the assembled team, who’d been watching the rest of the game on a monitor linked to the studio. If I’m honest, I would have to say that their congratulations rang slightly hollow. No one pretends that they come on Weakest Link not hoping to win, and the overriding atmosphere in the room was one of tangible disappointment. I’m sure I would have felt the same in their place.

I sought out a phone to ring Michael with the good news. It was around 3:45pm; by now he would be in Muswell Hill, at the home of our friends Richard and John with whom we were spending the weekend, and waiting on tenterhooks to hear how it had gone. He answered his mobile with a nervously breezy, "Hello!"

"It’s all over," I said, putting on a voice of brave disappointment. "I did OK... I didn’t get voted off in the first round."

"Oh – well done," he said, clearly trying to sound positive.

"We were a pretty strong team actually," I continued. "We banked quite a lot of money by the end – nearly four thousand pounds in all..."

"Wow, that’s really good."

"...which I won."

There was a moment’s stunned silence. Then a tremulous voice at the other end of the phone said, "You... you won?"

"Yep. Three thousand, nine hundred and thirty pounds."

"Oh my god! That... that’s amazing!" He was practically speechless, laughing and crying all at once.

"I’m in the mood for a celebration," I said.

"The wine’s already open. Just get back here as soon as you can."

I returned to the green room to find production co-ordinator Stephanie writing out my winner’s cheque (my travel expenses were included, which is why the amount is shown as £3,965). As I said my farewells, I heard a familiar voice on the TV monitor saying, "Right... now let’s wipe those smiles off your faces." For a moment, I thought it was a recording of our show, and glanced at the screen – to see another team of nine new hopefuls facing Anne for the final game of the day, just getting under way in the studio down the corridor.

I drove round the North Circular Road as fast as the early rush hour traffic would allow, arriving in Muswell Hill at around 4:30. It was a beautifully warm summer’s afternoon, and Richard, Michael and I drank a celebration glass of bubbly on the rooftop deck while we waited for John to come home. Later, I treated them all to a meal at a favourite north London restaurant – Capri in Archway Road, Highgate. (This act of generosity wasn’t quite as beneficent as it sounds, as Capri is famously good value for money – the bill for four came to less than £60!) It had been an absolutely brilliant day – one that I shall never forget.

Reactions to the broadcast

Before I left Pinewood, Emil had told me that the show I was in wouldn’t be aired until at least the end of 2003, possibly even early 2004; so I was stunned when, less than four weeks later, I received a call from the production office to say that it would be on BBC2 the following Monday (September 15). I sent out a mass email to friends and family to let them know it was on, without of course revealing the outcome.

On the day I was unexpectedly nervous waiting for 5:15 to come around. Making a fool of myself in front of a handful of strangers in a TV studio was one thing; knowing that millions of people would be watching, including countless friends and relatives, was quite another. I set the video and headed over to Michael’s around 4pm (we weren’t yet living together at the time); luckily, he was able to leave work promptly and made it home in time to watch the show with me, a bottle of wine and a tray of nibbles. It was great sharing his excitement at seeing the whole thing unfold – and we both roared with unkind laughter at the expression on Gail’s face when she got voted off.

That evening and throughout the next couple of weeks, emails of surprise and congratulation flooded in. People seemed very excited to see someone they knew on such a high-profile show and genuinely thrilled by my success. (Not least my father, who was inordinately proud and showed the tape endlessly to his friends and neighbours. He died less than a month later; it seems bizarre that something so utterly trivial should have brought us closer together at the end of his life, but I’m not about to knock it.)

A reporter from the local free paper, the Leamington Spa Observer, got hold of my number and called me for an interview, which I was happy to give. (The BBC forbid you to talk to the press about the outcome of the show before transmission, but have no objection once it’s been aired.) I was photographed holding the cheque (actually a photocopy – I’d paid the real thing into the bank the day after the recording) and asked what I planned to spend the money on.

To bank or not to bank?

In between recording and transmission, I found myself wondering how my winnings (which seemed high compared with most daytime editions of Weakest Link I’d seen) actually measured up, and started looking around the World Wide Web for some statistics. I still don’t know the answer, but I found the results of some fascinating research projects: in particular, a report called "The Weakest Link: A field experiment in rational decision making" (you’ll need the Acrobat PDF reader to view the document).

The researchers analysed data from 77 episodes of the show broadcast over a five-month period, and analysed the banking decisions made by contestants. They concluded, unremarkably, that contestants rarely followed the optimal banking strategy that would have maximised their winnings. Rather more surprisingly, they were also able to demonstrate that a simple rule-of-thumb banking strategy, while not necessarily optimal, would nevertheless have yielded higher total prize money in the majority of the games they studied. This strategy is as follows:

• In Rounds 1–4, bank if and only if the amount of money in the chain reaches £200 (unless the time remaining is 10 seconds or less, in which case bank after every correctly answered question).
• In Rounds 5–8, bank after every correctly answered question.

At first I imagined that, while this simplistic strategy might work in the majority of cases, it would be less effective in a game such as ours, where the team were generally strong and managed to amass a comparitively large amount using instinctive banking decisions alone. In fact, it turns out that, all other things being equal, we would have banked fractionally more – forty pounds more to be precise – had we followed the rule of thumb.

The end... or is it?

Being on Weakest Link was one of the most enjoyable and exciting experiences I’ve had. It’s now over three years ago, yet people still regularly ask me about it – or want to know when I’m going to be on another game show. The answer to the latter question is, usually, "As soon as they’ll let me onto one." I’ve applied for loads and had (unsuccessful) auditions for quite a few, including Channel 4’s venerable Countdown, Ant and Dec’s PokerFace and a yet-to-be transmitted show from Celador called Perfect Strangers.

As I write, however, it seems the Weakest Link tale is not quite over. On November 1 2006, I returned to Pinewood – this time as one of 160 former contestants making up the invited audience for the 1000th edition of the show.

Keep watching this space – I’ll let you know what happened.