BROOKINGS — Contestant game shows on television that bring a hint of fame — maybe those 15 minutes that we often hear about — are an American institution that a lot of Americans watch bur few get to experience as a contestant. Recently a Brookings teacher did. Kristi Raab is the Medary Elementary School physical education teacher for pre-school, early education and all the students through third grade.
The Floor, a pre-recorded game show that airs at 7 p.m. Wednesdays on Fox, puts 100 contestants on a floor. Each one occupies an LED square on a grid. They go one-on-one in hand-to-hand duels on a variety of trivia subjects as the clock ticks away. Win a duel, take your opponent’s square, and move on. The loser is eliminated. But getting to be a contestant and engaging in that first duel can be a challenge in itself, as Raab found out.
“I applied in February of this year, after the season three premiere, which was after the Super Bowl,” she said. “I got a call from production the following week and it set up interviews. I had Zoom interviews and things like that. Everything was done through them.
“I signed up; I liked playing it, it’s fun. I enjoy the show. It’s a clock show and it originally aired on Fox. Now you can screen it on Hulu after the fact. I thought I’d get a free trip to California; I’m from California and I thought I’d get a free ride back home.” Then she found that they shoot the show just outside Dublin, at Ardmore Studios in Bray.
“So I got a free trip to Ireland,” she said, laughing a bit. “That was kind of a neat thing.”
In a best-case scenario, Raab would have been in Ireland for 10 days, which would have demanded that she keep winning her duels. She arrived in Ireland earlier this year, around Easter time. She was there for five days; but there was little time for sightseeing, as preparation for the show demanded some long days. Her first day after there she was given some free time for activities such as sightseeing. The following days were taken up by the show’s business and left little time for leisure.
“The second day they started us with makeup, hair, press shots,” Raab said of the picked-up pace. “The next day our fulltime started at 6 a.m. They put us on a bus, we go to the studio and we’re there until after 11 p.m. So it’s a long day.”
Raab was in the show that aired on Oct. 15: episode No. 4 of season No. 5. “I didn’t duel on the first episode. At the end of the first night there were 91 contestants left. They eliminated nine. They tend to eliminate eight or nine people per episode.
“It’s a clock show. My episode I was in one duel and I lost. His name was Aaron (from North Carolina). He challenged me, so we were playing in my category (“buffet”). We went back and forth, naming the food category that was shown on the screen. You go back and forth until your time is up. You’re playing against the clock.” The contestant winning the duel then adds the loser’s squares to their own and moves on. Aaron would go on to win four more duels. “The person who at the end of the night has the most area of the floor wins money,” Raab explained.
“I had a blast. I had a free trip and a great time,” the teacher said, looking back on the experience. “I was disappointed that I lost, obviously.” Best case scenario, after all the season’s episodes are completed, the overall winner left standing will take home $250,000.
In addition to the travel abroad and the time spent as a game show contestant, which brought with it camaraderie with her fellow contestants, living and working together, Raabe became a celebrity with her students who were anxious to see her on TV.
In brief, “The Floor” is like all television game shows that are aimed at capturing an audience. However, this show is a bit complicated and might take a bit of viewing before all its intricacies and ground rules can be grasped. A visit to Wikipedia can give one all of that, plus statistics of every season, every show, every episode, every contestant’s first name and home state: Raab is IDed as “Kristi (SD).”
— Contact John Kubal at jkbubal@cmpapers.com.