UMTV game show tests knowledge

Apartments against Commuters, Greeks against Pearson-the heat is on for the $10 000 prize for the Live Championship Game in the School of Communication courtyard, April 17.

The UMTV produced 30-minute fact-based trivia game show where the questions come from the professors, rallied participants from the five residential colleges, the apartments, commuter students and the Greeks.

The two winning teams will move on to the final championship to battle intellectually in an hour-long show recorded live. The teams from the other residential halls were eliminated in the preliminary round.

Sanjeev Chatterjee, faculty advisor for UMTV, developed the concept for this quiz show and became the executive producer.

Under the direction of senior Rachel Brilla, and with the effort of Terri Maloney, head of post-production, the show materialized.

“I would like to see UMIQ become an event much like SportsFest, where the University community comes together in a competitive spirit where bragging rights are involved,” said Brilla.

She explained that Provost Luis Glaser allocated $15,000 in prize money to be used for academic purposes.

This will allow each of the eight players from the losing team to go home with $250 each and also award $1000 to each member of the victorious team.

Jacob Vincent, from the Apartment area, said he joined the team because he was lured by the idea of winning $1000, yet not all contestants were in it for the money.

Cherisson Cuffy of the same team said he did it for the fun of it, and many others said it was their love of competition and the idea of being on TV which led them to participate.

The Greek team, put together by outgoing student government president Jose Diaz, said that they were really enjoying themselves in this game and that overall the questions were very fair and somewhat easy.

A sample question could be: “What was the title of the first motion picture to offer sound recording?”

Professors from different fields of study such as history, English literature, chemistry, and motion pictures put together

questions to be asked in the different rounds of the game, Brilla said.

For the “In Depth Round”, the “specialist” in a particular subject area will be asked three in-depth questions directly by the professors. They will be recorded from another studio and their images will be transmitted to a screen to be seen by the players.

Some of the professors asking “In Depth” questions include Tom Goodman, professor of English literature, and biology professor Collin Hughes.

Including Diaz, the Greek team is composed of four Sigma Phi Epsilon brothers and three Zeta Tau Alpha sisters.

“As a fraternity we strive for excellence in manhood”, said Villamor Asuncion, creative writing major and Sigma Phi Epsilon Brother. “I like competition in sports and in life-inevitably it spills over to academics.” The success of this show relies entirely on the time and effort put in by students, organizers said.

UMIQ is a timely extracurricular activity that has taught students to work with limited funds and technology, and has provided students with a way to learn the ropes of the industry and the ‘real world,’ organizers said.

Brilla and Maloney said they spent every Tuesday and Thursday this semester in the editing labs.

“If we are feeling ambitious we can spend about 12 hours or so a day,” she said. “In the beginning we were spending about 40 hours to get one finished half hour episode.”

“The total time we have spent this semester working on post-production alone has surpassed maybe 200-250 hours,” she added.

Brilla said that a fixed budget, like all the other government organizations and clubs have, would allow UMIQ to advertise more effectively; promote the show in the breezeway; and have some money to purchase backdrops, a better buzzer system, and some of the technical equipment needed to operate a true game show.

“It takes ambition, desire and drive to follow through with a project of this proportion,” Brilla said. “Terri and myself know what this show has the potential to become and we will be content with the fact that we made this show happen, and we got it off the ground.”

“This has been a long and tedious process-but it’s also been lots of fun,” Maloney added.

The first two episodes of this television Quiz show, developed by students and faculty of the School of Communication, have already aired and can be seen Wednesday nights at 7 p.m. on campus station 24, and in the Coral Gables area on channel 96 at the same time.