Rewatchables Reference

• Bill: The stretch from Van Doren beating Stempel through the montage to the shoe-untying. Also: Stempel's first scene; Turturro flipping out when Paymer tells him to lose for $70K; the Van Doren interview where it's unclear if he took the bait.
• Koppelman: The sequence where Goodwin and Van Doren almost become friends – the Athenaeum Club through the Connecticut trip. Also: Rob Morrow buying the Chrysler in the opening – 'it's Mad Men. It's like an episode of Mad Men in this little tiny sliver 20 years before Mad Men.'

• 1950s rich people/class dynamics; the father-son relationship between Charles and Mark Van Doren.
• Rigged reality shows – prescient for the era of Bachelor manipulations and fake talent shows.
• The Scorsese and Levinson cameo performances.
• The real YouTube clip of Stempel throwing the show – available to watch online.

• Rob Morrow's Boston accent – divisive.
• Geritol being important to the plot (now defunct brand nobody remembers).
• Historical inaccuracies: compressed 3 years into 1, inflated Goodwin's role, falsely implied Van Doren lost his teaching career.
• Craig: 60 million people watching a game show weekly – unthinkable now.

• Bill: Herb Stempel as a character – tough hang for rewatchability, though Turturro's commitment is acknowledged.
• Koppelman: The Sputnik button in the opening car scene – 'the one moment that tries too hard.'

Turturro dials it up a couple times – 'out of admiration, not criticism.'

• Koppelman: Rob Morrow should have become one of the world's biggest movie stars after this movie. 'I don't understand why he didn't get cast in the next 'Jurassic Park'.'
• Bill: If 'Quiz Show' comes out one year later (1995), it wins Best Picture and Best Director over Braveheart. 'It was bad luck for this year.' Also might have beaten The English Patient in 1996.

• Redford originally wanted William Baldwin for Van Doren before settling on Fiennes.
• Paul Newman turned down Mark Van Doren.
• Barry Levinson was originally attached to direct (was doing Bugsy). Steven Soderbergh allegedly had it with Tim Robbins as Van Doren – Koppelman confirmed the Soderbergh part is true.

• Koppelman: Hank Azaria – 'not yet famous, pre-Birdcage.' The Paymer-Azaria comedy team dynamic is great.
• Bill: Barry Levinson as Dave Garraway. Also: Christopher McDonald; every scene has incredible character actors.

Hank Azaria – 'Dion Waiters award. Not in it much, kills every scene.'

• Bill: Young Russell Crowe in the Rob Morrow part – 'he would have killed it.'
• PSH for Van Doren, or possibly the Azaria or Paymer part.

• Attanasio confirmed Redford tracked down Scofield on a silent retreat on the Isle of Man via a lighthouse keeper.
• Barry and Enright (the real producers) went into exile after the scandal but came back with Joker's Wild in the early 1970s and got rich again.
• Charles Van Doren wrote a 2008 New Yorker article about the scandal – his wife had refused to let him consult on the film.
• The prize money was a fiction – contestants had side deals for appearance fees, not the actual prize amounts.

• Redford-directed movies: Debated between 'Ordinary People', A River Runs Through It, and this.
• Ralph Fiennes: Right around this era (Schindler's List through The English Patient).
• Rob Morrow: Actually 1992 – 'Northern Exposure was exploding, he hosted SNL with musical guest Nirvana. That's the definition of Apex Mountain.'
• Chris McDonald: 'Happy Gilmore' (but this is close).
• Geritol: Definitely.
• Quiz show movies: Yes.

Bill: Spielberg. Koppelman: Curtis Hanson – but if forced between the two, Scorsese.

Koppelman: 'The best freaking Charles Van Doren.' Bill: Could also have played the Azaria or Paymer part. 'Older PSH easily could have played the dad.'

• Bill and Koppelman share the same nit: How did the money work? The movie never explains what you risk when you keep playing. The real answer is they had side deals – contestants got appearance fees, not the prize money.
• Not enough cigarette smoking for a 1950s setting.
• The Reuben sandwich claim ('the only totally invented sandwich') is absurd.

Both agree: the screenplay for Paul Attanasio.

• Bill: The painting of Mark Van Doren – from the midnight chocolate cake scene.
• Koppelman: The silverware box from the same scene.

• Bill: 'Speculation in our society has a way of becoming fact.'
• Koppelman: 'Not till you have a kid of your own.'

• Koppelman: Donnie Brasco – same writer (Paul Attanasio), same outsider-infiltrating-a-world theme.
• Bill: Considered The English Patient. Craig suggested Network or The Player.

Bill: Redford – 'the last really cool thing he directed. Kind of the tale-end of this renaissance – the 70s, the 80s comeback, the 90s last run as movie star, director, and Sundance.'

Craig: 'I really hadn't heard of this movie, probably because it got shadowed by all the other great stuff in '94. But the themes got stronger throughout – by the end they're so much bigger than a cheating game show.' Appreciated that it ended on 'this icky feeling' rather than a tropey montage of people going to jail. Noted all the themes are still relevant in 2025.