Lana Jones
These are the contestants who came to play the most exciting game
of their lives. Even moreso, these contestants hold special places in
our hearts, because these contestants made Press Your Luck a treat for
the fans to watch. The excitement, craziness, spontaneity, and
sometimes accidental stupidity are what made these players real gems.
I don't have all of these contestants in my collection, but here are
my personal favorites and memories.
All images on this page were created by myself and Trevor Lake.
Lana Jones
I've heard so many things about this woman that I just had to trade to
see her appearance. Let's flash back to the very first show of Press
Your Luck (September 19, 1983), where Lana Jones was perhaps a little
nervous about being one of the first 3 contestants. In Question Round
#1, when asked what model of American sportscar is most likely to be
stolen, she buzzed in with "Chevrolet". She needed to give a model, to
which she responded after some thought, "Mercedes". Oops! She had only
1 & 3 spins earned in the 2 question rounds, and she was nervous at
the board, too, when she hit $3000+ in an attempt to catch up and she
cried to herself, "Oh no!" Maybe she thought she was forced to take
another spin. Overall, don't hold her nervousness against her.
Read my exclusive interview with Scott HERE.
(Special thanks to Scott Vasquez for supplying Michael's last name.)
I remember Michael from my childhood, but I didn't see him in action
until the USA reruns. Michael, who was on in December '83 just after
Scott, was one of the first to really get into the PYL game when he
was at the board. "C'mon baby, let's get some big bucks up there," he
would say. He would hit the money, pumping his fists, brief cries of
"WOO!", and right away, focused back on the board. He was featured in
clips in the show's opening, and perhaps his most famous moment (which
was shown in early clips) came when he was deciding to press or pass.
His cool quote: "So, if I'm gonna die, I think that I had better kill
myself. I'm gonna press my luck." Still gets a laugh to this day, and
I'm glad I have this guy on tape.
Maggie Brown is another person who I've only got to see recently. PYL
fans call her omnipotent. I think of her more as ever-present.
Carruthers Company must've really liked this woman. She appeared on
the pilot for Second Chance, the pilot for PYL, AND she was on PYL in
March of '84 for a couple days. And what can be said about Maggie?
Simply put, every moment of every game she played, she was a nervous
wreck. On each spin, upon stopping, she would almost have a breakdown,
saying "Freeze! Ooh! Ah!" and such in worry that the square would
change to a Whammy. (All of this accompanied by a small hop out of her
seat). And she had fun when she actually did hit a Whammy, one time
yelling, "Ah, shoot!" All in all, Maggie Brown was just one of those
people who stole the show, because you wound up watching her nervous
reactions more than the game itself.
How loud can you scream? DEFINITELY not as loud as Karen Martin. She's
in the opening clips of the Larson eps, and boy, she shows off her
voice. She's yelling herself hoarse with every spin, yelling such
great lines as, "Make me rich! Whammies, you can drop dead. STOP!!" &
"Bucks! Any kind, I'll take it and STOP!!" But what everyone knows her
best for was when she was trying and trying to get a pool table in
Round 1. "I need a pool table for Dan! C'mon pool table! C'mon...POOL
TABLE!" Peter would exclaim "You got it!" after she finally hit it.
Too bad she lost it later to a Whammy. She was on for 2 days and just
an absolute treat to watch.
If you are a Press Your Luck fan, and you've never heard of Michael
Larson, SHAME ON YOU! Here's the story in case you never heard.
Michael was an ice-cream truck driver from Lebanon, Ohio. In the fall
of '83, when he wasn't selling ice cream, he happened to flip on the
TV and find PYL. He became fascinated with it, and he discovered a big
secret. He found that the light going around the board was NOT random.
Using his VCR and a pad & pen, he taped the shows and wrote down the 5
patterns that the light had. From there, he would borrow money from
his friends to get to L.A., buy a 65-cent shirt from a thrift shop, &
appear on PYL in May of '84.
With the knowledge he had, he kept hitting money and extra spins and just cleaned house. His performance stunned the audience, the crew, and his fellow contestants, even when he almost lost it all on his last spin. The final total:
Later that same year, Michael lost all of the money that he had won. Originally, he had told TV Guide in 1994 that he blew it on a bad real estate investment. However, this was not the case. As shown in GSN's documentary Big Bucks: The Press Your Luck Scandal, Michael was actually robbed of his cash one Christmas night after leaving it all lying around the house in an attempt to scan serial numbers on $1 bills for a radio contest. He was thrown out of his house by his common law wife, and was hardly heard from by his family again until his passing in 1999.
Nevertheless, Michael Larson remains the most famous contestant in all of Press Your Luck (and perhaps all of game shows). He is the man that put the show on the map for all time.
Gene was a person who never really had tremendous things happen to him
in his 2 days on the show. I personally remember his excitement at the
board. If you've seen him in the opening clips, you've seen the look
and excitement in his eyes, and even moreso, the fact that anytime he
hit the big bucks, he would leap out of his seat, pointing at the
board yelling, "All right!" And when he won both days, his standing
celebration of howling and pointing at the board was just fun to look
at. You could just tell the man came to play.
Cathy, Cathy, Cathy...you have to feel sorry for her for the tense
game she played. Cathy won $2950 on her first day. Wasn't because of
poor playing, just some late Whammies messing things up. Her next
game, however, was much different. Playing against Randy & Lori, she
was having a good day. Then, Lori passed her some spins. The 2 would
wind up playing spin tag with a single spin for 5 minutes (not
counting what was edited). Finally, Cathy wound up with the spin and
$31,408. She kissed the Whammy on her podium, which was a mistake. SHE
WHAMMIED AND LOST IT ALL!! That $31,408 is believed to be the largest
total lost to a Whammy and one of at least two losses over $30,000.
And Lori wound up winning that day with over $24,000. It's a real
heartbreaker.
If you've seen the 1996 movie, "The Cable Guy", then you saw Beverlie
Peters playing PYL on the screen as Matthew Broderick was flipping
the channels. And perhaps you also noticed that crazy look on her
face. Let me explain. Beverly had a tendency to REALLY cross her eyes
whenever she hit something big. One instance, she hit $3000+ & crossed
her eyes screaming (as seen in an opening clip). Seeing this, Peter
would respond, "My God, Beverlie. You look like you're in pain. Are
you alright?" I guess Beverlie wasn't used to being excited. :-)
OK, so maybe Mike Horton didn't have any great things happen to him.
But I personally remember Mike for other reasons. Fans will recognize
him as Gemini, one of the original American Gladiators. Anyway, he was
an NFL player at the time he was on PYL, but what I found strange was
that he said that he was looking to open up a HAIR SALON?! Peter and
Mike joked about it, saying that he'd charge 15 bucks (yards) for
clipping and such like that. Just an interesting personal memory for
me.
If the name doesn't look familiar, substitute a "y" for the "ie" in
her first name. Yes, this is the talk show host we know and love (or
loathe) today. She was a contestant on PYL for 3 days in early '85.
Granted, her stay should've been only 1 day. She wound up winning on a
fluke because the person in 3rd place had the last spin and passed.
That person Whammied, and Jenny, in 2nd the whole time, snatched the
win. Nevertheless, it was great to see it happen, and she was a great
player, too. On her 2nd day, she was also one of the several who
encountered something odd. She hit Pick A Corner and had the option of
choosing a Whammy in square #1. Needless to say, she didn't take it.
(Eventually, though, that Whammy was finally moved one space down.)
Yet thoughout all this, I wonder if anyone has ever spoken to Jenny
about her appearance on PYL. I'm curious to see if she still remembers
it. (E-mail me if you've done this.)
Oh, boy. Have I gotten to Jim Hess already? Well, you know how no one
likes to hit a Whammy, right? Well, Jim REALLY didn't like it. And
that's what made Jim go down in infamy as the most FOUL-MOUTHED player
in all of PYL history. He hits his 3rd Whammy in Round 1, and faintly
says, "Oh, s***!" (But if you have a clear copy of the show, you can
hear it.) Then, Sam, one of his opponents, commits a faux paux and
passes his last spin to Jim even though he's in 3rd place. Jim,
saying, "Thanks a lot.", takes the last spin quickly, and Whammies.
This is where he just yells out of nowhere, "GEEZ! F***! S***!" The
best (or worst) part is that he said it loud and clear for the whole
world to hear it, and the censors NEVER bleeped it out! If you have a
copy of this with clear sound (which I don't), I consider you very
lucky.
The epitomized statement that players make when taking spins at the
board is "Big Bucks, No Whammies, STOP!" Well, Steve Bryant, a Houston
Oilers wide receiver, took that statement to new levels during his 3
days on PYL in '85. On virtually EVERY spin, Steve would yell out the
word "Whammies" in that statement for about 5-10 seconds. Thus, it
sounded like this, "I want big bucks and no
WHAMMIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES, STOP!" It made you laugh every time he
did it, and it was even funnier when he would whisper it at that part
sometimes. Even moreso, there was a time or two where he didn't say
it, and he wound up hitting a Whammy. Steve was another showstopper
that graced the stage on PYL; he was a real talent.
Maxine appeared on Press Your Luck in the fall of '85, and she was a
great player in her 2 days. Her initial appearance left something to
be desired, though. When Peter first asked if she was in LA, on
vacation, she said, "No, I just came to see you and The Pri-- and, uh,
Press Your Luck." Peter responded to the audience, "Do I look like Bob
Barker?" Maxine won over $20,000 that day, but then her exit from the
show the next day got just as much laughter. She got clobbered quickly
by the Whammies early in Round 2 and was eliminated. Peter said to
Maxine, "Wasn't too nice of us, was it?" Maxine's simple reply: "No,
it's not. I'm going home!" She was a fun person, though, and she took
it well.
I've left Peggy Davis for last on this list for 2 reasons. First, she
was last of the people on this list to appear on PYL. And second, she
holds an unusual place on PYL history by becoming the first and only
champion NOT TO SHOW UP! After winning on her first show, she just...
wasn't there the next day. I'm guessing that she won on the final
taping of that Saturday (since PYL taped 5 shows every Saturday), and
she didn't make to the studio in time the following weekend. Peter
joked about it at the beginning of the next 2 shows, saying that she
got lost on the African Safari she won. In any case, they started the
next show with 3 new players while they waited for Peggy. She wound up
not showing until 2 shows after that. By that time, the Whammies were
pretty steamed, because Peggy was eliminated early in Round 2 that
day. (Peter thought so, too, when this happened.) I guess that's what
you get for being late.
Oh, and for your information, in the 2 shows in between where Peggy
did not appear, the same man won both days. So on the day Peggy came
back, you had 2 champions versus 1 challenger. And it turns out that
the challenger wound up winning the game. "Two champs down!"
Comments? Did I leave someone out? Share your PYL memories on Mobius Forum
Classic.
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