Inside The Games - Teresa Strasser of While You Were Out Teresa Strasser was challenging you at home before you knew who she was. She was a writer for four celebrated game shows of varying degrees of prestige in the late '90s and early '00s. The bright and lively queen of Friday night cable television knows how to scour through the almanacs, the newspapers, the atlases and quotation sources. In a turn of events which surprised even Teresa, she became host of TLC's While You Were Out, the network's second-highest rated prime time show. The predominantly home improvement hour incorporates a relationship quiz with Newlywed Game-style questions, which leads to as much as $5,000 in prizes for the central couples. The premise features a Truth or Consequences-style ruse in which one half of a married couple is sent on a phony two-day excursion while the other half plans a surprise renovation of a room or outdoor section of their home. A recent episode led to a jolting backfire: the most vitriolic reaction from a husband in the show's history. Strasser discusses the show and the aftermath of the angry husband in an interview with TVgameshows.net. TVGS: Teresa, tell everyone about the steps in your game show career. You've done quite a few prominent shows. TS: The first was not so prominent. I was a writer on a Game Show Network show called When Did That Happen? - which is what we asked when it got cancelled five weeks later. After that, I was a writer for Win Ben Stein's Money (two seasons), Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? (the pilot series), It's Your Chance of a Lifetime (Fox) and The Chair (IMDB doesn't lie, so neither can I). I also co-hosted Lover's Lounge (afternoon wraparounds between relationship games) with Todd Newton on Game Show Network. TVGS: What motivated you to try your hand at game shows? You have had the kinds of jobs almost everyone who is a fan of these shows wishes they had. TS: I tend to let paralyzing fear and self doubt run my career; this is not one of the "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People." For this reason, I'm not very aggressive about creating a career path. I just sort of take the job that's in front of me. As for game shows, I had no intention of being in that world. A writer named Ed Crasnick saw me perform at a bookstore and thought I'd be good on WBSM, where he had worked. He referred me, I wrote a sample of ten titles and questions and by some miracle, I got the job. The rest of the jobs followed from there. TVGS: Let's follow up on that: so many people believe they could be terrific at writing game show questions. Tell us the truth----how difficult is that job? How tough is it to match your skills to the format of a specific show? TS: Every trivia writer, or as we sometimes call ourselves, "trivia monkeys," has a few choice books we rely on for questions. Each show is a little different in terms of the level of difficulty and the phrasing but, basically, the hard part is to not repeat what's already been asked on a particular show. With WBSM, they produced 120 shows a year, which meant there were 30,000 questions in the database when I left. After awhile, you're just scanning the Internet looking for obscure facts about sea captains and bark sap. TVGS: How much does it help for a game show writer to be a good game player? TS: I don't believe there is much crossover in the skill sets. TVGS: We are asked all the time how one breaks in as a writer or researcher on a game show. From your experience, what's the best path? TS: For me, I was just in the right place at the right time. That seems to be true of all the game show writers I know. It's usually a matter of knowing someone, getting the door cracked open and seeing if you can walk through it. Persistence never hurts. TVGS: We've begun including While You Were Out in our Friday night Scoreboard because your show does have a quiz element and gives away what at times are pretty nice prices (but a $3,000 food processor??? They don't have them that expensive at The Home Depot!). How did you end up getting the job? TS: I was on my second day of work as a writer for 30 Seconds to Fame when I got the audition. Because WYWO was replacing the first host, they were in a hurry. I auditioned for the show and days later, I was in New York meeting with TLC and BBC executives. TVGS: Tell everyone what you've told me. What appears to be a lively, upbeat, entertaining hour on TLC is highly exhausting work. TS: Well, it's certainly not working in a coal mine, but it is grueling. As a writer, I was used to doing all the work with my brain, not my hands. On WYWO, I was hauling, staining, digging, often for 14-hour days in blistering heat. At the same time, I was hosting the show and trying not to look like a total mess; at some point early on, I gave that up. I think that's obvious. TVGS: Everything is shot at the actual home over a two-day period.....but how much advance work has to be done and how much time do you have to spend in the various towns to do all of your wraparounds? TS: The designer works for about three weeks in advance to prepare for a show. Our crew would be in any one town for 10 days, shooting three shows. The hard part is post production, editing four hours of material (two cameras shooting for two days) into an hour-long show. TVGS: You have new viewers all the time: how do the producers select the people to have the surprise renovations? TS: It's mostly based on geography, because the cities are chosen first. Also, they look for interesting stories, dynamic people and different "theme" ideas for the rooms. TVGS: Then, in a sense, it's similar to the way contestants are selected for traditional game shows. You pop in and out to help out with the improvements and do the quizzes but what are you typically doing when we don't see you on camera during the course of the main production? TS: Working. What you see on TV is pretty much what we're doing. At the beginning of the season, I was asked to work straight through on the projects, cameras or not, no breaks. They felt that would add authenticity, which I think was an excellent idea. By about show 30, I was getting really exhausted and it started to show, so the producers backed off and allowed me to take some breaks. I would usually spend those huddled in an empty room going over my quiz information. TVGS: With that fast-track deadline, how often do your carpenter and designer go without sleep during the shooting? During that time, where do you sleep? TS: Never. They work their cans off, no doubt about that, but we all went home at night and slept in our hotel rooms. It might be tempting to work all night but it would probably have diminishing returns the next day. We all ended up sick and in emergency rooms at one time or another, so sawing on no sleep would have been a bad idea. TVGS: Most of the people love the surprises and even if they aren't crazy about the designs, they're nice about it. However, a couple of weeks ago, you had one husband named Dick Mudd who was anything but happy, friendly or kind about the surprise his wife planned for him. Have you ever had anyone go that ballistic? Poor Lisa, his wife, appeared to be about to cry at the end of the show at his reaction. TS: That had never happened before and I was in shock. I was really worried. TVGS: When he said, "Is this one of those home improvement shows?," you answered, "Yes, Richard, I'm Paige Davis." I pictured about half of your viewers on the floor in hysterics. Did that line come out of defense at his rage or had you stored that one up just in case something like this happened? TS: That was the fear talking. I was so scared and the moment was so uncomfortable, it just flew out of my mouth. Sorry, Paige. TVGS: This guy was a trip. The designer finally sent him over to give his wife a hug. He hugged her but asked, "Did you sign a waiver for this?" Did ol' Richard finally settle down or did you and the crew just get the heck out of Dodge as soon as you could tear down? TS: He settled down, our producers checked in with Lisa the next day and the next week, Dick Mudd had his deck returned to its original state and we all got out alive. TVGS: Teresa, you're about to break thousands of hearts. You're leaving WYWO. Is it primarily the travel which led to your decision? TS: Yes. It's still a very scary decision. People joke "you're pulling a Caruso." He left because he wanted to do better. I left because I wanted to feel better. I thought the road would be glamorous but it was just plain lonely. TVGS: Now that you have the emcee experience under your belt.....would you traditional consider hosting a game show? TS: Yes, especially one with some irreverence or comedy. There are way too few female game show hosts, wouldn't you agree? TVGS: I indeed would. Bob Boden, are you in the neighborhood? Your show is a little bit Truth or Consequences, a little bit Trading Spaces and a little bit relationship game. These shows have proven to draw great demographics for TLC. So, why haven't the big networks adapted the format? TS: I think one of the Trading Spaces franchises is airing on network TV (NBC Saturday mornings in a children's version) on the weekend. And look at Queer Eye for the Straight Guy - it aired on NBC and it's a great show, excellent production values and a big heart. I love that show. Come to think of it, I think it needs a host. TVGS: We'll miss you on WYWO.....but what do you really want to do now? TS: I want to be Andy Rooney. I know that sounds strange but he's a performer who writes his own material, and that's what I want to keep doing. Back to the "While You Were Out" homepage. Home Syndicated Column E-Mail of the Week News Archive Good Day New York Lovers Lounge Fashion Police Photo Gallery Video Gallery Mailing List Books and Music Resume