Final Jeopardy: 20th Century Arts (12-5-13)

The Final Jeopardy question (12/5/2013), in the category “20th Century Arts” was:

Pretending to be a tree is an exercise in a key textbook in this system that spread from Russia to Broadway and then to Hollywood.

This is a big game for 2-day champ Carlos Ross. He’s won $64,601 over the past two games and he can get on the TOC today if he wins this game. Will you be rooting for Carlos or one of these two players: Tahne Aarnes, from Chaska, MN; and Cecilia Cuevas, from Kansas City, MO?

News coverage of the death of Nelson Mandela cut into part of today’s show. After showing President Obama’s speech, for some reason, they decided to run 6 commercials (we counted), then pick up the show in progress. As a result, we believe we came in right after Carlos found the Jeopardy! round Daily Double. There was a lot of clapping going on which usually occurs after a contestant gets the DD right. Carlos had $5,200, Tahne had $1,600 and Cecilia had $200.

Carlos finished this round in the lead with $9,600. Tahne was second with $4,800 and Cecilia was last with $3,200.

In the Double Jeopardy! round, Cecilia found the first Daily Double in “U.S. Presidents.” She was in third place with $4,000, $14,800 behind Carlos’ lead. She bet $3,500 and guessed “Douglas.” That was WRONG.

In 1856, this West Pointer cast his only vote for President before his own election– for Buchanan. show

WHO IS ULYSSES S. GRANT?

It’s probably the first time in Jeopardy history that the round didn’t finish because of a marriage proposal. The last Daily Double was under one of three clues left on the board: The $200 clue in “I guested on Law & Order” and the $1600 and $2000 clues under “Midwestern Writing.” During the commercial break, an audience member named John proposed to his girlfriend. Alex announced the event, had the lady show her engagement ring (don’t know exactly how to spell her name – but it sounded like Sahar), and then proceeded with the game, without mentioning if John phrased his proposal in the form of a Jeopardy clue.

Carlos finished in the lead with a runaway $25,200. Tahne was next with $9,200 and Cecilia was in third place with $2,100.

NONE of the contestants got Final Jeopardy! right.

WHAT IS STANISLAVSKI’S SYSTEM?

“Stanislavski’s system is a progression of techniques used to train actors and actresses to draw believable emotions to their performances.” (wikipedia)

We’re assuming that this is the correct answer. Alex wasn’t too clear about that but the wikipedia article makes it clear that Stanislavski’s System and Method Acting are not synonymous, and we don’t know if “pretending to be a tree” is employed in both.

Boo! hiss! to Alex for saying he could see two of the players were stumped with this terrible choice for the Final Jeopardy clue.

Cecilia didn’t write anything down. She lost her $100 bet and finished with $2,000.

Tahne wrote down Strindberg but didn’t bet anything so she remained at $9,200.

Carlos didn’t write anything down either. He only lost $27 so he won the game with $25,173 and now has an astounding 3-day total of $89,774. This win knocks Salvo Candela off our TOC list.