Final Jeopardy: Shakespeare Comedies (2-8-19)
Today’s Final Jeopardy question (2/8/2019) in the category “Shakespeare Comedies” was:
At the end of this play: “Why are our bodies soft & weak …But that our …hearts should well agree with our external parts?”
2x champ Bif Reiser, a mathematician from Portland, OR, has won $60,801 so far. He’s going for his third win in the last game of the week and his opponents are: Josh Duggan, a production coordinator from Los Angeles, CA; and Rebecca Nowack, a government contractor from Leawood, KS.
Round 1 Categories: By George – Avengers Disassemble! – Churches & Cathedrals – The New Jersey Hall of Fame – What’s in Your Bento? – Drop It
Josh found the Jeopardy! round Daily Double in “New Jersey Hall of Fame” under the $600 clue on the 13th pick of the round. He was in the lead with $4,000, $3,000 ahead of Rebecca in second place. He bet $2,000 and took a guess with Pulitzer. That was WRONG.
Alphabetically, this early American pamphleteer immediately preceded Joe Piscopo as 2013 honorees. show
Bif finished in the lead with $5,000. Rebecca was second with $3,800 and Josh was last with $2,600.
Round 2 Categories: Bye Again, George! – Islands – Organizations – Faux Amis – Stargazers – The Title Planet
Josh found the first Daily Double in “Islands” under the $2,000 clue on the 5th pick. He was in second place with $2,600 now, $1,600 less than Bif’s lead. He bet $1,600 and he was RIGHT.
Larger than Maryland & lying near the equator, the world’s largest island in fresh water is in this river. show
Bif found the last Daily Double in “Organizations” under the $1,600 clue, with a baker’s dozen still to go after it. In the lead with $9,400, he had $1,200 more than Josh in second place. He bet $1,600 and he was RIGHT.
Read by Christiane Amanpour: “In 2005 I was proud to join the board of the CPJ, the “Committee to Protect” these people” show
Josh finished in the lead with $12,600. Bif was next with $10,600 and Rebecca was in third place with $5,800.
Only ONE of the contestants got Final Jeopardy! right.
WHAT IS “THE TAMING OF THE SHREW”?
Here is Elizabeth Taylor in Franco Zeffirelli’s 1967 film version of the Shakespeare comedy, delivering Katharina’s monologue after Petruchio charges her with telling “these headstrong women what duty they do owe their lords and husbands.” The entire part (at 1:56) is the same as in the play (Act V, Scene 2): “Why are our bodies soft and weak and smooth / Unapt to toil and trouble in the world, / But that our soft conditions and our hearts / Should well agree with our external parts?” Clap if you agree that clues with quotes should not have more than one part left out.
From 1999: SHAKESPEARE ($400) Meryl Streep & Raul Julia starred onstage in this comedy in 1978, 11 years after the Taylor & Burton film
Rebecca got it right. She bet $1,200 and finished with $7,000.
Bif went with “All’s Well That Ends Well.” He lost his $2,001 bet, finishing with $8,599.
Josh wrote down “Much Ado About Nothing.” That cost him $8,601. He landed in third place with $3,999 and Bif remained the champ, with a 3-day total of $69,400.
A triple stumper from each round:
BY GEORGE ($1000) George Bernard Shaw: “Mrs. Warren’s ____”
STARGAZERS ($2000) In 1983 this Cornell astronomer introduced the concept of the nuclear winter
2 years ago: TWO of the players got this FJ in “Literary Characters”
When we first meet her in the novel, she’s wearing a green dress with 12 yards of fabric & matching slippers from Atlanta. show
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I would hope that Alex will apologize on Monday for insulting Rebecca. He told her that it was an easy final BECAUSE SHE got it correct. Did he really mean that? Because she got it, it must have been easy? As a former contestant who was the only one who got Final Jeopardy correct, yet lost because it was a runaway game, I feel for her, and hope Alex can say something on Monday.
@Former Contestant, Maybe Alex meant to say it was easy for her (and wanted to add “Because she saw it”)?? But then even Alex is human and makes mistakes, he is after all not 30 or 40 anymore. It was at the very least very poorly phrased.
There is really only ONE famous pamphleteer in American history, and that is Tom Paine. Even if you don’t know he was from Jersey (I certainly didn’t), it HAD to be him. Especially with the big hint that it preceded Piscopo alphabetically. Pulitzer? Come on, that was a desperation guess. And how could no one know Carl Sagan? How many famous astronomers from Cornell were there publicly known in 1983? And they made it a $2000 question, no less.
*Clap, clap, clap*
Thanks, Cece 😊
Funny (OK, wrong choice of word), I just realized you have done away with the monthly R.I.P. post.
yeah, Cece, aside from a lack of time being a factor, it was depressing to me and idk why, but I hated singling out one person to post a video for so I started posting a video on Spoiler Talk for personalities everyone knows (I’ll post one for Albert Finney tonight). .
I can understand that being a depressing task. Oh, yeah, Albert Finney—that reminds me I need to watch Erin Brockovich in English. I really liked that movie, but watched with subtitles (don’t remember in which language).
Strange week with the FJs. I guess after yesterday, Trebek is expecting Bif to part the Red Sea. lol. At the end of the first break, Josh and Rebecca were tied at $2,000 and Bif only had $200 and Alex was like what’s the deal? Bif’s cool response: “we’ll get there.” I was happy he won. How often do we see a Friday 3x winner take a dive on Monday? Fingers crossed it doesn’t happen to Bif.
LINK: 13 more clues from the game
Typically clues with quotes either
1. Contain certain words or phrases that strongly hint in some direction
or
2. Are very famous and closely associated with the quoted material (e.g. “It was the best of times…”)
As far as I can tell, this clue did neither, so I was surprised even one contestant got it. I don’t see how one solves this clue without being a huge Shakespeare buff or having read or seen “The Taming Of The Shrew” in the somewhat recent past, with the quote implanting in your short-to-medium-term memory.
@JP, Well, some things stick for whatever reasons. There are plays or movies I have seen 20,30 years ago and certain scenes I can quote verbatim, even though I saw the play/movie never again. The same with books. Some passages just are burned in your memory, no matter how long ago it was and even if you saw/heard it only once.
Rebecca should’ve risked everything and played spoiler.
I only see Rebecca’s $1,200 wager making sense on 1 part. If Josh went for the lockout, and missed, which he did, he would have had $3,999, and Rebecca was thinking about staying above that, and not thinking that Bif would cover a $0 wager by Josh. Poor Rebecca is now a goner.
What a turnaround. I thought Bif’s streak would end, but Rebecca’s $1,200 FJ wager put her at $7,000 and Josh’s wager of over $8,000 made Bif remain as champion. Very interesting, VERY interesting. Bif’s $2,000 DD bet put him a very gutsy move, I think HE could be the one, a 5-time champion, that is.
That 2000 dollar wager was a smart move by Bif. Congratulations to him on his third victory. Also this week had two triple stumpers but glad Rebecca got it right. How did Josh not know Thomas Paine? Didn’t he coin that phrase common sense John and VJ? And what was your favorite line from the taming of the shrew? Joshua’s wager was risky and thought he could win with his response but it didn’t work out for him. Bif is probably looking good to earn more to get close to Alan Dunn or Rob Worman
@Lou
It was a pamphlet. But “Common sense” applies almost more to today’s situation than back then…..certain paragraphs are almost uncanny in their form, predicting and describing exactly what is wrong today…!!! I wonder: if he came back from the dead how he would evaluate our state of affairs right now? He was clairvoyant.