PORT TOWNSEND — Sometime during next week’s Trivia Night at the Uptown Pub, master of ceremonies Corey Knudson will ask the 1,000th question since its November debut.
For the first time in the contest’s history, it will be worth two points, as it will include a subtle twist.
“This will be a tough one,” he said of the question.
“I’ll be working on this one for a while.”
In keeping with the nature of trivia, one person’s tough question is another’s easy answer.
People have always amused themselves by discussing historical minutiae, but it took the 1980s game Trivial Pursuit to transform this interest into a competitive sport.
Restaurants and bars soon adapted the practice as a promotional tool, realizing the potential to draw in customers who are ready for a good-natured, team-based argument which rarely escalates to a fight.
It flew, all right
Knudson, a local stand-up comic and “self-unemployed contractor,” brought the idea to the Uptown on Nov. 18 and wasn’t sure it would fly.
But he has never had a night with fewer than seven participating teams.
The format, developed by Knudson, includes teams of four people paying an $8 entry fee.
The announcer passes out sheets with the space for answers to 30 questions, which are asked in sequence.
As the question is asked, the teams have one minute to come up with the answer and write it on the sheet.
There is an intermission after the first 15 questions, and the preliminary scores are announced.
“We use team dynamics to figure out a question,” said Alysse Hotz.
“We all have different interests,” she said. “Some of us grew up watching TV all the time while some others grew up with a lab set.”
“I bombed a political question the same night I aced one about ‘Calvin and Hobbes’,” said Sam Johnston. “It’s all what you know.”
None of the 11 on Wednesday night got a perfect score.
Era awareness
All of the questions, developed by guest emcee Arnold Phommavong, concerned the 1990s, whereas the decidedly older crowd would have been more comfortable answering questions about the Beatles or Archie Bunker.
For instance: “In the season two episode of ‘Saved By the Bell,’ Jesse was told that her addiction to what substance was a hazard to her health?”
Teamwork kicked in, with guesses ranging from cigarettes to video games.
Three teams got the correct answer: caffeine pills.
Phommavong, only the second guest host since the program began, trod a delicate balance between the obvious questions and the hopelessly obscure.
One question that no one answered correctly was to list the movies “Clueless,” “Can’t Hardly Wait,” “She’s All That” and “10 Things I Hate About You” in chronological order.
Phommavong was constantly looking to Knudson for approval, that his questions had the right balance.
Knudson answered in the affirmative, proving that he was stumped by many of the questions.
His team, in fact, came in next to last.
Wednesday night was closer than most contests, with four of the 11 teams emerging with the same point total.
Sudden deathM
This led to sudden death, where a single question would filter out the winner.
In this case, it was one that dated well before the 1990s: to provide the name of the lead chimpanzee in the first “Tarzan” movie.
There could have been two more tie-breakers in order to decide a champion, but the team known as the Non-inhalers was the only one to come up with the correct answer, “Cheetah.”
As per tradition, Phommavong took a beer pitcher stuffed with $78 in cash and “poured” it onto the winning table.
The team, two locals and two visitors, split the pot four ways.
While he handed over the emcee slot last week, Knudson will be back in place to ask the 1,000th question on Wednesday night.
He’ll attempt to stump the teams, but not make them feel stupid in the process.
He will also make sure to not repeat himself, referring to several loose-leaf notebooks containing all the questions ever asked during the event’s eight-month history.
“It bends your mind a little bit,” said Corrie Black, who plays nearly every week.
“It’s fun to watch the questions that he comes up with because so much is out of the blue. It’s hysterical.”
Trivia Night gets started at around 7 p.m. every Wednesday at the Uptown Pub, 1016 Lawrence St.
Admission is free, with an $8 buy-in required for each team.
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Jefferson County Reporter Charlie Bermant can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at charlie.bermant@peninsuladailynews.com.