Quiz (2020)

 ☆ ☆ ☆ ½

Quiz (2020) – S. Frears

I did not know – or had completely forgotten – that anyone had ever successfully cheated at “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?” But it really happened in the UK in the early 2000s. Stephen Frears’ three-part mini-series dramatises this event beginning with the development of the game show concept for ITV by the original producers, then depicts the cheating scandal and how it unfolded, and then closes with the consequences – the trial of Charles and Diana Ingram. I picked this up from the library because of my natural interest in quizzes/game shows. The first two episodes were the most gripping, detailing the mechanics of the game and how the Ingrams and others tried to beat the system set up by the production company in order to get on the show (answering questions on the telephone) and then into the hot-seat (fastest fingers) and then to win. The background family drama about the Ingrams is interspersed a bit but it seems that Frears is not really particularly interested in them – and the film’s third segment suffers because it wants us to believe that the Ingrams might actually be innocent -- which seems somewhat unbelievable given all that has gone before (but perhaps not entirely impossible).  More interesting are the reactions of the producers to the possibility that they’ve been gamed and the psychological effects on them. All told, it was a fun watch but lost steam in its third act.