The Bum's Rush

[Turner]

An agent dresses like a typical tourist and walks down Hollywood Boulevard or some other heavily-trafficked area. When a panhandler inevitably asks for "spare change", the agent says, rather sympathetically, "What's your name?" If the bum tells him, someone quickly fashions a "Price is Right"-style nametag with magic marker and posterboard, and the agent says "Well, Joe (or whoever), I'll give you a dollar...IF...you can tell me the capital of Vermont. Because you're on the game show where you can go from beggar to bigshot...THE BUM'S RUSH!"

A handful of "crew" shows up with cameras and mics, and maybe even a podium for the host and/or a stand for the contestant. The host then asks a series of trivia questions, and the bum can risk his winnings each time to go on for bigger money and/or prizes, up to, say, $50 or $100 (chipped in by the group), or gift certificates for food, clothes, a hotel stay, etc. Any other agents could be enthusiastic audience members who shout out answers to the contestant if he chooses his "ask the audience" option (assuming he doesn't know the capital of Vermont, or who played Gilligan, or who was the 16th president).

The bottom line would be that the bum would actually receive the goods no matter what (just make sure Charles Van Doren isn't one of the contestants), so that act of charity might undo the humiliation we're actually putting him through. I dunno. It could also be called "Street Smarts" (although that was taken by Leno), or maybe "Brother, Can you Spare a Dime?" (where dollar amounts would go up in multiples of ten (a dime, a dollar, ten dollars, a hundred dollars).

Thoughts?

[Mira Wilder]

Where is he gonna put the "Goods"? Or would somebody from Craig's List show up and List the items for sale, so the Pan-handler can get a place to stay?

Price is Right is about guessing the Price of each item....in that case, since the Bum has been walking around the city, 'window shopping' all his adult life...know the price of his 'goods'. The Goods; being items that would help him live the homeless life to the fullest.:a small portable pup tent complete with cooking gear, blow up pillow, a moon-lite induced "Lantern" ,and a can of mace for safety..
A Golden Piggy Bank for stashing that stash...
a vacation for two at the bus terminal of his choice...

Maybe, Drew Carey himself would show up and say 'not so fast.'...'you have to read/know the answers to certain questions from my favorite self help books.. .before you can move on'....it helped Drew....on his Golden Road to success...

The name of the show could be called...Beggars Bank Wit

[Turner]

Good point on the potential (likely) mental unstability of contestants. Sometimes they just plain look like they are a short 'n' curly away from snapping and attacking the average citizen (or maybe that's just a sales tactic, as it were--the citizen is intimidated and tosses them some dough just so they can get out of there).

There is a shopping district in Burbank that is always busy (San Fernando Blvd, on both sides of the mall). There are a handful of bums that I see working the same areas all the time, because there are always a ton of tourists who don't know that they are "regulars." Anyway, if one were be able to establish that the bum wasn't a threat, the only real danger would be the pigs stepping in before the game was over. Of course, if the cameras were just "tourists" with home video camcorders, there's not a whole lot a single pig could do about that.

Or, barring that, the whole thing could be a setup. The bum could be an agent as well.

[Jon]

hmm how about the "bum" is an agent, and you get a member of the public to "win the bum the money" ?

[Slithy Tove]

I love it! But a word of warning: there are a significant number of homeless persons who have psychiatric issues. It is generally not a good idea to have a large group of people running up to a paranoid schizophrenic and start asking him a bunch of questions.

[Daniel]

Haha! I love this idea!
We could have some people dress up as the show host and, if you ever watched the Price is Right, those girls who present the awards.

If I was a bum in NY I would be scared out of my pants and yet happy at the same time.