美国国家公共电台 NPR I'm So Excited!（在线收听）

I'm So Excited!

JULIAN VELARD: From NPR and WNYC, coming to you from The Bell House in beautiful Brooklyn, N.Y., it's NPR's hour of puzzles, word games and trivia ASK ME ANOTHER. I'm Julian Velard. Now here's your host Ophira Eisenberg.

(APPLAUSE)

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

Thank you, Julian. Jonathan Coulton is out this week. He's training to become a Pokemon monster. But we are so glad to welcome back Julian with his trusty keyboard. And we have a great show for you. We have four brilliant contestants who are backstage right now waiting to play our nerdy games. But only one will be our big winner. And our special guests are Gillian Jacobs and Kate Micucci from the movie "Don't Think Twice," which explores the world of improv comedy.

And as a stand-up, watching this movie made me so jealous because improvisers just seem happy. I actually dated an improviser for a while and it was pretty exhausting 'cause all day long, he'd just ask for suggestions. He was like, can I get an object? How about a location? I was like, how about my feelings?

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: We didn't break up. Just one day, I called scene. And...

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: ...I got my money back. Let's get things started with our first two contestants. First up, Jake Toffler. You work for a medical tech startup and you have a knack for winning things.

JAKE TOFFLER: Yeah, I've been pretty lucky. A few weeks ago, I actually won the "Hamilton" lottery.

EISENBERG: Oh.

VELARD: Whoa.

EISENBERG: Wow. I know, that's better now than the real lottery.

TOFFLER: Yeah, almost. I've also won a 60-inch TV, a free cruise and a year of free Chipotle.

EISENBERG: Free - oh. How did you win the television, for example?

TOFFLER: I went to Duke, and I was a big basketball fan. And they had a sign competition before our big rival, UNC. I made a sign that said I'm hopping Duke will win. And I was wearing a giant bunny mask. And I happened to be right dead center in the shot where they had the four anchors talking about the game upcoming. And I was jumping up and down the whole time with my sign.

EISENBERG: You know what? You deserve it.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: Your opponent is Viola Huang. You are a surgical resident currently researching how to improve liver transplants.

VIOLA HUANG: Yes.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: We are all impressed. So based on your research on livers, how...

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: How are you treating your own liver, first of all?

HUANG: Pretty good, actually.

EISENBERG: Pretty good?

HUANG: Once you start seeing what it looks like inside, you start taking care of yourself better. Although I still eat fries, so I guess that kind of...

EISENBERG: Oh, that's a problem, right?

HUANG: Yeah.

EISENBERG: Now that you've seen the liver, what's one tip you can give our listening audience on how to improve their liver health?

HUANG: I mean, don't drink but you guys are all...

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: I mean other than that, other than that.

HUANG: Just take care of yourself. Stay healthy, exercise, hydrate. I mean, the liver does so much for the body. It's such an important organ.

EISENBERG: Yeah.

HUANG: And people think the heart is so sexy, but I think the liver is the most - the coolest organ.

EISENBERG: Yeah.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: So the first of you who wins two games is going to move on to our final round at the end of the show. Your first challenge is called I'm So Excited. And in this trivia game, every answer contains everyone's favorite overused punctuation mark, the exclamation point, right? That's how you make texts seem like you're actually happy.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: For an example of what you're going to do, let's go to our puzzle guru Art Chung.

ART CHUNG: If I said this Best Picture Oscar winner was based on Charles Dickens' novel about a poor orphan, you'd answer "Oliver!"

VELARD: And I'm going to ask you to do something very un-Brooklyn-like and that is feign enthusiasm. When you give your answer, give us the full force of the exclamation point.

EISENBERG: All right, here we go.

VELARD: It's the Shania Twain song I'm channeling when I say (singing) whoa, whoa, whoa. I want to be free to feel the way I feel.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

HUANG: "Man! I Feel Like A Woman."

VELARD: Yes, Viola.

(APPLAUSE)

VELARD: Yes.

EISENBERG: The title character of this Nicktoon was often called football head, not because he had a concussion but because his head was shaped like a football.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

EISENBERG: Jake.

TOFFLER: "Hey Arnold!"

EISENBERG: Yes, indeed.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: I've never seen it, but it must be confusing when he plays football. That's all I have to say.

VELARD: It's the corporation that owns such artery-clogging favorites as Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and KFC.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

VELARD: Viola.

HUANG: Yum, I don't know.

CHUNG: We'll take that. It was Yum! Brands.

EISENBERG: Yeah.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: You have to know that from your research, right?

HUANG: Yeah, no, we have a blacklist of, you know.

(LAUGHTER)

VELARD: This Comedy Central show was set in a Nevada City that was once home to the world's longest domestic cat and the world record for the most simultaneous checker games.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

VELARD: Jake.

TOFFLER: "Reno 911!"

VELARD: Yes.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: All right, who cares about the show? Let's just discuss the world's longest domestic cat for the rest of the time we have here.

TOFFLER: It would be very NPR.

EISENBERG: That would be very NPR, just an entire expose.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: In this Dr. Seuss book, an elephant saves a tiny planet from being boiled in beezle-nut oil because a person's a person no matter how small.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

EISENBERG: Jake.

TOFFLER: "Horton Hears A Who!"

EISENBERG: Yeah.

(APPLAUSE)

VELARD: The final film in Baz Luhrmann's "Red Curtain Trilogy." It featured Nicole Kidman and Ewan McGregor ruining songs you love.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

VELARD: Viola.

HUANG: Oh, shoot. I knew it and then I forgot. Hold on. It's, like, the French thing (laughter).

EISENBERG: Yes.

VELARD: Yes, yes.

HUANG: I have it in there (laughter).

EISENBERG: I like what you're saying.

VELARD: Keep it going.

HUANG: Oh, God. For some reason, I'm blanking. But I can see the scenery, the - all that. But I just got...

EISENBERG: I believe you. I believe you.

HUANG: I got nothing.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: Jake, can you steal?

TOFFLER: Well, I don't know it. But she said French. So I'm going to go with "Moulin Rouge!"

(APPLAUSE)

VELARD: Yes, you are correct.

EISENBERG: And I like it, Jake. But let's pretend...

TOFFLER: I really didn't know it.

EISENBERG: We know. I know you know it, all right?

TOFFLER: I really didn't know it.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: You don't need this justification that you don't watch that continuously in a loop while you work out, all right?

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: All right, this is your last clue. Starring Leslie Nielsen, this movie's a spoof of the 1957 movie "Zero Hour," which also ends with an exclamation point.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

EISENBERG: Jake.

TOFFLER: "Airplane!"

EISENBERG: "Airplane!" is correct.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: Let's go to our puzzle guru Art Chung. How did our contestants do?

CHUNG: Congratulations, Jake. You're one step closer to moving on to the final round.

(APPLAUSE)