Now that I’m semi-retired I get to watch the Price is Right a bit more than I used to.
Watching Drew Carey on it is strange. It feels like it’s a Saturday Night Live skit. Carey is a seasoned comedian, and a damn good one at that. I’m just waiting for the day he goes off the deep end and spends the entire hour making sarcastic wisecracks about some contestants stupid bid. “Heres your showcase. You’ll be whizzed by bicycle to Hoboken, New jersey, where you’ll be the judge in a chicken cleaning contest!”
Shit like that. I can see it building up in him. He’s going to snap!
I’ve seen the show once or twice, and it seems to me Drew is overqualified for the job and knows it, but has been suckered in (for now) by the BIG MONEY! BIG MONEY! he surely is pulling in.
He’s a frequent guest on Craig Ferguson’s late night show; he’s good at not talking about his constraints on the show, but it still shows a little. In other news, it sounds like he’s “working on something,” so I’m guessing he’s aware that he will indeed go off someday and is planning for it.
Are you kidding me? This has got to be the easiest, cushiest job in Hollywood. I’d guess Carey feels like he’s the luckiest guy on earth. Carey has never impressed me as the tortured guy who must express his art, rather as a guy whose goal in life is to make enough money to be able to enjoy himself.
The Price is Right probably tapes 5 shows in one day for less than 12 months a year. That means Drew’s “workweek” is 9 months or so out of 12 of showing up sober at his place of business and decent enough to not get fired for 1 day a week out of seven. This is for a network show (i.e. big salary) that will never be cancelled. He can be doing this 30 years from now and he’ll still be the “new guy.”
The only strain he might remotely feel is the need not to do something so crazy that he hits the headlines and it reflects badly on the show - i.e. commit felonies with underage whores, get arrested while dressed as a woman, or start bouncing in and out of rehab.
Clearly you folks have not read Drew’s book. The short stories at the end are especially revealing. He’s been paddling around in the deep end for decades.
Several castmembers of his show said that “the real Drew is pretty much the same as the guy on the air… just a LOT sleazier”. He apparently loves titty-bars and porn and the like (not that there’s anything wrong with that and supposedly he’s a phenomenal tipper whether it’s a topless dancer or a coffee shop waitress).
He’s discussed his problems with depression in the past; I think he had a problem with it when he was the military (when he was surprisinglyhot).
This sounds about right. I saw him at the USA v Italy World Cup match in Kaiserslautern in 2006. He had press credentials and was attending the Cup as a camera man. He came over to say hello to the crazy USA fans in attendance, and gave someone a bunch of money to “buy beer for everyone here”. Probably gave the guy enough to buy a hundred beers or more. He came across as no nuttier than anyone else there, just a sort of regular schmoe living the dream.
Drew Carey usually only does things he enjoys doing. He did “Whose Line is It Anyway?” strictly because he loved the show and he got to hang out with his friends. I’m sure he enjoys doing The Price Is Right at least a little bit, or else he probably wouldn’t have taken the job in the first place. I will admit to being disappointed in his not making more jokes the few times I’ve seen his version.
I’ve been on vacation the past 2 weeks and I’ve been tuning in to the Price is Right.
On Thursday (Friday?) a woman came up on stage and said something like 'Oh my goodness - it’s so surreal to be on the Price is Right!" and Drew said 'I know just how you feel."
He was interviewed on Shatner’s Raw Nerve* and I recall him talking about how the TPIR gig just landed in his lap. It wasn’t like it was always his dream to do TPIR, the producers sought him out. He told them he would do it for awhile until they found a permanent host, but the work was too easy and enjoyable so he signed a multi year deal.
