FREE ESSAY ON THE MOVIE QUIZ SHOW

THE MOVIE QUIZ SHOW

Chernette Lewis
Social Psychology
December 15, 2000
In the movie "Quiz Show" The television game show "Twenty-one" was rigged to keep ratings
up at NBC. At the beginning of the movie question for the show were seen taken from a
bank volt. This gave the viewer the impression that no one saw the question before Jack
(the host) received them from the guards weekly. Herbert Stempel, a Jewish contestant, he
won for eight weeks on the show had become a national celebrity, to the audience he
seemed unstoppable. When the rating fell the producers of the game show decided to get a
more attractive contestant. So, they set out to find a new contestant. Charles Van Doreen
became their man to beat Herbert. Van Doreen was a handsome college instructor from a
prominent family of Nobel Prize winners. Since Charles was a better match for the show
Herbert was told he had to lose the next show and the question had to be simple. Although
Herbert did not want to he did. He then became outraged because Charles had became the
"Gentile" the beat the "Jew". Charles was well liked and won much more money. To get
revenge Herb spoke with a District attorney office labeling the show a fraud. 
This prompted an investigation. When Richard Goodwin, a Washington lawyer and
congressional investigator read about 
the grand jury statements being sealed in the New York Times he decided to investigate
it. He know something was wrong 
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when it should have been a public trial. Goodwin was determined to find out what the
secret was. 
The problem was the contestants were all given the answers to the questions before the
show. There were several psychological theories shown in this movie I will focus on,
group think, cognitive dissonance and conformity behaviors among the three men. 
Producers Dan Enright and Albert Freedman use the many psychological methods to get the
two contestants to cheating on the show. First with Herb they offer him $25,000. When he
accepts he believes he was the only one who had received them. Herb was finally apart of
the in-group. He showed illusions of invulnerability, making statements like this one
"they love me for the same reason they used to hate me, because I'm the guy who knows
everything." Being known as an intelligent person made him so arrogant that he would do
what ever the network say to stay in the spotlight. "I have waited for this my whole
life" said Herb, belief in the groups moral standards was never questioned by Herb until
he was no longer needed. 
Herb Rationalized his action to his wife in saying, "That box is the biggest thing since
Gutenberg invented the printing press, and I'm the biggest thing on it", this kept 
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his self-perception under control and made him feel better about himself. Herb showed
more of a cognitive dissonance position with his anger toward Charles then the fact that
he was responsible for the game show to continue on and cheat everyone including him.
Herbert had to prove to himself and to everyone else he was intelligent this statement
says it best. "You want to know what? If I do nothing else I will convince them that
Hebert Stemple knows what won the Academy Award for best picture of 1955; that's what I'm
gonna accomplish." This was the question he was forced to lose the contest on. It was not
until after Charles spoke to congress board that Herbert realized he was closed-minded
and did not take in to account how things would effect him, his family or Charles. 
With Charles the producers used the use foot in the door technique to trap him. First by
asking him to comply with cheating and when he did not they input a question for him to
answer so that he would have to make a public commitment. When Charles answered the
question it was his first step to conforming to the group think method. Charles loves the
attention he now receives as a result of his new found celebrity status. Charles not only
demonstrates the 
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same group think phenomena as Herbert, but he stereotypes Herbert to be weaker then he
and therefore not trust worthy or a good loser to Goodwin. Through out the movie Charles
protest being given the answers by the producers. He rationalizes it by requesting to be
given the questions to him and then looking up the answers. Eventually pressure from his
fans and his longing to escape his fathers shadow made it easier for him to conform.
Because Charles shows a great deal of cognitive dissonance he takes on an impression
management role. Role playing and changing his attitude made it more acceptable to keep
playing the game. He wants to be seen as a person who is capable of creating his own
fame. But personal feelings of guilt kept interfering. When Charles loses on the game
show on purpose he is trying to maintain self-control. He feels he can get out of the
whole ordeal but is not let out by the producers. He then signs a contract for a new
show. In the end Charles realize that he could not stop the inevitable which was the
congress committee inquire and he stated, to the board "I've stood on the shoulders of
life and I've never gotten down into the dirt to build, to erect a foundation of my own.
I've flown too high on borrowed wings. Everything came too easy." 
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Charles realized that although we are sometimes persuaded to do thing we do not want to
ultimately we are responsible for our actions right or wrong. 
Goodwin who is also Jewish can not believe that 
Van Doreen cheat on the show so he focuses on bring down the 
network with out implicating Charles. Dick (Goodwin) uses 
self-serving bias to keep Charles in the clear. Dick knows that Charles received the
answers but he does not want to admit it to anyone, if he does then his hero is gone. He
is even called "The Uncle Tom of the Jews" by his wife because he cannot bear to bring
Van Doreen in on the investigation. 
Dick is being altruist in his decision to keep Charles out of the spotlight but it not
just to help save the Van Doreen reputation it is to save the relationship with his new
friend. Goodwin cognitive dissonance is the strongest of the three characters in the
movie. He does not believe in the group think process and is trying to pull the producer
and president to their knees. 
To help resolve some of the guilty feelings he has Goodwin ask Charles man to man did he
accept the answer to the questions. He was allowing Charles a chance to self disclose his
feelings, Charles became out raged he wanted 
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and questioned Dick if he would have done the same given the situation, but because he
stated he would not, so Charles could not bring himself to admit his wrong doing until he
was subpoena to testify. Goodwin still gave Charles the 
opportunity to deny the accusation and was stunned when he did the right thing and
confessed.
The movie reminded me of the Asch's Studies of Group Pressure. Although the characters
knew what they were doing was wrong they continued to do what was asked of them to cheat.
Herbert and Charles relied on groupthink to 
influence them on what was the acceptable thing to do at that time. I find it hard to
believe that most of use would not do the same in if we though there were no chance of
getting caught. Deindividuation also led these men to do what is considered morally
wrong. During the testimony of Albert Freedmon he stated, It's not like we're hardened
criminals here. We're in show business. Which is to say what we do is give people what
they want entertainment.
It does not mean we have to do the moral thing to get our point across.