I had a weirdly very specific experience at Wheel of Fortune that I thought I’d at least mention a little, since some people were curious – and that is that we taped on kind of the ‘last normal day’ in the world pre-pandemic.
I taped Wheel of Fortune on March 13, 2020 – the day many people remember as the “last normal day before the pandemic.” For many people, this was the last day they went to work.
To my knowledge, this was the last Wheel tape day before the pandemic (though they may have had one or two the following week before the mayor’s order officially came down, but I thiiiiiink we were the last ones).
And it’s a little surreal to think about now. It was fairly simple. We didn’t even have masks yet! We didn’t know anything!
Contestants did have to sign papers that we weren’t having any symptoms, and I think they also said we hadn’t been out of the country in the last two weeks.
And there was no audience except for our guests. But what was funny was that they sat everyone right next to each other, so the audience would still look full for the camera, but it didn’t help the people, as no one was social distancing or anything.
And we weren’t allowed to touch Pat or Vanna, so if you noticed any slight awkwardness at times you’d expect him to shake our hands or anything, that’s why.
I most definitely wanted to hug him when I won the trip. And I got the sense he would’ve been up for a hug, or at least a handshake. Even though he can be a little sarcastic and make fun of people a little sometimes (as you’ve all seen on the show), underneath it all, he seems pretty warm! So, I got the sense he wanted to shake our hands and stuff. But alas, no touching. Of course, now that seems so silly, because us breathing on him is worse than handshaking. But we didn’t know anything at the time!
The funniest part of it all, to me, was people talking about what they thought was to come. And some of the backstage Wheel of Fortune people were just talking about how obviously they weren’t gonna shut down. Some places might, but not Wheel of Fortune – an institution. They’d figure it out.
Little did we know!
We were all so naive back then.
But yeah, so some precautions. Some innocence. Some rumblings of what was to come. It was a little weird, but not sooooooo different from a normal day, I don’t think.