Who Wants to Miss the Million-Dollar Question?

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L.A. attorney Ken Basin last month earned a dubious distinction: He became the only person in the United States to make it to the million-dollar question on the show “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” and give the wrong answer.

Basin, an associate in the entertainment practice at the Century City office of Greenberg Glusker Fields Claman & Machtinger LLP, is no stranger to game shows. The 24-year-old whiz kid played “College Jeopardy!” and participates in a weekly trivia game at a Santa Monica bar.

Basin originally tried out for “Millionaire” while on a trip to New York more than a year ago. He finally got his chance to go on the Aug. 23 show, which taped Aug. 5 in New York. To his surprise, Basin quickly made it all the way through the $500,000 round, using two of his “lifelines” in the process.

Then Basin made a fateful decision. When presented with the million-dollar question what was President Lyndon Johnson’s favorite soft drink when in the White House? Basin decided to guess the answer instead of walking away with $500,000.

“I chose to answer the question because I figured that if I walked away, I would forever regret not trying to answer the question,” he said.

But Basin’s answer, “Yoo-hoo,” was wrong. The correct answer was “Fresca.” He left with only $25,000.

Soon after the show aired, Basin saw his name underneath a screaming New York Post headline, “Schmuck! Meet the Know-It-All Kid Who Blew $475,000!”

But the really tough part was keeping his promise to keep quiet about the outcome during the nearly three weeks between the taping and the air date.

“I didn’t even tell my parents,” he said. “But they were very wily. In our conversations, they were constantly asking me where I ate while I was in New York. I think they were trying to figure out whether I won by looking at how expensive the restaurants were.”


Bed on the Wild Side

Donna Livingston of Los Angeles has been designing home interiors for nearly three decades. She’s done hundreds of upscale interiors throughout the city and elsewhere. Her makeovers are all-encompassing, transformative and expensive. A typical one will set you back $2 million or $3 million.

While most people ask for straightforward decoration, some have requests that are not what you’d expect from upper-crust clientele.

Take the case of an 84-year-old man with an Aspen, Colo., vacation home. When Livingston first worked on the house in 1996, he wanted a discoth & #269;que built into the home, complete with fiber-optic lighting in the ceiling that was made to look like a starry sky. Then there was his subterranean garage for his collection of motorcycles.

In February, when Livingston met up with the gentleman to discuss a remodel, he had an interesting request. He wanted a new four-poster bed tricked out with several amenities. The $10,000 hand-carved bed has a motorized lift that helps him sit up. And it has another feature that, shall we say, lets him express his adventurous side.

“It’s hilarious,” Livingston said. “Here is a guy who could barely get up from a chair.”


Staff reporters Howard Fine and Daniel Miller contributed to this column. Page 3 is compiled by Editor Charles Crumpley. He can be reached at [email protected].

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