The Craziest People on Fox Nation Are Its New Game Show’s Contestants

Standup comics organize a set like this: their strongest joke is the closer, the second-strongest is the opener, the third-strongest is the penultimate joke, the fourth-strongest is the second overall joke, and so on. In my standup days, an early closer was a joke about a family winning like $1,200 on Family Feud, and then having to split it five ways. The punchline: “Why didn’t you just go to work that day?”

Greg Gutfeld is a standup comic, a more-successful one than I ever was. He’s got a hit late-night-adjacent Fox News talk show — Gutfeld! is technically in primetime now — and a new game show on sister streaming service Fox Nation. The gimmick of the game show is interesting, though the prize money is a joke. Like my old closer advises, the contestants just should have just kept their day jobs.

Greg Gutfeld’s What Did I Miss? placed five people “in complete isolation in upstate New York, with no contact to the outside world — no phones, internet, television or social media,” per the logline. One of the five dropped out early. A scant 90 days (January 20 through April 13 of this year) later, the four remaining contestants are transported to Gutfeld’s Fox News studio to play an elongated game of True or False about the events of Donald Trump’s first three months back in the White House. It’s actually a funny and surprisingly self-aware premise considering Trump’s volatility and the conservative audience Fox News and Nation serve. The actual show itself isn’t especially watchable — but consider the budget.

The premise and payoff of What Did I Miss? goes like this: five contestants, 90 days, no contact, one winner, $25,000. We did not leave any zeroes off.

Upon apparently first learning of the prize money during a visit midway through the contestants’ isolation period, Gutfeld exclaims, “This is the cheapest game show in modern history! These people are in a house for 90 fucking days for 25 grand — they could have made that on OnlyFans!”

In the 1970s, which is not considered modern history, the grand prize on CBS’ primetime Pyramid game show was up to $25,000. In the ‘80s, the daytime version matched it and the syndicated nighttime show jumped to $50,000 and then again to $100,000.

The Fox broadcast network, part of the same company as Fox News and Fox Nation, currently airs game shows with cash prizes like $250,000 (The Floor) and $1 million (Beat Shazam).

“The contestants were compensated daily for their time,” a spokesperson for Fox News Media told The Hollywood Reporter for this story.

Visiting the contestants’ holding cell farmhouse, Gutfeld heads to the off-limits (for the cast) control room to try to scrounge up a bit more scratch. He’s only semi-successful: Lauren Peterson, the president of Fox Nation, ups the prize money to $30,000.

“I tried,” Gutfeld says. ”I got them an extra 5k — it’ll pay for the Uber back home.”

To be fair, as every cable news channel except maybe Fox News will tell you, we’re likely headed for a recession.

Back in the studio following the full 90-day isolation period, Gutfeld shared “some pretty good news” with the contestants.

“You probably know that I’m a pretty big deal around here, and sometimes I do keep my word,” the host says. “Not only did we get your prize raised from an insulting 25 grand to 30 grand, but I managed to go further. After more than one strongly-worded email…and two or three yelled phone calls, I got you a total prize fund tonight of $50,000.”

The reaction from the contestant podiums was a collective, “well, that’s something,” basically.

Gutfeld then quips that it’s “pennies” to someone like him, after which one contestant suggests he “add another zero.” Pass. Gutfeld makes millions of dollars a year as one of Fox News Media’s biggest stars.

Unfortunately, the very contestant who suggested pushing the prize to $500,000 was eliminated first. You do not bite the hand that feeds you (ramen noodles). But the “higher-ups” at Fox added a parting gift: one final question for $1,000. So there’s that.

And here’s some math contextualizing the opportunity. Ninety days is a bit less than 13 weeks. Putting in 40 hours per week at the New York (state) minimum wage of $15.50 per hour (New York City is $16.50/hour), any full-time worker walks away from the same three-month period with $8,000 — and that’s not even considering the other 128 hours each week that nine-to-fivers do not monetize but the isolationists must live out in, well, isolation. It may very well have been worth it to the contestant who eventually wins the (eventual) $50,000 prize, but probably not the other folks — especially the ones with kids. And several of them have kids.

“I feel terrible. I feel like I just spent 90 days of my life for no reason at all,” the first departing contestant says in an exit interview at the end of the first episode. “For a thousand dollars, which for in New York you could get a slice of pizza and maybe a Diet Coke.”

We told you the show was self-aware.

“Greg Gutfeld’s What Did I Miss?” premiered on Fox Nation today, May 12. Episodes two and three will premiere May 13 and May 14, respectively.