LAS VEGAS — The game is high-stakes hangman. Only three can play but millions can watch, and on this August afternoon at the Venetian hotel, “Wheel of Fortune” is the most riveting game in this joint.
Sixteen hundred fans, sardined in bleachers, have come to watch as the great wheel giveth cars, cash and trips to Antigua. And they’ve also come to see the mistress of letters, America’s favorite wordsmith, work her magic on the puzzle board.
Here we are at the bonus round. The category is PHRASE. The puzzle looks like a sandtrap on an emerald green golf course.
Ten seconds on the clock. The contestant is baffled.
“Oh. Um. It’s,” she pleads, until the answer dribbles off her tongue just in the nick of . . .
The buzzer bleeps. The crowd gasps. She won, right? After 30 seasons of Wheel of Fortune, the hosts aren’t exactly sure.
Pat Sajak runs off stage toward a bank of computers. Vanna White —wearing a sparkling fuchsia gown and a thigh-high slit — takes a mike and darts toward the crowd with the swiftness of a mountain cat. It is now, off camera, that the usually silent hostess does something that would shock the 30 million viewers who watch her each week.
She speaks.
For seven minutes.
“Sometimes, things are too close and we have to check the tape,” Vanna informs the crowd in a honeyed Carolina accent. “But this gives me some time to talk with you folks! Anyone have questions for Vanna?”
This is not part of the usual routine. This is Defcon-2 at “America’s Game.” Vanna has already gabbed with this audience, already told them about her cat, her two teenage kids and the 6,000 dresses that she’s worn on set since 1982. She’s already hugged a veteran and told a handicapped teen in the audience that she loves him, too. But Vanna will keeping talking — about blackjack or shoe collections — until the contestant on stage learns that she lost $50,000. That’s when Vanna will console her, clap anyway and change gowns for the next game, when some lucky someone might win the Camaro.
“It’s icky when that happens,” Vanna said backstage between games, referring to the too-close-to-call moments that give game shows their oomph. “But while they check the tapes, I try to entertain the audience. They don’t get to hear me talk too much, so I try to give them a little piece of who I am.”
After 30 years on Wheel of Fortune, who Vanna White is isn’t entirely clear.
Officially, the 56-year-old co-host is the letter-turner, the name for something she no longer does since the puzzle board is now computerized. But unofficially, Vanna has been everything: touchstone, mother goddess, laughingstock, author, spokeswoman, exercise guru, model, philanthropist and object of desire, envy or ridicule, depending on your taste for sequins. She’s held the same job since she was just 26, one with little path for career development. Despite aging, she’s maintained her status as America’s girlish cheerleader, and is now the longest-running female co-host on syndicated television, a feat that might have been a feather in the cap of women’s achievement if we weren’t talking about Vanna White. But Vanna — who, yes, gained first-name-only recognition in 1987 — doesn’t care to claim accolades. In her mind, there’s a reason it all worked out this way.
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