Part 1 of the Salt Lake version of "Antiques Roadshow" airs tonight at 7 and will be repeated Monday, May 1, at 7 p.m. Part 2 airs Monday, May 1, at 8 p.m.
This might sound strange, but the appeal of PBS's "Antiques Roadshow" has a lot in common with the appeal of ABC's "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?"
Really.
In both shows, average people have the chance to make big bucks; viewers might learn a thing or two along the way; and both have their kitschy moments.
And both shows are the sort of television that you find yourself sucked into, even obsessed with, if you sit down and watch a few minutes of it. The drill is simple — people haul their prized possessions (or stuff they've had in the garage or attic) down to be appraised, hoping against hope that the stuff might actually be worth something.
The "Antiques Roadshow" segments taped nine months ago in Salt Lake City at the Salt Palace finally make it on the air tonight and next Monday at 7 p.m. on Ch. 7. (No one said this "Roadshow" moves quickly.) And the two segments have all the appeal the show has demonstrated since it began airing on PBS three seasons ago.
Nobody becomes a millionaire in the two Salt Lake segments, but lots of people make out very nicely indeed. A highlight is a bit that sounds like one of those apocryphal stories that gets passed around — but it's true.
One woman brings in a painting she bought for $1.50 at a Salvation Army store. Turns out it's a painting by Freemont Ellis and the appraiser tells her its worth somewhere between $10,000 and $15,000 — a nice return on her investment.
"You're kidding me!" she exclaims. "My brother told me it's ugly! I never thought it would be worth that."
Or the woman who brought her federal mahogany wing chair and discovered it was worth $20,000.
"Oh my goodness," she said. "That is a surprise."
Other people weren't as lucky. The fellow who brought in a carved turtle shell with the hopes that it was a 19th-century antique worth tons of money was disappointed.
"The turtle shell is too good to be true," said the appraiser, who quickly told him it was made in a factory in England about 15 years ago and was worth maybe $150.
Other items appraised include swords and maps and World War I snakebite kits and toys and photographs and Native American artifacts and musical instruments and lamps and furniture and on and on. While we're waiting for the punch line — you can almost see some of the owners panting over what exactly their things are worth — we learn something about the piece.
The Salt Lake segments have a particular local flavor, including items such as old Mormon documents or people talking about how their pioneer ancestors brought the items to Utah.
The payoff is almost literal, however — the big bucks some of this stuff is worth.
But unlike the slickness of "Millionaire," part of the appeal of "Roadshow" is its rather casual production style. Watching the appraisers chat with the folks who brought in their stuff while people mill around in the background — complete with all the ambient noise — is charming in its way.
Host Chris Jussel also introduces a bit of a Utah travelogue. Standing at the This Is the Place monument, he provides a bit of history of Utah and the LDS Church, complete with beautiful footage of the Salt Lake Temple and the Tabernacle.
(Heck, he even refers to "modern, cosmopolitan Salt Lake City.")
There are also segments on the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, the Great Salt Lake and the various incarnations of Saltair, and the Violin-Making School of America.
As always, it's oddly seductive TV. And the local flavor only adds spice for Utah viewers.
Television editor Scott D. Pierce can be reached by e-mail at pierce@desnews.com