Two Views of Celebrity Poker Showdown

This review was written by a non-player. Pokersavvy.com has also published an avid player's view of the program.

	Pacific Poker's $100 Bonus Pacific Poker is the place to go if you're looking for a wide array of betting limits and soft opponents. Get $100 free when you sign up at Pacific Poker!

As someone whose poker experience is limited to pretzel-stake home games and video poker, I'm definitely a novice. I don't know the first thing about betting strategically, reading the cards, or bluffing, and I need Hoyle to tell me if a flush beats a straight.

So when I first heard about Bravo's Celebrity Poker Showdown, it sounded like a good idea. Watching decidedly unprofessional players paddle around in the kiddie pool might just be a painless way to get my feet wet. And with complete randoms like David Cross, Tom Green, and Coolio playing, it seemed worth tuning in, if only for the "what the hell?" factor. Plus, cute Paul Rudd? Cute Ron Livingston? I don't care who wins, I just want to see what everyone's wearing!

But as day one of the tournament approached and the promo footage of Emily Proctor tossing her blond, blond hair and saying, "THAT's what I'm TALkin' bout!" played for the seven thousandth time, I started to get a sinking feeling. Turns out, my dread wasn't altogether misplaced.

I sat through two rounds of the Celebrity Showdown (Game one: Ben Affleck, Don Cheadle, Willie Garson, Emily Proctor, David Schwimmer; Game Two, special "West Wing" episode: Timothy Busfield, Allison Janney, Richard Schiff, Martin Sheen, John Spencer). And while they weren't full-on train wrecks, they did offer more than their fair share of cringe-worthy moments. Kevin Pollak's impressions, for one (and for two, and three): the Christopher Walken opener was bad enough, just ... huh?, but when he lurched into his William Shatner bit, the expression on co-host Phil Gordon's face -- a frozen "how did I get here?" half-smile -- said it all. Willie Garson skipping around the table in the middle of a hand to whisper into a reluctant Don Cheadle's ear was pretty bad, too. Richard Schiff's "zany" hat and glasses and glasses and glasses disguise just made me feel tired. The two women players were both reduced to caricatures of "what's a poor girl to do?" girls: Allison Janney's crumpling under pressure to "show strength" on an undeserving hand did anything but, and Emily Proctor flapping her hands and saying "I can't do math" in a small, pouty voice was especially grim. And then there was all the awkward silences and leaden joking you'd expect from a group of actors without a script to follow.

There wasn't much Poker-learning going on, either. The ads for the tournament had created a lot of build up around the idea of actors bluffing, considering that their ability to fake emotions and motivations is their bread and butter. But if you've ever seen a drug dealer conducting business on a street corner -- the darting looks left and right and left, the ridiculously telegraphed exchange of goods and money -- then you have some idea of how obvious the bluffing was in these games. And I'm not just saying that because they let us see the cards.

They also made it look so easy ... not in the "those actors sure do know what they're doing" sense, but with the sort of thorough ineptness that makes you think you could do so much better if you had the chance. What's that I hear? The collective sound of every competent player in the greater Bay Area drooling at the idea of someone like me fired up with a sense of false confidence? That may just be the hidden benefit of Celebrity Poker: Gaming houses will flood with new players primed for fleecing.

The only glimpse I got of the true trickiness of hold'em was through a few of poker expert Phil Gordon's comments, like "Notice the quick call from David here," when David Schwimmer's Ad-10d met a 6c,5d,7d flop. "That's usually indicative of a flush draw." Or when he said, "Strong bets towards the pot are usually an indicator of weakness," regarding Tim Busfield's Ac-3c. If this stuff is common knowledge, I thought, that sure is a stupid move to make. UNLESS! If a player knows you know, betting like that might be calculated to throw you off the scent! Wait, unless the player knows you know that he knows? As I relived the "never mess with a Sicilian when Death is on the line" scene from The Princess Bride, I think I got my first taste of how complicated hold'em really is. (Note to the guy I once argued with in a bar about how craps players are more skilled than poker players: I'm sorry. You were right.)

So if you want to learn how to play Texas hold'em, I think you'd be better off observing professional players go at it. Because watching actors bet pretend money and play to the audience isn't exactly an accurate presentation of real play. But if you want to see celebrities juggle sunglasses, sip Bombay and tonics, and fill dead air with awkward, mumbled improv, then you're in luck: A new game airs each week through January, and Bravo is rerunning the the living hell out of each game.

Terms of Use | Copyright © 2003-2005 Palm Drive Media, Inc.