Audience Guide: Ryan's Pub, Trivia Night

Researched and Written by Tina Kakuske

Pub Quiz Evolution

Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night gives the audience a look into the pub trivia phenomenon that was popularized in the United Kingdom. The Guinness Book of Records claims that the first pub quiz happened in Yorkshire in 1946. While more instances of early pub quizzes can be found, the events were unorganized until a couple, Sharon Burns and Tom Porter, started taking their quizzes around to other pubs throughout the country in the 1970s. Pubs saw trivia as a successful marketing ploy for the quiet nights and soon trivia became the reason to visit the pub!

Pub Quiz jumped the pond when Bar Trivia started in the US in the mid-1980s. It grew quickly in popularity and has a more casual approach than in the UK. Bar trivia companies developed in the US and technology has revolutionized the services provided, including anti-cheating software.

Trope Watch: The Faustian Bargain

The Faustian Bargain or “make a deal with the devil/moral compromise” trope can be found in multiple genres including literature, films, books, games, music, comics, and TV. Some well-known examples include the book Dr. Faustus by Thomas Mann, the song The Devil Went Down to Georgia by Charlie Daniels and the book The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. Modern examples using this trope include Breaking Bad, The Little Mermaid, Supernatural, and the video game Cuphead.

“I seek to find the extraordinary in the ordinary. Make the mundane poetic. Make heroes out of the flawed folks you meet at the local bar” – Alec Silberblatt

Did You Know?

-The Guinness World record for largest pub quiz was a virtual quiz hosted in the UK by Jay Flynn in 2020 during the COVID lockdown and involved over 180,000 households.

-The Monongahela Monsters (Marci and Richie’s trivia team) is named after the Monongahela River which meets the Ohio River, with Pittsburgh at that confluence.

Pittsburghese?

Home and native origins can be heard in the way people speak and the expressions that they use. ‘Place’ plays a role in Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night by using “Pittsburgh speech [which is] different from other varieties [by] the particular combination of words, sounds, and grammatical patterns that can be heard in southwestern Pennsylvania.” Some words, expressions and sounds used by Pittsburghers include:

Downtown-pronounced dahntahn
Sammiches-sandwiches
Redd up-clean up, fix up
Buggy-shopping cart
Gum Bands-rubber bands
Jagoff-jerk, idiot
Yinz-you (plural)
Stillers-Steelers (as in the team)

Just as Wisconsinites supposedly say ‘ope,’ soda not pop, bubbler not water fountain, “ya know” and yous guys (you plural), Pittsburghese “is a reflection of how people THINK Pittsburghers talk.” In the end, it is all about enjoying our differences and similarities.

Duologue: Just the Two of Us

Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night is a duologue, which is a dramatic performance or piece in the form of a dialogue limited to two speakers. This type of play puts interesting demands on the two people who must carry the whole performance. When asked about these demands, Jacob Janssen pointed out that the actors “think differently about how they perform it, because they are talking almost the entire show.” He mentioned that they might consider possible physical strains, and use more vocal warm up and care of the voice outside of the performance itself.

Trivia at Home: Trivial Pursuit

Just like Richie (from Ryan’s Pub, Trivia Night) who carries around Trivial Pursuit cards surrounded by a gum band, people became obsessed with the game and all of its versions starting when it was first introduced in 1981. Two Canadian journalists, Chris Haney and Scott Abbott, were inspired by a Scrabble game that had missing pieces. Trivial Pursuit became a cultural phenomenon and was sold multiple times over the years, most recently to Hasbro for $80 Million.

“I write stuff that can be done anywhere for any budget. They have simple sets with an emphasis on the oral tradition of theater, great dialogue, and the love of a good yarn” – Alec Silberblatt

LEARN MORE

SOURCES:

_{https://lastcalltrivia.com/bars/bar-trivia-history/}
_{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pub_quiz}
_{https://lastcalltrivia.com/bars/bar-trivia-history/}
_{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pub_quiz}
_{https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/deal-with-the-devil-explained/#:~:text=This%20trope%20traces%20its%20origins,unrestricted%20knowledge%20and%20worldly%20pleasures.}
_{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deals_with_the_Devil_in_popular_culture}
_{https://newplayexchange.org/script/2034257/ryans-pub-trivia-night}
_{https://www.downtownwestchester.com/venue/ryans-pub/}
_{http://www.alecsilberblatt.com/}
_{https://scriptshopshow.com/the-deal-that-debbie-made_alec-silberblatt/}
_{https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W estern_Pennsylvania_English}
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_{https://www.slate.com/articles/life/the_good_word/2014/04/pennsylvania_dialects_from_pittsburghese_to_philadelphia_speak_the_keystone.html}
_{https://www.wesa.fm/arts-sports-culture/2017-09-28/redd-up-your-pittsburghese-a-deep-dive-into-how-yinz-talk}
_{https://tinyurl.com/p7an7a44}
_{https://www.pghcitypaper.com/specials-guides/pittsburghese-dictionary-how-to-talk-like-a-yinzer-19623370}
_{https://pittsburghspeech.pitt.edu/PittsburghSpeech_SpeechOverview.html}
_{https://www.itv.com/news/2020-05-14/virtual-pub-quiz-wins-guinness-world-record-and-raises-thousands-for-charity-after-going-viral-in-lockdown}
_{https://www.dictionary.com/browse/duologue}