IU students take talk show stage

When junior Amanda Fick hit the highway for a cross-country road trip with her two roommates over spring break last week, she hardly expected to find herself rubbing elbows with a daytime talk show host or cooking chili with a reality TV star. Covering thousands of miles in 30 hours left Fick and her friends exhausted, and sunning in Santa Monica. The trio browsed on Rodeo Drive and making the requisite tourist loop of Hollywood's walk of fame and Grauman's Chinese Theater during the 11-day jaunt. \nBut when several days passed with few celeb sightings -- save comedian-turned-TV-spokesman Carrot Top -- Fick's frustration mounted. The IU junior had never been west of St. Louis, and the possibility of hobnobbing with celebs in Los Angeles was particularly alluring. \nYet that changed when Fick and friends junior Heather Showman and junior Heather Majors decided to hit up the Ellen DeGeneres Show -- the only one they planned to catch -- one morning. While standing in line for three hours waiting for admission to the studio, the trio was approached by a vendor selling tickets for a variety of L.A.-based talk shows, and the nearby Wayne Brady Show was featuring Sean Astin, star of Lord of the Rings. The decision was made, and the girls bought tickets for the St. Patrick's Day taping.\nThat morning, after filling out information sheets before taping began, the girls were approached by a Wayne Brady staffer, who chatted with them about their three-day trip and asked if they'd like to introduce Brady at the beginning of the segment. \n"The next thing we knew, we were being rushed backstage, having microphone packs attached to us, and being told what to do and to be super-excited -- not a problem for us," said Majors -- who admits her hands were shaking as the cameras rolled. \nShowman agreed. \n"We just stared at each other and mumbled a 'yes,'" she said. "We were taken backstage and fitted for mics (which was weird because they didn't warn us, and all of the sudden this guy's hands are down my pants). They gave us a little tutorial which basically said, be enthusiastic, tell Wayne that you love him and are psyched to see him, and that Sean Astin is one of your favorite actors, then talk about traveling all the way out to L.A. in the car. So we did and had a fabulous time, even though we were shaking terribly."\nWhen the show began, Brady briefly talked to each of the girls about their trip before cutting to a commercial. The girls were re-seated in the back row of the studio, but were shortly called up again to test a batch of chili cooked by Survivor-star Rudy. \n"The chili segment was a complete surprise," Showman said. "It was filmed right after the introduction and we had already had our mics taken away and thought we were done except for some audience shots. Completely unbeknownst to us, Wayne starts cooking says, 'You know, I'm going to have my girls who drove here from the University come down and taste this for me.' It was almost better than the introduction because it was a complete surprise for us."\nFick, who was "giddy and shocked" to be on live television, said Brady made the girls feel at home on the set, crooning a Stevie Wonder song as he quizzed them about their trip. \n"Up close and in person, Wayne Brady was really great," Majors said. "He was very nice and gracious to us. He was also really funny, and something people don't know is that he is a great singer. He sang during some of the commercial breaks. When we thanked him after the show, he actually thanked us! We couldn't believe he thought we needed to be thanked"