Whose Line Is It Anyway?

If you're a fan of the impov comedy, you probably heard of the Whose Line Is It Anyway? show. It was one of the best comedy shows on TV (the best one on ABC, for sure). But one installment of the show that I watched was undoubtedly creepy.

Here is what you have to know to understand my disturbance. It was a fake "game show" with a host and four contestants. There were several "games" in the show, based on audience shouts; contestants acted an improvised sketch, then host pressed the buzzer to stop the sketch, and the next game began. Drew Carey was the host of U.S. version; he is heavily overweighted man, which is not healthy at all. But he is still alive and quite well nowadays. All the contestants had good relationships, most notably there was a friendship between Ryan and Colin, and a friendship between Ryan and Drew Carey, the host. Keep it all in mind.

Ten years ago (2001 or 2002) I was channel-surfing and occasionally switched to Whose Line. There was Drew pressing the buzzer and laughing his butt off; audience applaused and cheered; guys were standing on the stage, all four of them, smiling. Some game had just finished, and I should've missed some really great stuff: Drew's laughter was hysterical.

That's where things went totally wrong. Drew just won't stop laughing. Guys took their seats in the backstage, it was time for Drew to make another points-related joke and announce next challenge. But he just laughed and laughed. There was an awkward pause; confused contestants began to look at each other. That's when Ryan starts to act strangely. He was just staring at Drew, observing him motionlessly. Was he hypnotised or frightened? It was really creepy.

Drew started to cough severely, he rose from the desk and tried to go somewhere, but suddenly fell over, face down, on the stage. Audience was silent - don't know why, camera was tracing just Drew and occasionally the guys. I think it was shock, because even I felt it while watching. ''What the hell - why do they show us such a thing? And what is going on here?''

When Drew fell over, all the guys jumped up from their seats. All - except for Ryan. He cringed and sat back while still staring at agonizing Drew. It was very unlikely for friend to act like this. Like, he was not even care about Drew's health! Wayne was holding Drew, while Colin clapped on his back. Brad poured a glass of water. Somebody shouted: "Do you need any help?"; I think it was the audience. Nobody bothered to response, though. The cast were talking to each other, visibly concerned about the whole mess, but you could not figure out a single word. Microphones should've been switched off for some reason, or whatever, I don't know.

Colin said something to Ryan. Maybe, he even shouted it. Ryan did not answer, he just shook his head and shrank back even more.

I watched it, freaked out. ''Why do they show us somebody choking nearly to death in the prime time? Is this supposed to be funny routine?'' I'm not a kind of person who complains about TV stuff and writes protest letters, but this was the case just for it. Are they out of their mind!?

Drew was still trying to clear his throat. Suddenly he coughed blood. F***, said somebody loudly. (It could be someone from the crew; maybe Dan Patterson, the producer). I was totally confused. The program was usually very cencored. So... this is unedited? Live stream? But why would they broadcast it? I had no idea.

This was lasted for another ten minutes. No one else came there, no one tried to resolve the problem. Laura Hall (musician) was not present at the piano (she usually was not there during non-musical rounds, so the last game must have been one of these). At the end, Drew was not showing any signs of life. Neither typical signs of death, though. Still, was it immensely creepy.

Suddenly the broadcast was abruptly interrupted for commercial break. After it, another Whose Line episode began, without any oddities in it whatsoever.

So there you have it. As far as I know, nobody mentioned the incident in mass media or internet forums; the show was cancelled back in 2005, but Drew Carey is still hosting a couple of TV shows. He is safe and sound, and still is a friend of Ryan Stiles. I watched all the episodes of the show on Youtube, but never saw that particular one again. In one occasion, Drew choked on his cup, but quickly relieved. The whole thing took less than a minute, and Ryan was really caring about Drew this time. Also, some Ryan hoedowns (like "I'll have my own show, when I'll murder Drew Carey") become very creepy for me; but that is basically all I have noticed.

I still can't make my mind about what it was.