Lisa misses her Million Dollar Minute
After declining $500,000 Lisa Paton departs with $77,000 -but shows the spirit of a true champ.
- Published by David Knox
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After her third episode chasing one million dollars, Million Dollar Minute champ Lisa Paton was defeated by a newcomer yesterday and left the show with $77,000.
The 38 year old single mum was caught in a nail-biting, three-way tie with two new contestants and just one question remaining in the elimination round.
In the deciding question: “In the 1963 film Cleopatra, who plays Mark Antony?”
Despite knowing the answer, “Richard Burton,” she was beaten on the buzzer by new contestant Mark Vadas by just 0.25 of a second.
She leaves with the ‘safety net’ jackpot of $75,000 plus $2000 in safe money which she had banked along the way.
During a record-breaking run of 13 episodes, Paton had passed on the chance to pocket $500,000, but managed to remain upbeat.
“Of course I’m disappointed and I knew the risk I was taking…one million dollars is an amazing amount of money but $77,000 is also pretty good – that’s still going to make a difference to my life,” she said.
“It would have taken me 10 years to save this much money… it will clear some debts, my car is dying so now I can get a new car and take my daughter on a holiday to Malaysia.”
Host Simon Reeve, said “Lisa has this calm, considered way of dealing with things that speaks volumes about the type of person she is. Her daughter Caitlin will look up to her Mum as the inspiration she is. In life you have to have a crack, sometimes it will work, sometimes it won’t, but the main thing is to have a go and give it your best. That’s exactly what Lisa Paton did.”
Along the way she also gave Seven the best publicity and ratings the show has ever seen.
What a champ.
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19 Responses
@thedirtydigger more like 2 cars & quite a few holidays, unless she has expensive tastes lol
@annie16, if it was a set up don’t you think the guy who ended up winning would’ve taken the 15 points for both snap shot questions instead of taking the $1500 both times.
She should have made a gracious exit at $500,000, just like Pierre did. But – as they say – pride comes before a fall! No doubt she’ll live to regret what she did for quite some time to come!
The spirit of a mad mug punter.
Two words: greedy, reckless.
sorry guys, Lisa was set up, there is no way they were giving her 1 million dollars. The winner was from Scotland, how many questions were in there about Scotland and England. I’m disappointed in Channel 7
I wonder if 7 charge advertisers the same amount when somebody is going for the million $ ?
S’he who dares (sometimes) wins.
Nobody had a gun to her head. She knew what she was risking.
I came in every day from work just inn time to see her do the final round, such a shame!
It was exciting to see her journey, gutted for her!
Gotta say that if you turn down $500,000 that could set you and your child up for life just for the chance of a million, its a huge mistake. And so it proved.
If she had won, everyone me included would have breathed a huge sigh of relief and congratulated her. I would have still remained critical though.
These game shows do use greed and risk as a key driver which isn’t always the healthiest thing…
Who can afford to gamble $423,000?
Quite silly really.
Logically no one shoud ever get the top prize in Deal or no Deal.
But logic alas –good theatre it does not make!
Good on her! $77,000 is still a good prize money I hope she doesn’t regret anything!
You can tell from last night, especially the second last round, Simon really wanted her to win
I felt totally numb, and I can only imagine how Lisa must have felt. If only she had taken the $500,000.
Seven needed some big dollar wins to finally get viewers to tune in this classic quiz show re-boot…but they were never going to want her to win a million. She really should have quit while she was way ahead. There is an element of greed here…wouldn’t have $500,000 changed her life almost as much as one million ? As for $77K she gets a new car and a two week holiday. The financial win for the Network News … Priceless.
Not true. They wanted her to win.
I was gut wrenched for her. Lisa your a true champ.
What a heartstopper that was. I’m still shocked she lost to be honest. Even the guy who won today kept apologising for beating her. Seven will be happy though, they only had to fork out $77,000 in the end and they get three nights of high ratings and great publicity for the show.