Trade Your Way To The USA

So you've written a movie script and are trying to line up the funding to get it made.

Except your movie has no violence, no special effects, no explosions and nobody who takes their clothes off. And what does it have? Singing? Dancing? Cheesy backdrops?

And what's the plot again? Some creepy old guy tries to teach some pretty young woman how to speak properly, while her father tries to use this is a way to cash in?

And you expect to get this project going? Fat chance.

Which is a shame, because in 1964, this movie won eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor (Rex Harrison, as the creepy old guy better known as Henry Higgins).

The movie, of course, was "My Fair Lady," and it will always rank among TigerBlog's favorite.

"My Fair Lady" is set in London, a city that TB has never set foot in, located in a country that TB likewise has never visited. The closest he's come is Ireland, and history suggests that that is not really the same.

TB has seen any number of movies that make London (and England, for that matter) seem as familiar as New York (a city that TB has been to), from musicals like "My Fair Lady" and "Oliver" and "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" to Monty Python comedies to classic dramas like "Mrs. Miniver.

Of course, being an American, TigerBlog lives in a country that goes way back with the British, starting with "No Taxation Without Representation" and the Revolution and the War of 1812 and then, switching pages, as BFFs for the last 196 years (the War of 1812 didn't end until 1814). And hey, even "The Star Spangled Banner" came from the War of 1812.

Yes, it was a rocky start between the two, but you're going to have that when, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands that have connected them to another.

British Airways used to make fun of that history when it had an ad campaign featuring Robert Morley, who would implore Americans to visit England by saying: "do come home; all is forgiven."

Maybe it's the centuries of history, or maybe it's the impact that the English have had on this country and its development and culture. Hey, the Beatles alone are reason enough to love the English.

Or maybe it's just the accents. In "My Fair Lady" alone, you have Rex Harrison and Audrey Hepburn (who, by the way, was born in Holland) and their inflections.

When TB first got the voicemail asking about the possibility of incorporating the Princeton-Brown football game into a British children's version of "The Apprentice," the first thing TB noticed was the accents. A British accent always makes everything sound so much more formal and important.

Anyway, after much back-and-forth between the powers that be, it was determined that in fact the show could be held here. And so Saturday, during Princeton-Brown football, Princeton Stadium will host the final two teams of three English kids ages 12-14.

The show is part of the CBBC, which is the children's BBC, or the English equivalent of PBS Kids.

The show is called "Trade Your Way To The USA," and it started with a group of 14 teams of three each, who have been competing towards the grand prize of coming to this country for the final.

TB has never seen "The Apprentice," but as he understands it, there are teams competing in different business models. The same holds true for "Trade Your Way," where the kids have been all over England in different contests to see who could sell the most of whatever that week's product was.

And now, the six kids have made their way to this country. They've been around New York City, and they'll be heading to Princeton tomorrow, where they'll film with the band, the cheerleaders and head coach Bob Surace.

The contact person from the BBC sends emails in which she refers to Frist as "the canteen" and spells "realize" with an "s" instead of a "z." In all of TB's dealings with the BBC, nobody's ever referred to the game; instead, it's always the match.

And what will they be doing during the match?

Hawking cookies, candy and the like. Two teams. Three kids. Who can sell the most?

At Princeton-Brown football Saturday.

It figures to be jolly good stuff.