INSPIRATIONAL
TAKING A CHANCE
Although Allen and Polly Stottlemire are relatively new to Port St. Lucie, they brought big ideas for helping others when they moved to their “paradise.”
Couple wins big on game shows
and in the game of life
BY ELLEN GILLETTE
Polly Stottlemire had just one wish for her 50th birthday:
to be on a special mash-up version of The Price Is
Right and Let’s Make a Deal. Again.
In 1998, she and her daughter, Samantha, had
spent a week in Los Angeles where Polly was a contestant
on The Price Is Right, but didn’t win. Samantha was chosen
for Let’s Make a Deal but was zonked after picking a door that
had something worthless behind it.
Game show interviewers look for people with personality.
People who are so happy it borders on the obnoxious. A former
cheerleading coach, Polly is naturally enthusiastic. But
when she told her husband, Allen, about her birthday wish,
he was the opposite.
Business hadn’t taken off yet. The Maryland transplants
were renovating their Loxahatchee home. Their kitchen was
ANTHONY INSWASTY
such a disaster they were temporarily using a wash basin in
the backyard.
Anticipating push-back, Polly pulled out plane tickets. In
May 2016, they were the second couple in line at the television
studio. Each time someone else was called in, however,
the odds for their standby tickets grew slimmer.
“We were the last two people to get on,” she says.
DISAPPOINTING CHOICE
Game shows have a rigorous screening and interview
process, but Polly didn’t leave her chances to chance. She
instructed Allen what to say so they’d select her. Expecting
Allen to promote her, her own interview was subdued.
Allen shakes his head at the memory.
“I blew it,” he said. “I was so wound up by that time, I >>
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