Drew Carey reveals secret about ‘Price Is Right’ contestants

Drew Carey knows if you’ve been boozing before “coming on down” to Contestants’ Row.

Carey, in an interview with TV Insider, revealed his belief that audience members on “The Price Is Right” frequently show up to the tapings a little tipsy, or even high.

“Oh, that happens here all the time,” Carey, 66, said in response to TV Insider’s Kate Hahn, who asked whether he thinks some of the contestants use a little “liquid courage” before arriving at the studio.

“They’ll have a gummy or I’ll smell alcohol on their breath. Not unusual,” Carey continued, before claiming he later learned one contestant was actually on mushrooms during his appearance.

“He was a sketch [comedy] guy,” Carey said. “I found out later when I went to UCB [sketch improv theater, United Citizens Brigade] to hang out and they were like, ‘Did you see that guy who claimed to be a skateboarding rabbi?’ I asked him what he did for a living. And he goes, ‘I’m a skateboarding rabbi.’ He didn’t think he was going to get picked, and he totally tripped.”
Drew Carey is pictured during a January 2023 taping of “The Price Is Right.” (Sonja Flemming/CBS via Getty Images)
Carey is currently wrapping up his 18th season as the host of “The Price Is Right” — a milestone that makes him the longest-tenured game host of a game show still currently on the air, TV Insider noted. (Pat Sajak previously held the title before his retirement this year.)

Carey, in the interview, also indicated that he intends to stay with the show for as long as CBS will have him and perhaps even break Sajak’s record for the longest-running host of any game show.

The contestants, he added, are a big part of why he enjoys the gig and hopes to continue hosting.

“Regular people are more interesting than celebrities. Honestly,” Carey said. “They’ve all had their own problems to overcome and their own demons, to get their own special lives. I learn more from them than I do from anybody.”
Drew Carey interacts with the audience while taping the 52nd season premiere of “The Price Is Right” in August 2023. (Sonja Flemming/CBS via Getty Images)
It also doesn’t hurt that “The Price Is Right” is a positive atmosphere, according to Carey. It’s largely because he — along with everyone in the audience, and everyone watching at home — is rooting for the contestants to win, he said.

“It’s not my money — it’s CBS’s money, and we’re all trying to take it together,” he joked.

“The Price Is Right,” which airs on CBS, is nearing the end of its 52nd season, with its final new episodes scheduled through early July. The show’s current iteration, which debuted in 1972, was originally hosted by Bob Barker before Carey took over hosting duties in 2007.