Spelling bee moves into prime time

An author said participants succeed in their careers and lives.
SACRAMENTO BEE
Pardon the cheap pun, but it's too irresistible to avoid:
There's a huge buzz about this week's Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Once merely a cerebral exercise for word nerds, the bee and its reality-show-type drama have become a cultural phenomenon that transcends mere spelling. A Broadway musical revolves around a spelling bee ("The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee"). A new film, "Akeelah and the Bee," is in theaters. Novels ("Bee Season") and documentaries ("Spellbound") continue to do well.
And, for the first time, youngsters will display their orthographic chops live in prime time on ABC, with preliminary rounds, as usual, on ESPN.
Here's the scoop
So, what's the attraction? We quizzed James Maguire, author of the new book "American Bee" (Rodale Books, $24.95), about all things bee.
Q. In this age of spell-check, are spelling skills just for the elite? A lost art?
A. Spell-check is a surprisingly fallible tool. Certainly, spelling has gotten very casual. But the bar for important communication remains high for spelling correctly.
Q. What's the appeal of the bee? Can we credit reality shows for it?
A. It really is a reality TV show. You go round-by-round and you get to know the contestants because they walk up to the microphone and you see their little quirks. Then they get eliminated. Finally, you're down to the last two, like ("American Idol's") Taylor Hicks and Katharine McPhee. There's so much drama in that moment.
Q. You write about the bee having a Norman Rockwell type of image. But Norman Rockwell probably didn't imagine prime-time coverage on ABC. Has the bee become too corporate?
A. It has changed. Look back even to the '80s; it was still kind of a gentle, slow-moving competition. At one point, decades back, they even had a practice round and had no time limit. Now, it's very controlled.
Q. Having spent time with top competitors, what's the most important trait they shared?
A. The broad thing is sheer determination. They spend so many hours studying after school, drilling and understanding word roots. The more narrow thing is, it tends to be a person interested in details. Spellers tend to be more analytical, into math and science. It's a word competition, so you think they'd all want to grow up to be writers and poets.
Q. When you talked to past winners, you write about how they turn out. You've got Harvard students, Fulbright scholars, lawyers and doctors. Did you find any who were in jail or homeless or something?
A. I wasn't able to find someone with a colorful drug addiction or who played with guns.
Q. So it's not like child movie stars who go bad once they grow up?
A. Not only are they good studiers, which will make them successful, these generally are people who live the straight and narrow. It's not a wild bunch, to be sure.