What to watch
It’s the McDonald’s promotion that seems to guarantee a spike in sales every year. Forget chocolate-covered sundaes, McRiblets or Spicy McNuggets, the company’s annual Monopoly competition has become ingrained in popular culture, with families and individuals increasing their frequency and spend in a desperate bid to win prizes. But what if someone found a way to rig the game?
That’s the question at the heart of HBO’s new true-crime documentary series, McMillions, which begins screening on Sky TV’s Soho and Neon on Tuesday (February 4) at 9.30pm. Told over six, hour-long instalments, it details how a small FBI office uncovered a scam that meant there had been almost no legitimate winners of the high-value rewards for more than a decade.
The first surprise for most viewers will be how long the family board game-inspired stickercollection competition has been running – it made its debut in 1987.
The second is how it survived this near 20-year-old scandal and has expanded worldwide, while still running in pretty much the same format.
The third, and most important, is how a setup as potentially bland as the company’s products could be so juicy and compelling.
The key here are the characters involved. Co-creators James Lee Hernandez and Brian Lazarte (Katy Perry: Part of Me) have done a brilliant job gathering the significant players and then letting them have their say – with often hilarious results.
Top of that list is FBI agent Doug Matthews. He had just arrived at Jacksonville, Florida’s sleepy FBI agency – where healthcare fraud was their boring bread-and-butter – when he spied a note attached to veteran Rick Dent’s computer. It simply read: ‘‘Monopoly game fraud.’’
Persuading his partner to share some details, Matthews was instantly hooked by the news that someone had tipped them off that three of the games’ previous million-dollar winners were related. With approval from their superiors, they began doing a little digging, but quickly hit a dead end.
That’s when they, somewhat reluctantly, approached McDonald’s, suggesting it would be in their interests to send a person down to see them. The global fast-food corporation sent three. If what was presented wasn’t potentially jawdropping enough, Matthews decided to show up to the meeting in a gold suit.
Some in the company instantly wanted to drop the game, however they were persuaded against that and agreed to work with the FBI on Operation Final Answer (having rejected alternative titles such as Operation Unhappy Meals and Fallen Arches). So when casino pit boss Michael Hoover came forward to claim his $1m instant prize, complete with an amazing tale to tell of how he struck it lucky, Matthews and his colleagues were ready to strike.
Joining forces with McDonald’s usual promotions team, the Walter Mitty-George Costanza-esque Matthews posed as a commercial director to gain Hoover’s trust and start their surveillance. The payoff was almost immediate, but it turned out Hoover was the tip of the iceberg.
A kind of Argo-meets-The-Imposter by way of Super Size Me, McMillions is an enthralling thriller, which should more than satisfy fans of true crime, while not containing any of the genre’s usual stomach-churning grisly details.