"High Stakes Poker" (2006) TV series

Director:

Brian Lockwood

Seasons:

4

Release Date:

16 January 2006 (USA)

Genre:

Sport

Plot:

A televised poker cash game in which top pros including Sam Farha, Doyle Brunson, and Johnny Chan compete. This is not a tournament however, each player is playing with their own money and they have the option to buy in again.

Cast

A.J. Benza	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
Doyle Brunson	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
Sam Farha	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
Gus Hansen	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
Phil Hellmuth Jr.	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
Gabe Kaplan	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
Daniel Negreanu	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)
David Williams	...	Himself (1 episode, 2007)

Runtime:

60 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Trivia:

The biggest pot in the show's history ($575,700), occurred between Gus Hansen and Daniel Negreanu. When Gus' 5d 5cl outdrew Daniel's 6sp 6h on a board of 9cl 6d 5h 5sp 8sp. Giving Daniel a full house, sixes full of fives. And Gus four of a kind (quads).

One level for all to watch and learn: $300/$600 blinds with $100 antes

Players of the Vegas biggest cash games get the opportunity to show us what poker is really about. With all the TV tournaments these days poker has build up an audience and hordes of new players buying in the big events to shoot the Upper Class of Poker so it's becoming increasingly difficult for the pros to reach a final table.

Before they had endorsement deals that require them to take care of their media exposure pros were playing big cash games 90% of their time, so at last we got a decent idea of what it is to be a poker pro. $100k minimum buy-in (Daniel Negreanu brought directly $1m to ignite season 1 as he would lose half of it at some point), $50k minimum rebuy, lots of big sharks knowing each other and a couple of lost fishes just trying not to look too bad on camera: this certainly lacks the drama of a tournament with elimination rounds but it is how poker is really played by the best players in the world, i.e. those making a living off their skills, day in day out, month in month out.

It all started at the top with Season 1 but Season 2 was somewhat one cut below: directing and photography lost the focus on the action, too much was made in the editing room about the side talks and the background cameos (really terrible idea to bring out the player's mums). Also the camouflaged cameras where too obvious in the frames so let's say it was a matter of production values loosened by some sitcom production executive. Anyway the commentary by Gabe Kaplan is still the best part of it, even when action slows down: it precisely describes the action thru analyzing what is going on in the players' heads, it's light and funny, daring to make fun of the players and above all it perfectly blends in the action, never overlapping it.