Dan Akroyd

Back in the early ’80s, a movie was released staring Dan Akroyd and Richard Prior called Trading Places. Two characters in the movie, Mortimer and Randolph Duke (played by Ralph Bellamy and Don Ameche) are wealthy commodity brokers who argue constantly over social issues, and enjoy a small wager from time to time. The $5 wager between the Mortimer brothers is that if they put the Pryor character into the right situation, he’ll rise to his new circumstances, and behave like a well-bread, educated wealthy person. On the flip side, if Winthrope has all the trappings of wealth and influence removed from him, he’ll quickly resort to a life of crime and scamming. In the end, the joke was on the Duke brothers, as Winthrope and Valentine came together to not only financial destroy the Dukes, but become rich themselves. I think Karl Rove made a similar bet some years back.