The technology and personnel that help overcome the language barrier were not the most challenging part of putting “É campeão” together, Costa said. That honor goes to the negotiations and continuing care of the panelists.

“It was hard to make the agreements,” he said, standing in the studio on a recent night. “There were a lot of different questions to answer. Which airline? ‘I love American Airlines.’ ‘I love Delta.’ ‘I love United.’ Then when they get here, you need a driver for each one. We have two producers who just make sure they are comfortable. The room is good. The cable TV works. We have to make them happy people.”

While Costa was talking, the panelists trickled in. Spitz reached the studio first. His mustache is long gone (“Sometime in the ’80s, got tired of it”), and his hair is bushy and gray. Wearing a dark blue sport jacket, khakis and sneakers, he came across as a very fit college professor and gave answers that were far closer to lectures than sound bites.

Asked what he had been up to these many decades, he started out with a description of his family and his licensing company, then segued into his lengthy résumé as an entrepreneur. Then he plunged into a detailed discussion of “convertible debentures.”

“It’s basically a fancy word for ‘loan,’” he said. About two minutes into this somewhat technical lesson in high finance, it was pointed out that the conversation was a bit in the weeds.

“What I’m trying to tell you,” he said, “is that at the end of the day, that was my passion!”

Convertible debentures?