The Squarest of Them All?

Piao Sam (or "Pi," as he likes to be called), a 25-year-old tax accountant from Lorton, can add a celebrity element to his resume: He's vying for $250,000 as a contestant on the third season of "Beauty and the Geek."

Sam traveled by bus to New York for the April 30 audition and was thrilled to learn he'd made the cut as one of eight geeks.

"I was beside myself. I couldn't believe it -- well, actually I could, knowing who I am," he said with a laugh.

The third season of CW's unscripted brains-meets-beauty series pairs eight academically challenged women and eight socially awkward guys into teams of two. The pairs lived together in a California mansion over the summer, where they competed in tasks that tested intellectual and social skills.

Sam was teamed with Sheree, a former Hooters waitress from Florida, to compete for the grand prize. "She really impressed me, not just with how attractive she is, but with how intelligent she is," Sam said. "You wouldn't expect that from someone with the tagline 'a beauty, not a scholar.' "

In the two-hour season premiere, the female contestants must find library books organized under the Dewey Decimal System. The male contestants face their own challenge: Each is armed with sunscreen and must find a stranger to help apply it.

"Beauty and the Geek" is the brainchild of executive producers Ashton Kutcher and Jason Goldberg, whose penchant for social experiments began with their 2003 MTV series "Punk'd."

As in past episodes, the season premiere features its fair share of stereotypes -- for instance, the geeks arrive on scooters and the dimwitted beauties struggle through a TV interview. But there are surprises as well, and Kutcher's trademark "all in good fun" attitude materializes in plenty of feel-good moments.

Sam must keep mum on how the show turns out. But, win or lose, he said some of those feel-good moments resonated as much with him as they do with viewers.

And his fondest memory? "Whenever I was in the hot tub, that was my favorite part."

-- Holly E. Thomas

BEAUTY AND THE GEEK

Season 3

premiere

Wednesday

8 p.m., CW