![]() And while his career in broadcasting was long and included other game shows before Jeopardy!, how many other game show hosts boast a similar eclecticism of interests? This air of scholarship-which could sometimes be mistaken for pomposity if you didn’t watch the show often enough-contributed to the show’s frequent bursts of comedy, as when Trebek, in reading a clue, had to quote rap or rock lyrics that he was clearly unfamiliar with (and if you think in these cases he didn’t realize the joke was on him, you’re wrong).įor all its celebration of learning the show could often be quite funny, because Trebek himself was funny. ![]() But while attending the University of Ottawa he was a member of the English Debating Society, graduating with a degree in philosophy. Did he know as much as he seemed to? No, because nobody knows everything. But none of this would matter nearly as much with someone other than Trebek at the podium, a host who, among his many other virtues, seemed to be as smart as the clues it was his job to read. There is no part of the show that could not be done from your couch, aside from literally buzzing in. In addition, it’s one of the few game shows in which the home viewer could reasonably pretend to be a full participant. Some of it has to do with the show itself: Jeopardy! can be very suspenseful, partly due to the amount of money that could be won by its smartest and best contestants (see the jaw-dropping runs of victory by the show’s most famous champions, Ken Jennings and James Holzhauer). Lots of people in media and entertainment hold the same job for as long or longer but do not enjoy this kind of loyalty from their fans. If that sounds dramatic to you, consider the fact that Trebek inspires this emotional response not merely by virtue of having done this particular job for so long. Since news of Trebek’s death broke just a few hours ago, social media has been filled with people mourning him, and the absence they’re already feeling. As the disease progressed, then retreated, then returned, Trebek hosted the game show-perhaps the last, at least in the United States, that specifically rewarded intelligence and erudition-with the same grace, smoothness (his facility with the pronunciation of seemingly any word in any language was staggering, if you stopped for a minute to think about it), sympathy, humor, and even taste for gently ribbing contestants who have guessed poorly, as he ever had.Īnne Applebaum discusses a ray of hope in Europe with the defeat of Poland’s authoritarian… Yet despite all this-the cancer, the painful treatment, even the suicidal thoughts-Alex Trebek continued to host Jeopardy! And even though every one of the show’s millions of fans knew what he was dealing with, they only knew because they knew, because he told them, and not because you could tell by watching him. That’s the responsibility that has bothered me.” And then he did this negative thing.’ So, yeah. “‘Well, hell, he was telling us to be positive. He just got too discouraged,’” the quiz show host says in an interview from his office. “You can’t be telling people ‘Keep your chin up, fight on!’ and then all of a sudden you counter that by: ‘What happened to Trebek?’ ‘Oh, he killed himself. Through it all, he was very candid about the physical pain and psychological toll, recently telling the Los Angeles Times that occasionally he was so discouraged that he felt suicidal. Trebek, born in Sudbury, Ontario, in 1940, passed away this morning after a nearly two-year battle with pancreatic cancer, one of the most hideous and hateful forms of that hideous and hateful disease. ![]() This is entirely because Alex Trebek has hosted the current iteration of the show (earlier versions aired in the ’60s and ’70s) since its debut in 1984. The habit of watching Jeopardy!, the iconic quiz show that required its contestants to answer “clues” in the form of a question, has been with me for just about my whole life, and though certain things about it have changed-some rules have been tweaked, the set and answer board have been upgraded to the latest game show set style and answer board technology-it has always felt, in the best way, like the same show. So as I’m sure you can appreciate, this crisis was no joke. ![]() There was a certain urgency to this, because Jeopardy! was on in less than an hour. So, largely at the behest of my mother, though without objection from anyone else, a small selection of my family went out and bought a new TV. Many, many years ago-I’m going to say sometime in the early ’90s, possibly even the late ’80s-on a week night, my family was settling in for our evening routine when our television, a gigantic tube monstrosity, blinked out.
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