Jeopardy! Post-Alex Discussion Post

[BonusShell]

At what point to members of the public own their decision to read more into things than were there? And what should Sony have done about what to call them? Guest hosts seems absolutely fitting.

And I don’t think Burton was a candidate. This is harsh, but if they’re looking at someone who might have a very long run should the show be so fortunate, then they need to look a bit younger.

I've already indicated that there are some people who are choosing to read into things that may or may not have been there. With all due respect, you seem to be doing much the same in your tireless defenses of the Richards selection, with retorts ranging from assuming that person X or person Y was not contractually able to be permanent host to indicating that Jeopardy! was looking for somebody whose age would permit them to host the show for a very long time.

At this point, we should just agree to disagree about how the hosting selection process was conducted as well as its outcome.

[Mr. Weatherman]

I’ve updated the thread title from “Jeopardy To Resume Taping On 11/30 With Interim Guest Hosts” to “Jeopardy! Post-Alex Discussion Post,” as this thread remains active nearly a year later with 11/30 coming back around in a few months. Just wanting to get ahead of any possible confusion.

[PatrickRox80]

At what point to members of the public own their decision to read more into things than were there? And what should Sony have done about what to call them? Guest hosts seems absolutely fitting.

The general public has lives outside of Jeopardy! so assuming they’re going to know every detail about the hosting process is expecting a lot. Stop resorting to putting words into casual viewers’ mouths. If some of them want Mike, so be it. But don’t assume they’re all going to be fine with how Sony handled things.

[Axl]

*In regards to why a person's preferred choice didn't get the job, a common response I've read on social media (including message boards) is that Guest Host X might have had contractual obligations that prevented him or her from being the full-time Jeopardy! host. Perhaps that is true for a small subset of the guest hosts, but who really believes that this was the case for the lion's share of the 16 people who auditioned? (Unless, of course, a lot of what was going on weren't genuine auditions to begin with.)

I totally believe that. Many of the guest hosts were in the TV news business, and most of them host daily programs. That's not a situation where you can just schedule everything around Jeopardy! and block-tape your own work at another time. WWtBaM and the Today show gave Meredith Vieira every possible accommodation, yet the game show still had to have a few fill-ins nearly every season.

And that's when the Today show and WWtBaM were produced only about a dozen blocks from each other. You really think Anderson Cooper or Robin Roberts are going to fly from NY to LA and back to do 230 episodes of J! every year? Between taping and travel, that would eat up four days of their week, two or three weeks a month for about eight months of the year. There's just no way.

There are some game shows whose production has been built around the host's schedule... Pyramid with Dick Clark, and most notably Family Feud with Steve Harvey. Wheel of Fortune might be able to do it one day. But that's not practical for Jeopardy! They have to create 740 clues for every taping week, each of which must be meticulously fact-checked. They can't just cram a few shows' worth of material at the last second because of scheduling issues with an actor or journalist who is the daily host.

And unlike most other game shows, J! has returning champions who are cast from around the country. It would be very difficult to consistently bring returning champions back on short notice. What would the host say? "Matt isn't able to join us today to defend his championship because I just got cast in a movie that shoots next month, and we had to reschedule three weeks of tapings, and that didn't give Matt enough lead time to travel back... so here we are."

[pricefan18]

There are some game shows whose production has been built around the host's schedule... Pyramid with Dick Clark, and most notably Family Feud with Steve Harvey. Wheel of Fortune might be able to do it one day. But that's not practical for Jeopardy! They have to create 740 clues for every taping week, each of which must be meticulously fact-checked. They can't just cram a few shows' worth of material at the last second because of scheduling issues with an actor or journalist who is the daily host.

Match Game in the 70's did it too I think you could say, given Gene Rayburn would fly out from New York what twice a month to record 10 to 12 shows depending on the time period between daytime and nighttime shows over a weekend? And they had no summer break at least in the 7x era, so they were doing some 250/260 new shows a year. But that too woulda been much easier to pull off than Jeopardy would be for sure, even with the addition of needing 12 celebrities all told for use on both days of taping.

[BonusShell]

I totally believe that. Many of the guest hosts were in the TV news business, and most of them host daily programs. That's not a situation where you can just schedule everything around Jeopardy! and block-tape your own work at another time. WWtBaM and the Today show gave Meredith Vieira every possible accommodation, yet the game show still had to have a few fill-ins nearly every season.

And that's when the Today show and WWtBaM were produced only about a dozen blocks from each other. You really think Anderson Cooper or Robin Roberts are going to fly from NY to LA and back to do 230 episodes of J! every year? Between taping and travel, that would eat up four days of their week, two or three weeks a month for about eight months of the year. There's just no way.

There are some game shows whose production has been built around the host's schedule... Pyramid with Dick Clark, and most notably Family Feud with Steve Harvey. Wheel of Fortune might be able to do it one day. But that's not practical for Jeopardy! They have to create 740 clues for every taping week, each of which must be meticulously fact-checked. They can't just cram a few shows' worth of material at the last second because of scheduling issues with an actor or journalist who is the daily host.

And unlike most other game shows, J! has returning champions who are cast from around the country. It would be very difficult to consistently bring returning champions back on short notice. What would the host say? "Matt isn't able to join us today to defend his championship because I just got cast in a movie that shoots next month, and we had to reschedule three weeks of tapings, and that didn't give Matt enough lead time to travel back... so here we are."

I'm not sure how much Alex himself was involved in writing the clues, but Jeopardy! obviously has always had a full-time staff devoted to clue writing. I do recall reading that Alex had the final say in determining whether a response was correct or not, but I'm guessing that authority was given to him only because he had been at Jeopardy! for many years. Since Mike is also the EP, it's a safe bet that he'll now have the final say when such disputes arise, not only on the shows he hosts, but also on the episodes hosted by Mayim.

I've tried to be fair in my analysis of the hosting selection process, and the fact that Mike was essentially the only candidate with the authority to settle contestants' objections was certainly a factor favorable to him. More broadly speaking, the selection of Richards means that Sony gets to save costs by having the same individual serve as EP and host.

I will have to respectfully disagree with your analysis about a potential heavy burden arising as it relates to clue writing. Even if Jeopardy! selected a host who lived in the NY area, I would figure that the show's full-time, behind-the-scenes staff would still have plenty of time to write and fact-check clues far in advance of tapings. If the host had to be an integral part of this process, then he or she could do this portion of the job remotely.

Match Game in the 70's did it too I think you could say, given Gene Rayburn would fly out from New York what twice a month to record 10 to 12 shows depending on the time period between daytime and nighttime shows over a weekend? And they had no summer break at least in the 7x era, so they were doing some 250/260 new shows a year. But that too woulda been much easier to pull off than Jeopardy would be for sure, even with the addition of needing 12 celebrities all told for use on both days of taping.

If I'm not mistaken, I believe that Gene Rayburn lived in Cape Cod, Massachusetts instead of New York during the 1970s. However, I did not know that that many shows of Match Game were produced each year back then, so I appreciate that bit of information.

While candidates residing in the Los Angeles area no doubt had an advantage in the hosting selection process, it would not have been an insurmountable obstacle for an East Coast-based individual to fly to LA every three or four weeks or so and then spend three or four days taping five episodes a day. And I'm honestly not sure if the logistics of bringing back returning champions (in such a scenario) would be materially more difficult than the issues Match Game faced in recruiting and retaining celebrities.

[Roadgeek Adam]

Alex went over all the puzzles, making diacritic marks, notes to discuss at the meeting before taping etc. He had quite a say in how clues were written, even if he wasn't the writer.

[SeaBreeze341]

And I think that was important for Trebek to have some input as it relates to the clues on the show.   Whatever makes him feel comfortable; kind of like Drew Carey and TPIR.  You have to operate in a way that best fits the host and face of a show.  Not to compare Alex to Drew Carey given one had been with the show for a long time while the other hasn't yet (but has lasted on one program longer than most people in gameshow history).

In terms of recruiting & retaining celebrities for Match Game, fortunately the number was closer to 8 or 9 and not all the way to 12 for the most part at least, but still a tall task.

I agree with BonusShell that it would not have been a big deal to have someone travel from one coast to the other every 3-4 weeks.  FWIW, Michael Strahan travels from coast to coast weekly, and while everyone's different, I don't think it would've been a big deal.  Possibly a factor within the final decisions, but I still feel that Sony selected the best people (or who they feel was the best candidate or candidates) for the job.

I'm not going to bet on Mike Richards prep matching Trebek, at least for the start.  I feel that he'll have his own routine on how to prepare.  It's something that'll take a fairly long time before he can be Mike Richards the "star" of Jeopardy.  Fortunately for Richards, as the EP, he'll have a say by default, in addition to being the host

[imhomerjay]

Setting aside any individual’s personal preferences (like family considerations) for taking a bicoastal job, and that Strahan’s NFL commitment is fewer weeks than Jeopardy, to have the likes of an Anderson Cooper or Robin Roberts do that is impractical. News breaks on weekends and travel is required to get to breaking stories. The networks have invested heavily in their personalities and those obligations (and contracts) are the first priority. CNN for instance did not invest in building the AC360 brand to have him unavailable if a news story breaks on a weekend. Never mind the disruption to the taping schedules.

[BillyGr]

One might also think that, had a host been selected that wasn't able to devote as much time to the show as Alex did, someone like Ken (already being involved behind the scenes) might have been able to do those pre-show tasks (like reviewing the games), with the host just coming in for the actual tapings.  Truthfully, that could still happen, depending on how involved Mike stays in production for both shows.

If they tape 5 shows in a day, a full week would allow for over a month's worth.  So a month of straight tapings would cover something like 110 shows (depends on how many weekdays in the month - close to 1/2 a season).

It definitely would be different, but not impossible to prep and have ready to go enough shows to tape the season in a couple long blocks - that would have been for someone like a sports player, where they could tape Sept-Feb early in the summer and then March-July in February, to fit around a season.

[imhomerjay]

Not sure it would be wise or practical to upend everything else that goes into the production for that kind of schedule. Perhaps not even possible for this season if the staff lacked the time to adjust.

[Axl]

I will have to respectfully disagree with your analysis about a potential heavy burden arising as it relates to clue writing. Even if Jeopardy! selected a host who lived in the NY area, I would figure that the show's full-time, behind-the-scenes staff would still have plenty of time to write and fact-check clues far in advance of tapings. If the host had to be an integral part of this process, then he or she could do this portion of the job remotely.

I'm not saying that the host needs to have any role at all in writing the clues. I'm talking about the production schedule, about which many articles have been written over the years. Clue writers work five days a week on a more or less year-round schedule because there is so much material to produce. But on taping days, they have to put that work aside because the writers and researchers are needed to assist in the judging and adjudication of disputes. That's one of the reasons they only tape two days a week... they can't afford to tie up the writers for days on end without risking running behind.

Obviously, they have a marginal amount of wiggle room to reschedule tapings, as they did during Alex's illness and some of the guest hosts. But they would really have to rethink their whole production process in order to accommodate a schedule as loose as Steve Harvey's, who has been known to tape upwards of 25 episodes in a week so he would also have time to do his talk show, his radio show, and all his other commitments.

I do recall reading that Alex had the final say in determining whether a response was correct or not, but I'm guessing that authority was given to him only because he had been at Jeopardy! for many years. Since Mike is also the EP, it's a safe bet that he'll now have the final say when such disputes arise, not only on the shows he hosts, but also on the episodes hosted by Mayim.

Alex had input, but Harry Friedman had the final say during his tenure, subject to the advice of the legal and compliance departments. I once personally witnessed him overrule Alex after a lengthy discussion.

I assume Mike has had final say since he took over, but I'm curious as to whether that may change with him as host. For legal reasons, it's generally a "best practice" to separate the host as much as practical from behind-the-scenes decisions that affect the outcome for contestants.

[C8]

Well that didn't last long. Mike has quit after a whole litany of offensive remarks came to light:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/20/media/jeopardy-mike-richards-steps-down/index.html

Mike has shot some episodes but guest hosts are to now resume.

[mrbrown2195]

Mike has shot some episodes but guest hosts are to now resume.

The real question is: do those episodes see the light of day?

[Torgo]

Good riddance, scumbag.