Now that you mention it, this is a very interesting suggestion.
Going strictly by elapsed time, they’re overdue: the new version of the game started in 1984, and the scores were doubled in 2001. However, according to this online calculator, the value of a 1984 dollar in 2001 was $1.70. The value of a 2001 dollar today is only $1.53, and a 1984 dollar is only $2.61.
So if the prizes are only keeping pace with inflation, it shouldn’t happen now. But you’re right that it certainly would attract interest and attention. I think it would be a great idea.
They do have to pay that money out though. How much does Jeopardy! make?
The average winning score is about $20,000, according to many sources I Googled just now. Doubling the take home jacks that up to $40,000. How much does that impact the show’s profitability? I know they’ve been handing out big bucks to charity but my understanding is they don’t plan on doing that forever.
You know that we’re not all in your head, right? So an allusion or movie reference or whatever that may seem obvious to you may mean nothing to everyone else. I usually ignore such weirdness but don’t think that everyone remembers a movie quote that you do.
I think it’s hugely profitable. What they pay out is probably a rounding error on their balance sheet. Alex made $10,000,000 per year (for essentially part time work) (Pat Sajak reportedly makes $12M per year).
That headline is funny, it seems to me if they’re really Jeopardy! fans, they’ll know who Mike Richards is just because of his time in front of the camera plus the speculation of who the new host will be…
How much you want to bet that adding Mayim Bialik as a “specials and to-be-determined spinoff series” host was a last minute swerve due to the press over Richards’ discrimination and harassment lawsuits?
After the death of the longtime “Jeopardy!” host Alex Trebek, the game show has decided that it will take not one — but two — people to fill his shoes: Mike Richards, the show’s executive producer, will become its new regular host and the actress Mayim Bialik will take over for prime time specials.
As the show’s executive producer, Richards already has one of the top roles on the program and has been involved in strategizing how to keep the show going past the Trebek era.
“Never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined being chosen to step into a role of this magnitude,” he said in a news release.
“A senior group of Sony Pictures Television executives pored over footage from every episode, reviewed research from multiple panels and focus groups, and got valuable input from our key partners and ‘Jeopardy!’ viewers,” Ravi Ahuja, a Sony executive, said in the release.
In an email to “Jeopardy!” staff that the show released to the media earlier this week, Richards — who was the host of a reality show called “Beauty and the Geek” — wrote that he was “humbled and deeply honored” when he was asked if he would consider hosting the show.
“The choice on this is not my decision and never has been,” Richards wrote. “Alex always believed the game itself and the contestants are the most important aspects of the show.”
In his note, Richards also addressed an employment lawsuit against “The Price Is Right” when he was an executive producer, a controversy that resurfaced online when his name was floated for the host position. In 2010, one of the game show’s former models, Brandi Cochran, filed a pregnancy discrimination lawsuit against the show, CBS and others, saying that after she revealed she was pregnant, she was repeatedly taken out of acts she would have appeared in before and was denied the chance to return to work after she took maternity leave.According to the lawsuit, after Cochran revealed on air that she had been carrying twins, Richards put his face in his hands and said to her, “Twins? Are you serious? … You’re serious?” The case went to trial and the jury sided with Cochran, awarding her about $8.5 million, but the decision was later overturned and a judge ordered a new trial. The sides ultimately settled in 2016.
Richards wrote in his note to “Jeopardy!” staff, “The way in which my comments and actions have been characterized in these complaints does not reflect the reality of who I am or how we worked together on ‘The Price Is Right.’”
He added, “I would not say anything to disrespect anyone’s pregnancy and have always supported my colleagues on their parenting journeys.”
Well crap. Totally disappointing choices for me. I know this shouldn’t bother me that much considering I wasn’t a big Trebek fan. His mid game interviews were painful to watch sometimes. Thank god for fast forward.
They couldn’t pick one of the people that wasn’t involved in two harassment suits?
Not really fond of Mayim Bialik either, but she was definitely the best woman out of the bunch.
I think I see less Jeopardy! in my future. I’m pretty sure I haven’t missed an episode since in came back on the air.
I suspect the actual truth is more mundane - that Richards simply tested better with the show’s traditional, core audience (in other words, the white male who looks and sounds like a game show host.) Then, aware of how disappointed every non-core fan would react, they found something for the person who was the least like Mike Richards.
