[msb-alumni] Alex Trebek, Beloved Jeopardy Host, Dies at 80 on November 8, 2020 Articles

From: Steve <pipeguy920@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <msb-alumni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 2020 18:54:18 -0500

BlankAlex Trebek, Beloved Jeopardy Host, Dies at 80 on November 8, 2020

Los Angeles -- Alex Trebek, who presided over the beloved quiz show Jeopardy!
for more than
30 years with dapper charm and a touch of school-master strictness, died
Sunday. He was 80.
Trebek, who announced in 2019 that he had advanced pancreatic cancer , died at
his
California home, surrounded by family and friends, Jeopardy! studio Sony said.
"Jeopardy! is saddened to share that Alex Trebek passed away peacefully at home
early this
morning, surrounded by family and friends. Thank you, Alex."
pic.twitter.com/Yk2a90CHIM -
Jeopardy! (@Jeopardy) November 8, 2020

The Canadian-born host, who made a point of informing fans about his health
directly, spoke
in a calm, even tone as he revealed his illness and hope for a cure in a video
posted March
6, 2019. In the video, Trebek said he was joining the 50,000 other Americans
who receive
such a diagnosis each year and that he recognized that the prognosis was not
encouraging.
But Trebek said he intended to fight it and keep working, even joking that he
needed to beat
the disease because his Jeopardy! contract ran for three more years.

Less than a week later, he opened the show with a message acknowledging the
outpouring of
kind words and prayers he'd received.
"Thanks to the believe it or not hundreds of thousands of people who have sent
in tweets,
texts, emails, cards and letters wishing me well," Trebek said. "I'm a lucky
guy."

Jeopardy! bills itself as Americas favorite quiz show and captivated the public
with a
unique format in which contestants were told the answers and had to provide the
questions on
a variety of subjects, including movies, politics, history and popular culture.
They would
answer by saying What is ... ? or Who is .... ?

Trebek, who became its host in 1984, was a master of the format, engaging in
friendly banter
with contestants, appearing genuinely pleased when they answered correctly and,
at the same
time, moving the game along in a brisk no-nonsense fashion whenever people
struggled for
answers. He never pretended to know the answers himself if he really didnt,
deferring to the
shows experts to decide whether a somewhat vague answer had come close enough
to be counted
as correct.

"I try not to take myself too seriously," he told an interviewer in 2004. "I
don't want to
come off as a pompous ass and indicate that I know everything when I don't."

The show was the brainstorm of Juann Griffin, wife of the late talk show
host-entrepreneur
Merv Griffin, who said she suggested to him one day that he create a game show
where people
were given the answers. Jeopardy! debuted on NBC in 1964 with Art Fleming as
emcee and was
an immediate hit. It lasted until 1975, then was revived in syndication with
Trebek.

Long identified by a full head of hair and trim mustache (though in 2001 he
startled viewers
by shaving his mustache, completely on a whim), Trebek was more than qualified
for the job,
having started his game show career on "Reach for the Top" in his native
country. Moving to
the U.S. in 1973, he appeared on "The Wizard of Odds," "High Rollers," "The
$128,000
Question" and "Double Dare."

Even during his run on Jeopardy! , Trebek worked on other shows. In the early
1990s, he was
the host of three -- Jeopardy!, "To Tell the Truth" and "Classic Concentration."

Jeopardy! made him famous. He won five Emmys as its host, and received stars on
both the
Hollywood and Canadian walks of fame. In 2012, the show won a prestigious
Peabody Award.

He taped his daily Jeopardy! shows at a frenetic pace, recording as many as 10
episodes (two
weeks' worth) in just two days.

After what was described as a mild heart attack in 2007, he was back at work in
just a
month.

He posted a video in January 2018 announcing he'd undergone surgery for blood
clots on the
brain that followed a fall he'd taken. The show was on hiatus during his
recovery.

It had yet to bring in a substitute host for Trebek save once, when he and
Wheel of Fortune
host Pat Sajak swapped their TV jobs as an Aprils Fool prank.

In 2012, Trebek acknowledged that he was considering retirement, but had been
urged by
friends to stay on so he could reach 30 years on the show.
He still loved the job, he declared: "What's not to love? You have the security
of a
familiar environment, a familiar format, but you have the excitement of new
clues and new
contestants on every program. You cant beat that!"

Although many viewers considered him one of the key reasons for the shows
success, Trebek
himself insisted he was only there to keep things moving.

"I'm introduced as the host of Jeopardy! , not the star," he said in a 2012
interview. "My
job is to provide the atmosphere and assistance to the contestants to get them
to perform at
their very best," he explained. "And if I'm successful doing that, I will be
perceived as a
nice guy and the audience will think of me as being a bit of a star."

******
Alex Trebek, longtime 'Jeopardy' host and TV personality, dies at 80.

Alex Trebek, the master of trivia whose quick wit, easy smile and
my-favorite-professor
demeanor made Jeopardy! a welcome guest in the living rooms of America for
decades, has died
at his home following a battle with pancreatic cancer, per the quiz show's
Twitter account.
He was 80. The game show host had suffered a series of medical complications in
recent
years -- a heart attack in 2007 and brain surgery for blood clots that formed
after he hit
his head in a fall in 2018.

In early 2019 he revealed he had Stage 4 pancreatic cancer and vowed to beat
the disease,
joking that he still had three years left on his contract.

But there was urgency in his voice as well. "So help me," he said on a YouTube
video
announcing the diagnosis. "Keep the faith and we'll win."

Late in the summer of 2019, Trebek -- who was candid and open about his fears
and the
wrenching pain and lingering depression after undergoing rounds of chemotherapy
-- announced
that he was back at work, filming for the upcoming season.
"I'm on the mend," he said, "and that's all I can hope for."

As the cancer ebbed and then roared back again, audiences, contestants and
viewers seemed to
form a nearly familial bond with Trebek, holding up signs of support during
tapings,
donating to cancer research in his name, lining up just to cheer as he entered
the studio.

One contestant, stumped by a question on Final Jeopardy, simply wrote, "What
is, 'We love
you, Alex!" on his answer board. Trebek's eyes welled up as he softly read the
response
aloud.
"Thank you," he said.

Relentlessly academic and stodgy -- in contrast to the more high-octane game
shows of the
1980's, Jeopardy! had already been canceled once when Trebek arrived in
Hollywood in the
early 1970s.  But somehow, in his hands, the show was a natural fit, and he
drove it up the
ratings charts where it remained an early evening favorite, even as other shows
came and
went.

Trebek became such an institution that he was parodied by Will Ferrell on
Saturday Night
Live, played himself on dozens of television shows and was used as a narrative
device on
television hits such as Seinfeld. Even his theme music became an instantly
recognizable
jingle that signaled, Hurry up, time's ticking.

Born July 22, 1940, George Alexander Trebek grew up in Sudbury, Canada, in
northern Ontario
where he dreamed of becoming a hockey player. Studious as a child, Trebek
graduated from the
University of Ottawa with a degree in philosophy and became a regional
authority on the
controversial separatist movement in Quebec while working as a reporter for
Canadian
Broadcasting Corp. His ability to speak French put him at an advantage over his
colleagues.

And then, on nothing more than a whim, he tumbled into the world of television
game shows.

Telegenic and thoughtful, Trebek was put to work on regional shows including
Music Hop,
Vacation Time, Outside/Inside and the long-running Canadian quiz show Reach for
the Top.

His material caught the attention of the daytime programming czar at NBC, who
was in the
process of cleaning out daytime personalities such as Dinah Shore and Art
Fleming and any
show that fell into the dreaded fiftysomething demographic.

Jeopardy! -- then hosted by Fleming, was among the casualties.

Trebek's first assignment was to host "The Wizard of Odds," a game that
revolved around
statistical questions. When that failed to gain traction, it was shelved and
Trebek was
asked to host "High Rollers," a gambling-style game. The show was a quick hit
and spawned an
evening version, also hosted by Trebek.

But the life of a television game show is a fickle one, much like the fate of
the
contestants, and in yet another sudden housecleaning move NBC canceled High
Rollers as
audiences moved on to more frenetic scream-fests such as "Family Feud," "The
Newlywed Game"
and "The Gong Show." High Rollers was brought back briefly and then killed for
good in 1980,
in part to make room for a rising TV personality, David Letterman.

In 1984, Merv Griffin decided to revive Jeopardy! and pair it with Wheel of
Fortune in an
early evening time slot. On the advice of Lucille Ball, Griffin asked Trebek to
be the host.
And on the advice of Griffin's wife, the format of the show came with a twist
-- give the
contestants the answer, and let them puzzle out the question.

Some thought the idea sprung from the so-called quiz show scandals of the 1950s
in which
contestants were given answers or asked to throw the game. She said, "Why don't
you give
them the answers?"
And he said, "Are you crazy?"

"That's what got us in trouble with the government," Trebek explained to NPR's
Rachel Martin
in a 2016 interview. And then she said "The answer is 5,280."
He said, "How many feet are in a mile?"

That was the beginning of 'Jeopardy! Alex Trebek Alex Trebek in Las Vegas in
2000, showing
off the new Jeopardy slot machines. (Steve Marcus / Associated Press)

As the quiz show rolled through the decades, surviving upstart challengers
including "Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire" and programming shifts, Trebek remained a
comfortable fit with
audiences -- fatherly, dependable, the keeper of all questions.

In a 2014 Reader's Digest poll, Trebek ranked as the eighth-most trusted person
in the
United States, right behind Bill Gates and 51 steps above Oprah Winfrey.

At home, Trebek said, he preferred to watch the Lakers or hockey games rather
than his own
show. And on weekends he liked to drift through Home Depot, looking for
whatever gadget or
gizmo might be handy for a home improvement project.  Sometimes he and his wife
would
retreat to their lake house in Paso Robles to escape the crush of the city.

In front of the camera, Trebek at times seemed as though he'd stepped straight
from
Masterpiece Theatre. He never hugged guests, kept small talk to a minimum,
announced
categories with grave seriousness and let contestants know their fate with a
curt Correct or
No.

But during breaks, he would seemingly flip a switch and become bubbly, urging
those in the
audience to ask him questions.
"When are you going to retire?" someone in the crowd called out when a
Washington Post
reporter was watching the taping in 2016.
"When am I going to retire? Jeez. I never liked you," he joked.

"How do you prepare for every taping?" another person wondered.
"I drink," he replied. "And I'm going to do that now."

Trebek said he enjoyed hosting the show because he liked being in the company
of smart
people, those fluid enough to pivot from Samuel Taylor Coleridge to Tupac
Shakur, from the
fictional kingdom of Narnia to the Curse of the Billy Goat at Chicago's Wrigley
Field.

It remained a puzzle, though, whether Trebek was an intellectual himself,
though he was
bookish and sometimes surprised those who visited him in the dressing room when
he would
suddenly start talking about ancient Alexandria or sketch out the solar system
on a piece of
paper while talking about a book he'd recently read on the history of the
universe.

When fellow game show host Steve Harvey questioned whether Trebek was really as
smart as
viewers seemed to think he was, Trebek challenged Harvey to a trivia showdown.
Harvey never
brought the matter up again.

A lifelong insomniac, Trebek said he would often retreat to his den and read or
work on
crossword puzzles until the predawn hours, when sleep finally overtook him. He
admitted that
he was sometimes so sleep-deprived that he would nod off while stopped at a
traffic light.
"It's a scary way to live," he said.

In a typical workweek, Trebek would tape up to five shows every Tuesday and
Wednesday,
arriving at the studios around 9 a.m. and heading back to his Studio City home
a little
after 6 p.m. The schedule allowed him to spend time with his children when they
were young,
and then to travel with his wife when they were grown.

When he arrived at the studios for work, Trebek would retreat to his dressing
room and spend
several hours reviewing the 300-plus questions that researchers came up with
each taping
day, testing himself along the way.

"On average," he said, he "got 65% to 70% correct."

The hundreds of thousands of clues uttered by Trebek on Jeopardy! over the
years are
cataloged on fan websites like museum pieces, a mountain of trivia that can't
possibly be
scaled. As of January 2020, Albert Einstein had been the subject of 302
questions, the
Beatles 562 and Jupiter or its moons 319.

And perhaps only Trebek pondered each one.

"My life has been a quest for knowledge and understanding, and I am nowhere
near having
achieved that," Trebek said in a 2012 interview with The Times. "And it doesn't
bother me in
the least. I will die without having come up with the answers to many things in
life."

Trebek is survived by his wife, Jean Currivan, and two children, Matthew and
Emily.

*****

Former Jeopardy contestants from Spokane remember Alex Trebek as a "total pro".
After years
spent watching Alex Trebek on TV, local "Jeopardy! contestants said Sunday
meeting the TV
giant was like catching up with an old friend. An old friend who happened to be
beamed
nightly into millions of homes for more than three decades. It was just one of
those
experiences where you can't believe you're having your picture taken with Alex
Trebek," said
contestant Lynn Yount, after news of the longtime TV icon's death broke Sunday
morning .
It's something that's a milestone in my life. Yount, then Lynn Swanbom, won
$10,400 in her
first appearance on the show, then added another $2,000 in a second-place
finish in October
2009. At the time Swanbom was a Spokesman-Review employee.  "Jeopardy! has been
on
television for most of Yount's life after premiering in daily syndication in
1984, helping
her learn unique tidbits.  "I grew up. It has been on basically my entire life.
It was just
a fact of life that 'Jeopardy! would be on at 7. Most of the time we would tune
in," Yount
said. "I was a kid that just loved having those banks of knowledge. After years
of watching
the show, Yount decided to take the online "Jeopardy! audition test on a whim.
Not long
after, she was selected to compete. When it came time to meet the famed Trebek,
Yount said
he felt like meeting someone she had known for years.  "I'd seen him on TV a
lot and so it's
kind of this feels (like) you're shaking somebody's hand who doesn't know you
from Eve, but
you feel like you know them already," Yount said. During filming, contestants
don't have
much time to talk to Trebek, but after competing Yount watched from the
audience. While on
commercial break, Trebek answered questions from the audience and shared
stories about his
recent home improvement projects.  Yount was shocked to discover the show isn't
edited very
much, which she partially attributes to Trebek's consummate professionalism. He
was who you
see on the TV, which is very polished. He knows what he's doing and he doesn't
make very
many mistakes while doing it, Yount said. He's just so quick to handle
whatever. At least
five contestants on the show have hailed from the Spokane area. Kate Allison, a
public
defender in Spokane, competed most recently in 2019 . Nine Mile Falls resident
Staci Huffman
won $30,000 during her two appearances on the show in 2018.  Huffman remembers
recording the
show on VCR when her family would miss the 7 p.m. airtime.  "I've been watching
it since I
can remember," Huffman said.  She had taken the "Jeopardy! test multiple times,
but often
testing occurs in March. As a CPA that's Huffman's busy season.  "I just went,
'All right
I'll do it,' and that was it," Huffman said.  When it came time to film her
episodes,
Huffman said Trebek was just like she had seen on TV.  "How he is  is how he
projects
himself," Huffman said. "It just still feels very natural. Like Yount, Huffman
loved
listening to Trebek answer audience questions during commercial breaks.  "He's
so generous
with his questions," Huffman said.  After watching an entire week of filming,
Huffman said
even she knew the questions Trebek was asked the most, like which category was
his favorite.
No matter how many times Trebek had been asked any question, he would answer it
like it was
the first time, Huffman said.  While Huffman said she has been bracing for
Trebek's death,
it was still a sad to find out he had died. Since then she said she has been
thinking about
how "Jeopardy! will live on.  "There will be a distinctive line," Huffman said.
"It's kind
of like a distinctive family that's going to have this new experience without
Alex. Huffman
said she hopes Ken Jennings, owner of the longest winning-streak on "Jeopardy!
at 74
matches, , takes the reins. Jennings, a native of Edmonds, Washington, tweeted
a photo of
himself and Trebek taken on one of his appearances on the show . "Alex wasn't
just the best
ever at what he did," Jennings, who joined the show as a consulting producer in
2020, wrote.
"He was also a lovely and deeply decent man, and I'm grateful for every minute
I got to
spend with him. While Yount agrees no one can replace Trebek, she agrees
Jennings would be
perfect to carry on the show's legacy.  I really want it to continue and I
think Ken is the
show guy that Alex was, Yount said. That's kind of a clear transition for me.
The most
important thing is keeping the show alive, Yount said.  "I wouldn't want the
show to die
with Alex ," Yount said. "He wouldn't want that."

*****

Alex Trebek, 80, 'Jeopardy! Host For 37 Years, Dies. By Katharine Q. Seelye.

A good host, he once said, could set his ego aside and let contestants be all
they could be.
But he let them know when he thought they missed easy answers.

At a restaurant several years ago, a stranger went up to Alex Trebek, the
longtime host of
'Jeopardy! and as strangers often did, tried to stump him.

"The American flag flies here 24 hours a day, every day of the year," the
stranger said,
using the quiz show host's particular locution, in which questions are
delivered as answers.

Mr. Trebek sensed that the stranger was looking for something more clever than
a list of
which buildings, like the White House, had been authorized to fly the flag
through the
night. And without missing a beat he answered in the form of a question: "What
is the moon?"

The quick-witted Mr. Trebek, who died on Sunday at age 80 after a battle with
cancer that
drew legions of fans to rally around him, hosted 'Jeopardy! for a
record-setting 37 years.
He was an authoritative and unflappable fixture for millions of Americans who
organized
their weeknights around the program, shouting out the questions as Mr. Trebek
read the
answers with his impeccable diction.

One major appeal of the show, apart from its intellectual challenge, was its
consistency.
Over the years its format stayed reliably familiar, as did Mr. Trebek, though
he trimmed
back his bushy head of hair, grew grayer and occasionally sported a mustache,
beard or
goatee. Otherwise he was the model of a steady and predictable host -- a
no-nonsense
presence, efficient in his role and comforting in his orderliness.

Mr. Trebek's death was confirmed by the show's producers. They said that
episodes of the
show he hosted would air through Dec. 25 and that they had not made plans for a
replacement.

(Steve's Note: I felt a couple months ago when they hired Ken Jennings, that he
would
probably be the next host.)

Mr. Trebek had announced in a video on March 6, 2019, that he had received a
diagnosis of
Stage 4 pancreatic cancer that week. He said that like many others with the
disease, he had
no symptoms until it had spread throughout his body. He delivered the news from
the show's
set, wearing, as usual, a bandbox-fresh suit and tie as he spoke straight to
the camera
without sentiment or histrionics.

When he commanded a game, he might occasionally raise an eyebrow and say "Oooh,
noooo,
sorry" or repeat a clue with a whiff of condescension; he told New York
magazine that when
contestants missed obvious answers, he deliberately struck a tone that was
meant to convey:
"How can you not get this? This is not rocket science."

Through it all, he kept the game running on its strict timetable. He started
hosting in
1984, when the show returned to the airwaves after a hiatus. Since then he has
been the only
host, helming every episode except one, on April Fools' Day in 1997, when he
swapped places
with Pat Sajak, the host of "Wheel of Fortune."

Mr. Trebek and Mr. Sajak had a friendly rivalry over the years as they led two
of the
longest-running game shows in television history. For years, 'Jeopardy! was the
top-rated
quiz show in America and usually the No. 2 game show, behind 'Wheel of Fortune."

A few weeks after Mr. Trebek announced that he had cancer, the ratings for
'Jeopardy!
coincidentally began to soar when a contestant, James Holzhauer, a sports
gambler from Las
Vegas, roared through the game on a winning streak that captivated the nation.
Each night,
more and more viewers tuned in to see whether Mr. Holzhauer could beat the
record set by Ken
Jennings, a computer programmer, who scored 74 straight victories in 2004.

With Mr. Holzhauer on the buzzer, "Jeopardy!" even blew past "Judge Judy," long
the
top-rated show in syndication.

In the end, Mr. Holzhauer fell just $58,000 shy (over 32 games) of breaking Mr.
Jennings's
record win of $2.5 million. But he boosted the show's ratings to a 14-year
high, drawing
13.3 million daily viewers. He later donated some of his winnings to charitable
causes,
including research into pancreatic cancer in Mr. Trebek's name.  Mr. Trebek
said later that
while he was taping some of the shows with Mr. Holzhauer, he had been in
excruciating pain.

Unlike many celebrities who conceal illness, Mr. Trebek was transparent about
what he was
going through.

Sometimes his pain would shoot 'from a three to an 11' during tapings, he told
CBS's 'Sunday
Morning' in May 2019.

"I taped the show, and then I made it to the dressing room on one occasion,
just barely,
before I writhed in pain and cried in pain," he said.

In March 2020, he gave a one-year video update on his status, noting that just
18 percent of
people with pancreatic cancer live that long.

"The chemo treatments were almost too much," he said. "There were moments of
great pain," he
said, "days when certain bodily functions no longer functioned and sudden,
massive attacks
of great depression that made me wonder if it really was worth fighting on."

But to give up, he said, would have been to betray loved ones who were helping
him survive.

Model of Decorum

Mr. Trebek hosted more than 8,000 episodes of 'Jeopardy! In 2014, he claimed
the record for
hosting the most episodes of a single game show, surpassing the record set by
Bob Barker,
who had led "The Price is Right" for 6,828 episodes between 1972 and 2007.

Mr. Trebek once said he thought game shows did well because they avoided
conflict.

"In this day and age, when there is so much societal tension, game shows are
valuable
because they're pleasant," he told New York magazine in 2018.

Some viewers were drawn to the sense of absolute certitude that Mr. Trebek
projected.

"As we get further into the 21st century, and we become more aware of the
relativism of
truth, there is something satisfying about Alex telling you it's right or
wrong," Robert
Thompson, a professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University,
said in a
phone interview. "I love that there is no discussion, no panel of experts," he
said. "Just
Alex with his cards."

Mr. Trebek spurned being called the star of "Jeopardy!" He wanted viewers to
focus on the
material.

The show derived its drama not from any antics of his, but from the contestants
and the
possibility that at any moment fortunes could shift, with an apparent loser
becoming an
instant winner, and vice versa.

"You have to set your ego aside," Mr. Trebek said of his role. "If you want to
be a good
host, you have to figure out a way to get the contestants to -- as in the old
television
commercial about the military -- "be all you can be. Because if they do well,
the show does
well. And if the show does well, by association, I do well."

The show did well. 'Jeopardy! has won more Emmy Awards -- 35 -- than any other
game show.
They included the 2017 Daytime Emmy for outstanding game show -- remarkable for
a program on
the air for more than three decades. Mr. Trebek himself won six Emmys for
outstanding game
show host and an additional lifetime achievement award. 'Jeopardy! won a 2011
Peabody Award,
the first time in more than 50 years that a television quiz show had been so
recognized. The
citation said the award, given in 2012, was "for decades of consistently
encouraging,
celebrating and rewarding knowledge." It said that 'Jeopardy!" was "a model of
integrity and
decorum."

The nod to integrity was significant. Quiz shows had fallen into disrepute
after cheating
scandals in the 1950s; the 1994 film "Quiz Show" dramatized the deceit.

In reaction to those scandals, the idea for 'Jeopardy! was born. Merv Griffin,
the talk show
host and media mogul who created the show, recounted in "The 'Jeopardy! Book"
(1990) that he
had been talking to his wife in 1963 about how much he missed the old quiz
shows. But, he
said, he recognized that the format had lost all credibility after revelations
that
contestants on some programs had been secretly fed the answers.

Well, then, his wife, Julann, had said, Why not give contestants the answers to
start with
and make them come up with the questions?

It was a light bulb moment. Ms. Griffin said, "79 Wistful Vista."

And Mr. Griffin replied, "What is Fibber McGee and Molly's address?" -- a
reference to
characters on a long-running radio comedy.

The mechanics of the game, initially called "What's the Question?" went through
a few
iterations before "Jeopardy!" made its debut on NBC on March 30, 1964, with Art
Fleming as
the host. Initially a hit, the show was canceled in 1975 as NBC sought to reach
a younger
demographic.

"Jeopardy!" returned in 1978, disappeared again, then underwent a high-tech
face lift.

The low-tech game board was replaced with a bank of video monitors. The theme
music,
composed by Mr. Griffin, was updated using electronic synthesizers. And in
1984, the show
came back for good.

"Part of Americana"

Mr. Trebek has said that he was chosen as host because he had made a good
impression when he
filled in on "Wheel of Fortune" in an emergency when the original host, Chuck
Woolery, was
hospitalized. Merv Griffin Enterprises, which created both shows, appreciated
Mr. Trebek's
seamless performance on 'Wheel' and offered him "Jeopardy!"

Mr. Griffin also wrote the show's highly distinctive "Think" theme, which is
played during
"Final Jeopardy!" as contestants write down questions that usually make or
break them. Its
30-second countdown has become synonymous with any deadline pressure, with a
wood block
timekeeper and a harp glissando finish as well as pizzicato strings at the very
end.

Mr. Trebek enjoyed hearing the theme music played at ballparks and football
games when
managers huddled or time was otherwise stopped. That meant that the music was
instantly
recognizable, that 'Jeopardy! had arrived, he said -- that it had become "part
of
Americana."

George Alexander Trebek was born on July 22, 1940, in Greater Sudbury, Ontario,
north of
Toronto. His father, George Edward Trebek, was a chef who had emigrated from
Ukraine as a
child, and his mother, Lucille (Lagac?) was French Canadian.

Alex grew up in a bilingual French-English household. He attended Jesuit
schools until the
age of 12, when his parents divorced; he then left Sudbury to attend boarding
school at the
University of Ottawa High School in Ottawa, graduating in 1957.

Afterward he enrolled at the University of Ottawa. By his junior year he needed
money to pay
for college and found a job at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a
summer relief
announcer. He took on other announcing gigs.

After graduating in 1961 with a major in philosophy, Mr. Trebek stayed at the
CBC, where his
interests turned to hosting. His first such job was for a Canadian music
program called
'Music Hop' in 1963. He then hosted a high school quiz show called 'Reach for
the Top' and
other miscellaneous programs until 1973, when he moved to the United States.

There he started out on a short-lived game show called 'The Wizard of Odds. A
dizzying
series of other shows followed, including 'High Rollers,' 'Double Dare' and
'The $128,000
Question.

In 1974 he married Elaine Callei, a businesswoman and former Playboy bunny.
They had no
children and divorced in 1981.

In 1990, he married Jean Currivan, a real estate project manager from New York.
Survivors
include his wife and his children, Matthew, Emily and Nicky.

In 2016, Forbes estimated Mr. Trebek's salary at $16.5 million and ranked him
as the 11th
highest paid television host in the world.

Nonetheless, Mr. Trebek eschewed the Hollywood high life. He reveled in being a
homebody,
drove a pickup truck and spent his leisure time on do-it-yourself home repairs.

For a time, he owned a 700-acre ranch near Paso Robles in California, where he
bred and
trained thoroughbred racehorses, but he sold it in 2005.

His job helming 'Jeopardy! did not prevent him from periodically hosting other
game shows,
adding to his popularity. He hosted "Jeopardy!" and "Classic Concentration"
simultaneously
and on Feb. 4, 1991, made broadcast history when he also appeared on "To Tell
the Truth,"
becoming the first person to host three American game shows at once.

A Pop Culture Figure Somewhere along the way he became a cultural icon. Mr.
Trebek appeared
frequently as himself in movies, including in "Charlie's Angels" (2000), and on
television
programs, including "The Simpsons" and "The Colbert Report."

He ran a leg with the Olympic torch in advance of the 1996 Games in Atlanta.

He even hosted a debate for the governor's race in Pennsylvania in 2018, but
the result was
disastrous. He had said that he wanted the format to be conversational, but no
one had
anticipated how much he wanted to be part of the conversation. He talked for
more than 40
percent of the time, including offering random comments on the clergy abuse
scandals in the
Catholic Church.

He later apologized, saying he had misunderstood the role of moderator.

Still, in an unscientific poll in Reader's Digest in 2013, he came in eighth on
the list of
100 most trusted Americans (he became a naturalized United States citizen in
1998).

Since Mr. Trebek announced his diagnosis, his admirers have flooded the
internet and
elsewhere with encomiums.

"Despite the diagnosis, Trebek continued to work, to put on his suits and read
his clues,"
wrote one, Sam Anderson, in 2019 in The New York Times Magazine. "It was a
dignified refusal
to surrender to doom," he added. "He was the squarest possible existentialist
hero: a man
who holds the answer to every single trivia question, but not to the great
final question of
death -- and yet he keeps showing up anyway, reading his clues, giving us every
last answer
he can."

*****

AN APPRAISAL. For Decades, A Calming Purveyor Of the Truth. By James
Poniewozik. When Alex
Trebek stepped up to the answer board, night after night, class was in session.
For more
than 35 years, he was introduced with, 'And now, here is the host of 'Jeopardy!
... Alex
Trebek! But 'host' never seemed quite the right term for what Trebek did..
'Host' suggests
that the show you're watching is a party, a social get-together -- which is how
most hosts,
especially on game shows, treat the job. They want to invite you in, entertain
you, get you
to like them. Trebek, who died on Sunday at 80, was not like that. There was
nothing
ingratiating about him. When he crisply welcomed you to 'Jeopardy! ,' he
invited you for a
half-hour of play that he took seriously. It would be fun, his hearty,
efficient manner
suggested, because it was fun and bracing to exercise one's brain. He served up
TV's
favorite healthful indulgence -- a mindful good time that went down as easily
as a mindless
one. Watching 'Jeopardy! year after year was like auditing a seminar led by a
gentle but
firm professor with a rotating roster of star pupils. It's not as if Trebek had
no showbiz
in him. He was a game-show veteran -- you can still find him on YouTube,
rocking a Gabe
Kaplan 'stache and a loose '70s manner on 'High Rollers. But when he assumed
the post once
held by Art Fleming in the 1984 revival of 'Jeopardy! ,' he adapted his style
for a show in
which the star was what was between the contestants' ears. He had courtly
formalities that
are increasingly scarce in TV today. The 'Shall we? at the outset of a match.
The little
wince when someone would fumble a Double Jeopardy question. His Picard-like
cool was his
appeal, in an environment of emotive syndicated Kirks. When he delivered one of
his
trademark careful pronunciations -- 'Comintern,' 'Argentina' -- it seemed not
showy but
respectful. It was the spirit of 'Jeopardy! to care about getting things right.
With some
celebrities, you might fantasize that, if you ever met them, they would like
you. With Alex
Trebek -- as you sat on the couch, struggling to remember characters from 'The
Aeneid,'
thumb clicking a phantom buzzer -- you dreamed that, if you ever made the big
show, he would
respect you. You sensed there was a line with him: He would joke around to a
point, but
class was in session and he took it seriously. It was a game-within-a-game to
find the rare
contestant who could come up with a clever enough response during his midgame
interviews to
be rewarded with a laugh: 'Pick up that signaling device! What a great answer!
Trebek
himself was not an oversharer, which was why it was so striking when the
occasional story
came out about his life outside the studio, like his injuring an Achilles'
tendon while
chasing an intruder at his hotel in 2011. The idea of this umpire of the mind
having a
physical exploit -- surely he could just stop a burglar with disappointed
passive-aggression? -- was surprising and delightful. And maybe this was why,
when he
announced that he had Stage 4 pancreatic cancer, fans both intense and casual
were swept up
with such feeling. All of this time, the news made us realize, we had felt for
him not just
respect but a quiet 'Remains of the Day' kind of love. In January, ABC aired
the 'Jeopardy!
The Greatest of All Time' championship in prime time. Sure, it was a chance to
see the
game's three most celebrated players face off. (Ken Jennings won, albeit by
adopting James
Holzhauer's 'all in' style.) But come on: We knew what the real occasion was.
The tournament
was like a homecoming, a chance to see a few successful students come back to
campus and
offer what was most likely their final toast to the man who had put them
through some
heart-pounding exams. Amid the white-knuckle bets and trash talk, there was an
'O captain,
my captain' feel to the tournament. On Night 3, Holzhauer used the Final
Jeopardy round to
submit the question-answer 'Who is the G.H.O.S.T.? (Greatest Host of Syndicated
TV),' and
I'd like to see 'This Is Us' come up with anything as tear-jerking. The
'Jeopardy! brand
will surely live on. But there is something especially poignant now about
saying goodbye to
Trebek because of what his show represented: a place of empirical, uncontested
truth in the
media. On 'Jeopardy! ,' after all, there were not alternative facts, only
actual ones. They
did not change depending on how you felt about them or the person revealing
them. Trebek was
that rare thing in contemporary media: a voice of simple, declarative truth and
trusted
authority. But it was an authority he wore lightly, like a well-tailored
jacket. On a show
that was usually scheduled between the depressing evening news and a night of
reality and
crime shows, Alex Trebek did more than teach us trivia and betting strategies.
He gave us,
five days a week, a place to go where it was OK to know things. He was our
trusted man with
the answers, even in times when reality came to us in the form of a question..

*****

[msb-alumni] Alex Trebek, Beloved Jeopardy Host, Dies at 80 on November 8, 2020 Articles

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