Mayim Bialik steps down from Celebrity Jeopardy! amid strikes
Ken Jennings will once again take Bialik's place as host
Aux News Jeopardy!
We’ve already used up all of our best joke ledes about Jeopardy!. (“Jeopardy! is in jeopardy!”; “This long-running game show has courted controversy for moving forward amid the ongoing WGA strike. What is Jeopardy!?” and so on.) So we’ll just say this: it’s wild that this show has become such a lightning rod for controversy in the first place.
The newest update to the Jeopardy! vs. writers strike saga comes from the spin-off Celebrity Jeopardy!, in which actors, athletes, and other stars compete in a tournament for a charity of their choice. Per Variety, Mayim Bialik—who exclusively hosted season one—will not be returning to the podium for season two in continued solidarity with the writer and actor strikes. Instead, Jeopardy! alum Ken Jennings will once again take over hosting duties in her stead.
This move is sure to ignite the masses, and indeed has already brought out calls of “Ken Scabbings” on X. For context, this is not the first time Mayim Bialik has stepped away from the show, or Jennings has been accused of crossing picket lines. Bialik also stepped down from the final week of filming for OG Jeopardy!’s 39th season back in May in solidarity with the beginning of the WGA strike. She was swiftly replaced by Jennings.
While many expressed their ire over Jennings’ choice, both showrunner Michael Davies and the host himself have asserted that the series—which uses WGA writers to pen its questions—would never “air game material not created by WGA writers.” Instead, the blue board will be populated with “re-deployed” questions (a.k.a., recycled from older seasons) until the strike concludes. But it’s not just that. Those old questions will also be answered by old contestants, as Davies frames the upcoming season as a “second chance tournament” for contestants who lost their first game. This announcement also came on the heels of a number of former Jeopardy! winners announcing their intention to boycott the annual Tournament of Champions in solidarity with the strike.
All of which begs the question: who is actually going to compete on Celebrity Jeopardy!? While season one starred the likes of Simu Liu, Patton Oswalt, and Michael Cera, it doesn’t really seem like this would be a good look for any stars moving forward. Whoever they are, we’ll find out when the season premieres on September 27.
73 Comments
I feel like Ken should know better. Can’t wait to see the third-tier ‘celebs’ they get for this. What’s Snookie up to lately? Or maybe the cast of “Siesta Key’ could do a mini tournament?
The nation is primed for a Celebrity Jeopardy reunion of Shasta McNasty!
Verne Troyer wishes he could attend.
I wish he could attend too.
You know who I wish could also attend?
Alex Trebek hosted throughout the previous writer’s strike (and previous SAG strikes) and no one batted an eye. Game show hosts are in a different union and not allowed to strike in solidarity with the WGA.
Trebek did not host during any SAG strike. He was a SAG member, and there is no separate union for game show hosts. He hosted during the 2007-2008 WGA strike because he contractually had to. He wasn’t a WGA member and had to fulfil his broadcast contract which falls under a different SAG code. The show did the same thing it’s doing now, recycled questions, to avoid shutting down. If there was a SAG strike between season during his period of hosting he would’ve had to strike too. Jennings is not in any union, so it doesn’t matter to him, but it’s bullshit of him to try to point out that Trebek worked through the 2007-2008 WGA strike as though it’s a comparable situation.
Game show hosts, talk show hosts, news anchors and soap opera actors have a different SAG contract. They fall under News/Broadcast contract. The only contract that has expired is the TV/Theatrical contract. Game show hosts contract does not expire until next year. If the current strike was happening, Trebek would be expected to work under the terms of his union contract.That’s why Drew Carey, Wayne Brady and Nick Cannon are all keeping up hosting duties as well while getting far less flack.
I know. I said that:“He wasn’t a WGA member and had to fulfil his broadcast contract which falls under a different SAG code.”I’m aware of the Network Code, hence what I said, and which is not a separate union but a separate contract. Trebek also never hosted during a SAG strike, which you said. The ‘86 SAG strike lasted less than a day. Nobody “batted an eye” because it’s not comparable. Jennings isn’t in any union and his trying to claim he’s right by tweeting quotes from random crap articles that Trebek worked through a strike, without the context, is just dickish BS.
Trebek would be required to host the show during a SAG strike unless it was the News/Broadcast strike. Drew Carey is required to host during this SAG strike and will be hosting Primetime Price is Right. Wayne Brady will be hosting Primetime Let’s Make a Deal. Nick Cannon will be hosting Masked Singer. No one seems to be batting an eye about Drew Carey. In fact, I’ve seen many people highlighting that he can’t go on strike.There is this weird desire to hold Ken Jennings to some other standard than everyone else.
WTF? I know, I said as much, but you said Trebek hosted through a SAG strike, which is untrue. I understand the Network Code and I’m not saying Jennings is a scab. He’s just a massive douche whose been trying to defend himself with by bringing Trebek into it without context. Drew Carey, since you singled him out, has literally been feeding the strike lines upwards of $60K now. You can still have solidarity even if you’re under contract.
Kinja doesn’t let you edit your response. I concede that the 1986 strike was one day. But at the same time, if he were still the host, he would be required to host the show. JUST LIKE KEN JENNINGS. So why should he let people single him out as doing something EVERY OTHER GAME SHOW HOST is also doing? He tweeted that because Wil Wheaton and others were saying that everyone would remember that he crossed a picket line.It’s great that Drew Carey is helping feed writers. He’s also going to be continuing to make money and host his game show AS REQUIRED BY HIS CONTRACT. What kind of writers do you think The Price is Right is using now that it’s back in production? There has been this weird idea that Ken Jennings is crossing a picket line that ignores every other game show host. Drew Carey is one example. So is Wayne Brady, Terry Crews, Nick Canon, Pat Sajack, Steve Harvey, Michael Strahan, Alfonos Ribero, Jaime Camil, Rupaul, Jane Lynch, Jamie Foxx Dwayne Johnson – All of whom are actively in production on game shows.
If they can’t use celebrities who are screen actors, then maybe they need to go with musicians or politicians? I would tune into Snookie vs. Britney Spears vs. a former orange president who shall remain nameless to have lots of missed questions, even if they’re repeats.
I wish they would just find an actual good host. And fix some things. I’d like to see something done about the “buzzer advantage” (no idea what) mostly, but if they are going to stick with the current wagering system they need to figure out a way for people to come from well behind occasionally.
Jennings is the actual good host. Since last season, they’ve been giving new players a second round of buzzer practice on the tape days. I’m not sure what more could be done to better prepare them for the mechanics of the game.
I hear Kevin Sorbo is looking for things to do. He claims Hollywood won’t take him. Maybe Jeopardy will.
Kev has issues with facts, so probably not.
I’d love if he had to answer questions about recent elections or major things that happened in the 40’s.
Kind of sucks to not participate in a charity endeavour because of the strike. I get that it’s still on TV and that the production company still makes money from it, but it still looks bad to not participate in something that is for charity.
No, it looks bad that a bunch of greedy companies worth billions (or in a couple of cases trillions) of dollars have kept the industry on strike for close to four months now.
No. The businesses didn’t force a strike. The workers voted to strike. No one but themselves are keeping the strike going. They can unilaterally end the strike, they are literally the only side that can.
I think you’re just quibbling with semantics (one of my favourite things). Would you agree that the business created the conditions that necessitated a strike?
Hey, someone that actually understands what I said. Yeah. I’d agree that businesses created the conditions for a strike. However, I would add that the timing of the strikes was pretty tone deaf. Their business segment has barely begun to recover from the covid shutdowns, which puts them in a weak bargaining position. On top of the fact that we’re running headlong into a recession, which will hit studio bottom lines enough that they would have been trimming staff and projects anyways. And their business segment is shrinking, not growing. That’s not to say that I oppose them striking. Only that because of their timing they will likely be on strike for a long time and get barely anything they’re asking for.
To be fair, I didn’t really understand what you were getting at, and had to infer a lot and give you the benefit of the doubt.If anyone’s tone deaf, it’s the executives making millions who don’t want to pay people a fraction more for doing the actual work. They could easily afford to cut their salaries in half and still be millionaires. This is the only fact that matters to me. They have more than they can spend, while their employees can’t make rent. There is only one solution, and the owners hold all the cards.What are the writers supposed to do, wait until there a better time to strike and lose out on wages until that time? It’s now or never, and the strike is going to hard no matter when it happens.
Yeah, that’s fair. Generally there is no ideal time to strike.I would be all for executives seeing pay cuts in favour of providing more generous compensation to workers. But honestly, the writers and actors would be pretty low on the list of people who I think deserve better pay from a company like Disney. If you do the rough math for the last WGA agreement in 2020. The lowest possible pay for a writer works out to about $90/hour for a standard contract. They aren’t exactly low paid. I’m sure some park janitors and front line staff could use a better compensation package a lot more. At their current rates a writer who is working consistently for the year should be pulling in around $185,000/year on the low end. So even if you account for the fact that it’s gig work and they may only work half the year they should still be able to pull in $92,000 on the low end. Which is generous pay. The problem seems to not be compensation but that there are too many writers for the available work. I don’t think it’s a realistic request to say that someone should be paid more for an individual contract simply because they can’t find other contracts. And that’s definitely a major factor since the WGA is insisting on more writers for each project.
I’m sure everybody could use more money, so why put any job in a position on a list? The writers are currently on strike, so whatever anyone else working for Disney makes isn’t important to this conversation. Comparing these things is just a diversionary tactic so you don’t have to focus on the issue being discussed.Your math doesn’t add up. You’re assuming that writing is like a regular 9-5 salaried position. In most cases it’s not. You’re assuming that the time they work is all on the clock. You’re assuming a lot of things based on numbers that don’t reflect the real world.There are currently more writing jobs in Hollywood than there have ever been. The problem isn’t that there are too many writers. The amount of TV shows produced today compared to the pre-cable era and the pre-streaming era is huge. The difference is that most of the shows have shorter episode orders, and the pay hasn’t kept pace with inflation for decades. There’s also the matter of residuals, which are much lower for streaming than for traditional network shows with a 20+ episode order.
bootlicker
“No. The businesses didn’t force a strike. The workers voted to strike.”
“No, the Japanese didn’t force a war. The United States Congress voted to declare war.”
they’re_the_same_image dot jpeg
*kicks doddsy in the nuts*Hey. It’s not my fault that hurts. It’s your nervous system, buddy.
If you actually knew anything about the war you’d understand that the comparison you made is nonsense.
If you knew anything about anything you’d know that businesses did force a strike and stop being a shill for ridiculous vultures and leeches.
Get bent, shill.
Wow, you’re fucking stupid.
What I said was true. If you can’t see that I don’t think I’m the stupid one.
Nah. The only thing that ends the strike is the studios dealing and being fair to workers. Shame on you.
The businesses could have agreed to set up pay structures that didn’t turn writing and acting into barely sustainable gig work for all but the top tier. They could have taken a long view and realized that their practices are making it almost impossible for writers to advance into that top tier, undercutting the quality of their product and kneecapping the future of the industry in favor of this quarter’s profits.Each one of the companies in the AMPTP could have broken away individually and made a deal at any time. Still could.Hell, they could have just thrown money at the problem, since writers and actors are asking for literally less than one percent of even the smallest of these companies total revenue (and in the case of Amazon or Apple, it’s more like a hundredth of a percent).Most of all, they could have been sitting at the negotiating table for the first 100 days, making an actual effort to find a middle ground, instead of attempting to starve out their own workers.
But, to be fair, it’s probably hard to recognize all that from all fours on the ground with your tongue full of boot.
Have you actually looked at the current compensation package the WGA has? It’s pretty generous. The 2020 agreement just provided it’s final pay increase 3 months ago. The minimum pay for a story outline for a non network 15 minute segment is $3645. If they write the teleplay it’s $9099. That’s hardly starvation wages. The low end for a script polish is $12721. The minimum for a screenplay script is $42366 for a non original screenplay. Contracts to write a screenplay are typically 10-12 weeks. That means the minimum pay a screenwriters makes for a script is almost $90/hour. How exactly is that a starvation wage?
How many screenplay scripts do you think the average WGA member actually writes and gets paid for per year?
That’s not a compensation issue. That’s an issue of oversaturation of writers. Those are two different things. If businesses paid people more to work less they wouldn’t stay in business very long. The WGA even acknowledges that as being a major issue in their demands since one of them is to have more writers on each project. They are trying to artificially increase demand for their industry.
How much a person actually gets paid in a year is quite clearly a compensation issue. The people you are arguing are getting $90 an hour for work are not getting $90 an hour for 40 hours of work per week, 52 weeks per year. Few will even write a single screenplay in a year. Writing work is by definition episodic, and often writers have to make a few weeks or months of work stretch over long periods of time.It’s funny how insistent you are that you’re a card carrying liberal/progressive/leftist, and here you are implying that labor is being greedy asking for decent wages. Siding with capital over labor, the clear sign of a progressive!
Do you actually understand anything about the business you’re talking about, or did you just spend 30 seconds googling the 2020 contract?
As BuriedAliveOpener says, how many scripts and jobs do you think writers actually write a year? 14K for an outline and a script sounds great, until you have to make that last for 3-6 months (or more) with LA cost of living.
Same for writing the screenplay. Sure, it sounds great to make 43K in 2.5-3 months. Now take into account the months of unpaid meetings that writers have to take in order to get that one job. Does it address the fact that studios routinely avoid actually paying that money for a script by requesting endless polishes? Do you understand that scripts are routinely rewritten multiple times before they’re submitted, effectively for free, because producers hang the idea that they only have one shot at getting it made over the heads of the writers, and keep stringing them along for months?
Here’s a taste of what that looks like, day to day, for even a fairly successful screenwriter: https://colehaddon.substack.com/p/screenwriting-tales-the-fcked-upDo you understand that residuals used to cover all that time between assignments and allowed that system to function, even if it was still arguably abusive? Do you understand that’s why residuals are such a huge part of what the WGA is asking for?
Do you think writers are all making up the stories of 12 cent residual checks? Or that many have to take second jobs because writing can’t make ends meet the way it used to?What’s your solution here? For writers to just simply bend over and say thanks for whatever the studios decide to give them, even if it eviscerates the future of the industry because writers won’t be able to make a career out of being writers?
Those are all ridiculous bad faith arguments though.The number of contracts someone gets is directly correlated to demand. If there aren’t enough writing jobs to support the number of writers that isn’t a compensation issue, that’s an issue with poorly selecting your profession or not being a skilled enough writer to get work. Saying $14,000 isn’t enough to cover living in LA for 3-6 months is a meaningless statement when I’m talking about actual compensation for work. Yes, people don’t get paid when they aren’t working, just like in every other profession. I understand that very well. I worked as a consultant for years. The rewrites argument is also flawed since writers receive additional pay for rewrites and script polishes. I do believe that people get ridiculously low residuals in a lot of cases, but how does that negate the fairness of the upfront pay exactly? I don’t view this as being any different than people who try to make it as a musician. They are selecting to try and make it in a profession that very few people break into the upper levels of because of the cache of the profession. These people are actually better off than musicians since there is no minimum pay for a musician. I’ve never said that they shouldn’t get a raise. I only said that the talking point that they are paid starvation wages is complete BS because it objectively is.
Except you’re ignoring (willfully, I wager) that the system in place doesn’t allow for people to work consistently, and does so because that benefits the exact companies that are being struck right now. And it was made to work this way, systematically over the last 10-15 years, by those same companies.Re: rewrites. They receive additional pay in theory. In practice, they get paid for one “step”, and that pay is only delivered when the executive decides to submit it to the studio. But until then, there are endless tweaks, polishes, and revisions on the basis of notes that will *theoretically* give the script its best chance of being greenlit. Used to be that writing a script was guaranteed two steps, meaning the initial draft and the first rewrite, which allowed for writers to get paid in the middle of the process, and prevented studios from dangling that carrot of payment for weeks or months.Re: residuals… again, I refuse to believe you are not being willfully stupid about this. Talk about bad faith arguments… You can’t honestly think that having half (or more) of the compensation a career depends on disappear is not a factor to be considered. The upfront payments, even the proposed ones, don’t come close to making up for what’s been lost on the backend.You say you used to be a consultant- say that your contract for years had been upfront pay with performance based bonuses. If those performance bonuses became literally pennies, would you have given a fuck if your client offered you a couple of percent more upfront? Maybe you’ll say you’d just start doing another job. I suppose that’s a fair answer, but if enough people do that and it guts an entire industry, maybe it’s not a smart business practice either, right? You can’t make money on a company that doesn’t exist any more.Holding up the music industry as an example is not the win you think it is either. Do you know any musicians? How many of them make money from it? Can they live off it as their only source of income? Do you actually like the idea of a society where the only way that people get to follow any kind of passion-no matter how skilled they are at it- is by squeezing it into their off-hours from peeing in bottles while delivering Amazon packages?
Finally, no one’s claiming starvation wages, so leave that poor straw man alone. He’s already dead. Writers say they can’t have a functional career anymore. The closest anyone’s come to talking about “starving” writers is the quote that came from the studios, not the writers, when they said the goal of the strike was to wait until writers and actors default on mortgages and start to lose their homes. That’s the mentality you’re defending here.
Nope. That’s BS. There are currently about 20,000 writers in the WGA and about 450 movies made last year and about 560 scripted shows. So there were about 1000 available projects for 20,000 writers. Granted some of those writers will be not working of their own accord, but even if you say that half of them aren’t working cause they don’t want to be working (i.e. retired, on a maternity leave, working on another project) that’s still 1000 jobs for 10,000 people. The issue isn’t pay. The issue is that there are too many writers. So yes, my answer to that would be to get a different job. We don’t have any problem telling coal miners to upskill cause there aren’t enough jobs for them. Or should we instead just pay coal miners way more money per hour and have them rotate jobs between each other every few months? How does that make any sense?
So, from your complete unwillingness to engage with the idea that the disappearance of residuals might not actually be offset by a small upfront raise, I assume you’re conceding that. Same with the abusive nature of how writing actually works in the real world.
There are undoubtedly more writers than there are jobs. That was never a point of contention. It’s always the case with entertainment jobs that there are more people who want the job than can do it, and even the people that can do it can’t always do it long-term. Plenty of people only have one saleable script in them, and just can’t hack it for 20-30 years, but they remain in the guild. SAG has the same problem, almost literally ten times over.
That doesn’t change the fact that the jobs that are being offered now pay considerably less, because of changes made by studios which have posted record profits for years.It’s a business that was built on the theory that if you created something that was successful, you’d share in that success (even if that was usually far less than creators were legally or morally entitled to in practice, via Hollywood accounting). That’s no longer the case, even in the lip service way it used to be.It was also built on the working practice that people might only have one or two (paying) jobs a year, and the compensation (especially residuals) would allow for the unpaid work (writing specs, pitching projects, working to develop ideas out before actually writing anything).
Both of those things are no longer true, eroded both in contract and practice, and it wasn’t the writers that made it that way. I don’t understand why that’s so hard a concept for you to grasp, unless it’s a conscious choice to do so.
Get bent, shill.
I know she stepped down out of solidarity with the WGA, but as a member of SAG would hosting a game show be considered scabbing?Either way, Bialik isn’t a good host and has a lot of bad opinions, but credit to her for this.
Along with things like daytime soaps, variety shows and other game shows, Celebrity Jeopardy (both hosting and appearing as a guest) isn’t included in the expired AMPTP contract, but is governed by the National Code of Fair Practice for Network Television Broadcasting, aka Network Code, contract which doesn’t expire until next year. SAG-AFTRA members are free to do that sort of work without (formally) scabbing.
Seems pretty clear even though this isn’t scabbing, that’s still her main union.Ken can be as Ken as he wants with whatever his day job is. (Yes I know, but he wasn’t Blossom now was he?)
As shandrakor mentioned, the Network Code is a separate contract than the TV/Theatrical contract. While it’s getting blurred now with streaming, broadcast TV was always handled differently because it was local TV channels paying their workers through their network of local network channels that are paying a network for the rights the broadcast their show, who in turn pay their employees/hosts/etc. Those local channels also depended hugely on local advertising and maintaining high gain antennas an a host of intermediary contractors to reach homes, plus paying the network for the right to broadcast it. Channels would just go out of business and disappear, or be bought out and suddenly become a different channel entirely. The Network Code came about to basically ensure that the broadcast system was treated differently. So that a strike wouldn’t cut off news principally, or stuff like game shows an soap operas which were the primary advertising income that kept local broadcasters going.
One thing I’m confused about is: is Bialik supposed to stop hosting per the SAG rules? Like is hosting a show officially a violation of the terms of the strike? I guess I’m just curious if Jennings is actually scabbing or not.In any case, it’s not a good look for him :/
Did you read the article? Showrunner and Jennings said they’ll be reusing old questions with old contestants, nothing new is being written so it’s not against WGA.
Did YOU read my post where I specifically said “SAG” and not “WGA”?
Okay, but the article specifically cites her timing as stepping down in solidarity with the *WGA* strike. So no, hosting a game show is not an official violation per a bunch of technicalities. But that’s not really relevant to her stepping down anyway since it was done for the WGA strike.(This is all per the article. I don’t know how much of it is true, I’m just saying that your confusion has been addressed within the article itself.)
Ken Jennings has addressed this – If I recall he is in sag, but that specific area of game shows/soaps/daytime television isn’t on strike. And he claims that he’s consulted with sag about it and they told him to fulfill his ongoing non-strike contract (Who knows if it’s true, but mostly immaterial to the details either way) – and he isn’t in the writers guild so that’s not an issue for him either way.
The important thing is Ken isn’t in solidarity with the rest of the industry because he’d rather make a little more money
Fingers crossed she doesn’t come back at all.
“Good to see you, Zachary Levi and Stephen Amell!”
Nope… they’ll be fighting off a panel of Kim, Khloe, and Kourtney!!
Alex Trebek continued hosting during the 2008 strike. I see no big deal at all.
The 2008 strike was WGA, not SAG. Trebek was in SAG, not the WGA. Today both are striking. Seriously, just… look up shit before saying dumb shit.
but I thought we deferred to Dracula Mountain for all labor issues
Can she step down from regular Jeopardy too please? Thanks.
Old contestants answering reused questions.You may just as well air reruns at that point.
The show has been on the air for almost 60 years. To imagine that haven’t reused questions before is a stretch, but if it’s actually the first time I’m sure they have a pretty deep well to draw from.
This is just the shot in the arm Jeopardy needed.
People need to step back and remember that Ken Jennings is NOT a writer, nor is he an actor, meaning he is not a member of either union. While I’m here I want to share some thoughts on these two strikes. 1. I’m not sure how much money writers are paid, so I will not be making comments about them. However, actors by and large are very minted and watching millionaires fight with billionaires in this day and time is pretty disgusting. You had this fight when cable became big 45 years ago. Go back use the same formula used then kiss and make up and get back to work. Unlike back then, this is not just a California thing its a Georgia now too. And Georgia is my home and this BS is hurting people I know and care about. I know not every actor is loaded, but the perception is there and that’s it takes. Please bring adults to the table get serious agree to fair deal for all and end this insanity NOW!!! Thanks
of course he’s a member of a union. and he’s a shitbag not supporting his own team.
“However, actors by and large are very minted”That is truly fucking delusional. 95% of them barely work.Shame on you for not supporting workers. Shame on you.
Those old questions will also be answered by old contestants, as Davies frames the upcoming season as a “second chance tournament” for contestants who lost their first game.The second chance tournament has been in the works since before the strike, even though you appear to be implying otherwise.
I’m sure the people who are mad at Ken Jennings were also furious at Alex Trebeck when he also continued to host Jeopardy back in 2007-2008 during the last strike.
Kat Dennings will once again take Bialik’s place as host?
hopefully this will buy Maym a little good will, I’m pissed at Ken
Judging from some of these comments…no.