J! in the Media

[alietr]

My only comment on the documentary ... $80 MILLION!?!?!?!?!

[Mario500]

Article on the upcoming special: https://nypost.com/2020/01/02/jeopardy- ... -the-best/

Jennings says he was playing during the first Bush presidency. Huh?

He probably meant W's first term.

I can accept that the reporter might have bungled some quotes. For instance, as much as I like Jan Brady

[Alex] still does a very difficult job with amazing plumb...

Ken must have said "aplomb".

The mentioning of "plumb" might had been correct (it might had been said in accordance with certain definitions for certain dictionaries).

[triviawayne]

Hoping I get to see this on Hulu or somewhere. Just so I don't skip over something I shouldn't - was this considered an episode of 20/20 or something else?

[MarkBarrett]

Hoping I get to see this on Hulu or somewhere. Just so I don't skip over something I shouldn't - was this considered an episode of 20/20 or something else?

If you have Hulu then try this: https://www.hulu.com/series/what-is-jeo ... 35dbfc8633

On Hulu I also found that clicking the search icon and typing "jeopardy!" quickly brought it up as well. The GOAT shows as well but is locked.

[yclept]

The documentary is good. Not a lot of new information, but Alex, his wife, and the show crew all come off very well.

The surprise of it all for me was the inclusion of Greg Hopkins, the champ from the first episode. He talked about how the $8,400 he won made a difference in his life (with no mention of throwing away $9,000 in the following episode).

Also briefly depicted was Michael Pascuzzi's marriage proposal in 2018 (with no love for our humble administrator's own in 2006.)

It would have been a fun little story to tell about what happened in Game 2 and I am surprised they didn’t.

As an aside: Looking at the archive of that game brought me to the run of Elise Beraru. People would have loved her for her runaway FJ bets. Those aggressive bets worked wonderfully in Game 2, when she shattered the $20K barrier. However, a few misses on those aggressive bets probably cost her a spot in the future UTOC. If only she knew....

[MarkBarrett]

From Marc Berman's Programming Insider:

8:00 p.m. ABC – What is Jeopardy?” Viewers: 7.80 million (#1), A18-49: 0.9/ 5 (#1t)

CBS – Young Sheldon (R) Viewers: 4.58 million (#3), A18-49: 0.5/ 3 (#3)

NBC – Superstore (R) Viewers: 2.01 million (#4), A18-49: 0.4/ 2 (#4)

Fox – Last Man Standing (season premiere) Viewers: 5.23 million (#2), A18-49: 0.9/ 5 (#1t)

CW – Supernatural (R) Viewers: 640,000 (#5), A18-49: 0.2/ 1 (#5) 8:30 p.m. ABC – What is Jeopardy?”

[brick]

My only comment on the documentary ... $80 MILLION!?!?!?!?!

RIGHT? And the piano, etc is relegated to a STORAGE LOCKER?

[Robert K S]

My only comment on the documentary ... $80 MILLION!?!?!?!?!

It's like Gene Roddenberry said regarding his writing "lyrics" to the Star Trek theme so that he could take co-writer credit with composer Alexander Courage and thereby claim half the performance royalties: "Hey, I have to get some money somewhere. I'm sure not gonna get it out of the profits of Star Trek." J.J. Abrams was taking notes because he "composed" the "theme" to Lost, "wrote" "songs" for the Star Wars movies, etc.

[twelvefootboy]

It would have been a fun little story to tell about what happened in Game 2 and I am surprised they didn’t.

We've been teased twice now in this thread, can you please elaborate? I can't be the only boardie who's been snipe hunting multiple times, lol... Fair is fair, I must explain this:

Spoiler

Rural kids (somebody's little brother mainly) used to be punked by being taken out into the woods on a "snipe hunt". The veracity is proved by looking up "snipe" in the dictionary, and it is a real bird. The victim is told to beat the ground with a stick and to hold a gunny sack open in order to attract and capture "snipes". The co-conspirators allegedly were out on the perimeter chasing them toward the dupe in this prank. While actually they were home or wherever, and safe and warm. Yeah, it is boring out in the sticks .

[seaborgium]

It would have been a fun little story to tell about what happened in Game 2 and I am surprised they didn’t.

We've been teased twice now in this thread, can you please elaborate? I can't be the only boardie who's been snipe hunting multiple times, lol...

J! Archive has the second game of the Trebek era, and that would make it all clear, but here's what happened: Greg Hopkins had a narrow lock at the end of his first game, bet appropriately small, and was chided by Alex for it when he got the softball FJ in HOLIDAYS right. In the second game he led $9,500 to $5,000 and bet everything on the FJ category THE CALENDAR. His opponents did too, and they all went to $0 on the old quibbly chestnut (or perhaps not so old then) about

Spoiler

when the 20th century began.

I think Greg could have easily been the first 5x champion right out of the gate otherwise.

[twelvefootboy]

It would have been a fun little story to tell about what happened in Game 2 and I am surprised they didn’t.

We've been teased twice now in this thread, can you please elaborate? I can't be the only boardie who's been snipe hunting multiple times, lol...

J! Archive has the second game of the Trebek era, and that would make it all clear, but here's what happened: Greg Hopkins had a narrow lock at the end of his first game, bet appropriately small, and was chided by Alex for it when he got the softball FJ in HOLIDAYS right. In the second game he led $9,500 to $5,000 and bet everything on the FJ category THE CALENDAR. His opponents did too, and they all went to $0 on the old quibbly chestnut (or perhaps not so old then) about

Spoiler

when the 20th century began.

I think Greg could have easily been the first 5x champion right out of the gate otherwise.

Thanks! I only get to the Archive when someone links to it, but I thought there might be subtext beyond figuring it out from the box score. We know these as strange wagers now, but maybe you'd do anything to avoid winning a year's supply of odor eaters or some of their other consolation prizes. How quirky that it happened in Alex's first hour on the job!

[twelvefootboy]

So we watched the ABC show / promotion for net week tonight. I was surprised to see Michael Strahan doing a non-sports program. I thought his narration was excellent, and he handled the interviews pretty well, but a little thin in substance.

Johnny Gilbert told the audience about the ridiculous residuals for Merv Griffin from the theme song when we attended a taping a while back. Our copyright laws and inheritance tax policy are ridiculous. It was cool to see Alex's workshop - it's a lot like mine if you wreck a train in the middle of it.

Overall, it was a melancholy piece but interesting to see how much they explained.

[goongas]

So we watched the ABC show / promotion for net week tonight. I was surprised to see Michael Strahan doing a non-sports program. I thought his narration was excellent, and he handled the interviews pretty well, but a little thin in substance.

Michael is on Good Morning America, GMA3 in the afternoon here in NY, hosts Pyramid on ABC in the summer, along with his duties for NFL on Fox, if it ever comes up.

[MinnesotaMyron]

And now for something completely different. This is an episode of the CBS sitcom The 5 Mrs. Buchanans, from 1995. The relevant part comes in the first 3 minutes, but then the plot takes a hard turn, and never gets back to that set up! Or at least I assume it didn't, I couldn't watch the rest of it. One you get to the car ride with the terrible green-screen, you can turn it off. Bonus points if you recognize the blonde actress from her much more successful sitcom that would debut the next year, or if you know which much more successful series Marc Cherry would go on to create in the 2000s.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=_mGWmUSw4SE

[Lefty]

It would have been a fun little story to tell about what happened in Game 2 and I am surprised they didn’t.

We've been teased twice now in this thread, can you please elaborate? I can't be the only boardie who's been snipe hunting multiple times, lol...

J! Archive has the second game of the Trebek era, and that would make it all clear, but here's what happened: Greg Hopkins had a narrow lock at the end of his first game, bet appropriately small, and was chided by Alex for it when he got the softball FJ in HOLIDAYS right. In the second game he led $9,500 to $5,000 and bet everything on the FJ category THE CALENDAR. His opponents did too, and they all went to $0 on the old quibbly chestnut (or perhaps not so old then) about

Spoiler

when the 20th century began.

I think Greg could have easily been the first 5x champion right out of the gate otherwise.

Spoiler

Watching that game at the time, I assumed you had to include the day of the week. I think I picked the wrong one (I never have figured out how to do that trick; also I don't think I knew then that 1900 was not a leap year). I also remember that, inspired by their success with the question, they asked a version of it in each of the next couple of or several seasons.

[davey]

So we watched the ABC show / promotion for net week tonight. I was surprised to see Michael Strahan doing a non-sports program. I thought his narration was excellent, and he handled the interviews pretty well, but a little thin in substance.

Michael is on Good Morning America, GMA3 in the afternoon here in NY, hosts Pyramid on ABC in the summer, along with his duties for NFL on Fox, if it ever comes up.

Not to mention he hosted Live! with Kelly Ripa for 4 years until 2016.

[davey]

And now for something completely different. This is an episode of the CBS sitcom The 5 Mrs. Buchanans, from 1995. The relevant part comes in the first 3 minutes, but then the plot takes a hard turn, and never gets back to that set up! Or at least I assume it didn't, I couldn't watch the rest of it. One you get to the car ride with the terrible green-screen, you can turn it off. Bonus points if you recognize the blonde actress from her much more successful sitcom that would debut the next year, or if you know which much more successful series Marc Cherry would go on to create in the 2000s.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=_mGWmUSw4SE

A fun find! That's a distinguished cast...Eileen Heckart! Too bad the script seems like standard, dull stuff.

[Bamaman]

My only comment on the documentary ... $80 MILLION!?!?!?!?!

It's like Gene Roddenberry said regarding his writing "lyrics" to the Star Trek theme so that he could take co-writer credit with composer Alexander Courage and thereby claim half the performance royalties: "Hey, I have to get some money somewhere. I'm sure not gonna get it out of the profits of Star Trek." J.J. Abrams was taking notes because he "composed" the "theme" to Lost, wrote songs for the Star Wars movies, etc.

Director Robert Altman asked his 14 year old son to write lyrics to a song giving him a title and to make the lyrics as stupid as possible. The song was used for a movie. You may not be familiar with the words, but an instrumental version of the song earned the younger Altman a lot more money than his dad made directing the movie.

[Robert K S]

To have one's income go to one's children instead of oneself is every rich person's dream. If you take a class on tax law you learn about all kinds of unsuccessful schemes for income shifting. "Suicide Is Painless" is the best one I've ever seen that was 100% legal.

[Bamaman]

Michael Altman wrote the song himself, so there was nothing tricky going on. And I am sure he never dreamed he would be making money off it 50 years after he wrote it.