Jeopardy! Host Ken Jennings Comments on Mayim Bialik’s Ouster

Jeopardy! host Ken Jennings said he was taken off-guard when Mayim Bialik exited the long-running game show. Jennings, who has has shared hosting duties with Bialik since the since July of last year, will now take over Bialik’s share of the job, which included hosting Celebrity Jeopardy! and other primetime specials. Her star power made sense in that scenario, but hardcore fans of the show never really seemed to let of the idea of Jennings replacing the late Alex Trebek as host. The compromise lasted for about a year, until Bialik stepped away from the show during the Writers Guild of America strike.

Bialik is a member of SAG-AFTRA, the actors’ union which also went on strike this summer, and reportedly left Jeopardy! in solidarity with the writers ahead of the SAG strike. Jennings, who is a member of neither union, remained at the podium. Earlier this month, Bialik revealed that she had been let go entirely.

“It took me off guard, because I loved working with my Mayim and I’m gonna miss her,” Jennings told The Hollywood Reporter. “I can’t speak to her decision-making process or her opinions about it. But on my end, I’m just a fan of Jeopardy! and I’m always delighted to host when they call upon me. I just feel extremely lucky to have even been considered for this job as a non-broadcaster.”

A report earlier this month suggested that Bialik’s firing had been a result of numerous factors, but that her decision to stand with the striking writers ultimately made producers mad enough to pull the trigger. According to behind-the-scenes reporter Matthew Belloni’s What I’m Hearing, “Sony TV executive Suzanne Prete and executive producer Michael Davies were furious when Bialik said in May that she would step away from the final week of filming last season in solidarity with the show’s striking writers. After all, Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune are well-oiled machines, requiring precise timing to make the show’s five-episodes-a-day schedule. Plus, Bialik wasn’t loved on set, and Sony had switched up shooting that season to accommodate her Fox sitcom, Call Me Kat.”

In the U.S., workers cannot be fired for refusing to cross a picket line — which you could argue is what Bialik was doing — but the law can’t protect you if the official reason for termination is given as something else. If it’s true that Bialik’s schedule was a problem, or that she was not widely liked on set, those would have given Sony cover to fire her even if the real precipitating factor was supporting the striking writers.

From the outside, it seemed like Bialik’s hiring was intended to mirror that of Drew Carey, who took over The Price is Right after Bob Barker’s run ended. A beloved TV comedian, Carey settled in at The Price is Right and has made that his primary gig ever since. Bialik, fresh off The Big Bang Theory, was between projects when she was hired at Jeopardy!, but it never seemed like she planned to stop the rest of her career for it.

The star was controversial from day one. Bialik had previously expressed anti-vaccine (or at least “vaccine-skeptical”) views — something that was big headlines in 2020, when Trebek passed away and the search for a new host began. Of the Jeopardy! guest hosts, she was fairly popular, but there was a vocal movement to get LeVar Burton the job if it was going to go to a celebrity. Jennings was a fan favorite from day one; the former contestant is the biggest winner in the series’ history, and had long been discussed as an obvious replacement for Trebek when the time came.