Johnny Gilbert has been saying the same ten words for over 36 years, with the same blend of blinding and sublime cadences from a trained showman: “And now, here’s the host of ‘Jeopardy!’ … Alex Trebek! ” Trebek would appear with a wave and a smile, and the game would begin.
He has performed a version of the famous warm-up more than 8,000 times since Trebek’s first episode, which aired on September 10, 1984, when the newborn host walked onto the stage with a dark, bushy mustache and a light pink color. pocket square. But on Friday, television audiences will see Gilbert’s final launch of a longtime friend who has become a friend. The last episode recorded before Trebek’s death in November is being broadcast.
“I never thought he was dying so much,” Gilbert said. “The day I heard that, a part of me left this world.”
Next week “Jeopardy!” will return with Gilbert introducing a new name: Ken Jennings, a record-breaking former contestant, who will be the first in a series of new interim hosts.
“It was a very bizarre feeling,” Gilbert, 92, said in an interview Wednesday. “I never thought of anyone to host the show except Alex.”
After the death of Trebek, Gilbert, who was about 70 years old career in entertainment, said he wondered if it was the right time to leave. Due to the pandemic, he was not working in the studio in Culver City, California at the time, but recorded his announcements in a bedroom in his home in Venice Beach.
I thought, ‘Gee, can I do this? Can I still do what the program needs? “He said. ‘And I decide, yes, I will go on. I would go on because Alex wanted the program to continue. ”
When Trebek passed away in November at the age of 80 after struggling with stage 4 pancreatic cancer, the producers of the show made it clear that there was no rush for the role of a man who had the face and voice of ‘Jeopardy’ ! ‘ Wash, not to fulfill. so long. Only ten days before his death, Trebek was filmed in the studio, and the series had enough episodes to end the year. Instead of finishing in the last week of 2020, a chaotic week for television and viewers, the program decided to push Trebek’s last five episodes to this week.
The show also acknowledged that Gilbert was among many who felt uneasy by a new host called ‘Jeopardy!’ clues. Instead of immediately choosing a permanent successor, they opted for a series of interim hosts. Jennings, the only host officially announced, has already recorded 30 episodes, a spokesman for the program said. Jennings has been getting a bit on social media over the past few days for posting insensitive tweets in the past, for which he apologize, which raises questions about whether he would be permanently in the role.) The Los Angeles Times reported this week that Katie Couric was offered as another host, but the program does not confirm this.
Gilbert and Trebek, who both worked on television in the early 1980s, met for a few years in Hollywood before Merv Griffin decided on a new production of “Jeopardy!” Gilbert was already a well-known TV presenter by day and was a broadcaster with a golden voice for ‘The Price Is Right’ and Dinah Shore’s daily talk show.
In his memoir, published last summer, Trebek writes that he recommended Gilbert to Griffin: “How could you forget such a voice?” (Gilbert’s voice was not only used to announce; he was a singer early in his career and recorded two albums in the 1960s.)
The result was, according to Gilbert, a friendship that involved a lot of chatting in locker rooms, good-natured teasing in front of studio audiences and a deep mutual respect. On the set of “Jeopardy !,” Trebek often made fun of Gilbert’s age and joked that he was the announcer of Abraham Lincoln.
“We have been together for more than one of our marriages, and we have never had a crossword puzzle,” Trebek wrote in his memoirs about Gilbert.
With one of his many “Jeopardy!” as varsity-style jackets, Gilbert will warm up the audience before the recordings and encourage them to talk to Trebek during commercial breaks and ask him the questions. When the time came, Trebek would talk endlessly to audience members, Gilbert recalled, adding that Trebek’s engaging conversations with members of the studio audience would survive more than one time commercial interruptions.
Gilbert remembers how Trebek continued to work through his illness. When Trebek received chemotherapy treatments, Gilbert said, there were times when he was in a lot of pain. Sometimes he was too unwell for the usual chatter between deliveries with the production staff.
Trebek writes in his memoirs that there were days during his illness where he could barely walk to production meetings. But after Gilbert delivered his brand introduction – “And now, here’s the host of ‘Jeopardy!’ … Alex Trebek! ” – Trebek wrote that he will feel like himself again and can walk out on stage.
This transformation was also clear to Gilbert.
“No matter how he felt when he walked on stage,” Gilbert said, “when I introduced him, there was Alex Trebek.”