I was never one of those superfans who would watch every single night and know all the statistics and the pantheon of all the greatest players. I had watched it with my parents growing up, but I was not one of those hard-core people. It wasn’t until my fiancé and I moved in together, about five years ago, that we got cable — it was the first time I had cable since I was a little kid. And I remember having this light-bulb moment: “Oh my God, we can record ‘Jeopardy!’ every night.” And because of my day job, I started getting to write about it.
Two weeks ago, the big hosting announcement dropped: Richards had been chosen. Knowing what you knew about him at the time, what was your reaction to the decision?
As I had started to write about “Jeopardy!” more and watch it more seriously, I learned more about the world. I met the fans; I met the people who make the show. And I kept hearing things from people close to the show: that the host-search process might not have been as aboveboard as the way that it was being described publicly, and a number of staff members had fairly grave concerns about him. I wanted to know more about his past and his genesis as a television personality because he had been really open about the fact that, in addition to producing, he wanted to host.
What led you to his podcast?
He has talked about it in interviews but also, literally, it’s listed — or at least it was — in his official Jeopardy.com bio, that he hosted a comedy news show as a college student called “The Randumb Show.” And I tried to find as much as I could about that show, but it was all taped in the ’90s. It did lead me to the podcast with the exact same name, which is the one that he hosted as the executive producer of “The Price Is Right.”
So you’re sitting there listening to these episodes. At what point do you start to become unsettled by his comments?
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/arts/television/jeopardy-claire-mcnear-mike-richards.html
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