A EMMY AW RDS

38th Annual Daytime Entertainment CREATIVE ARTS EMMY ® AWARDS
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Above: Alex with Ruta Lee on
the game show, “High Rollers.”
Long-Running Quiz Show Host
Who is Alex Trebek?
By Elizabeth Jensen
Ask “Jeopardy!” executive producer Harry Friedman
about Alex Trebek’s contributions to the fast-paced
show over 27 years, and he singles out the host’s powers
of concentration.
“When he’s in the studio he has his game face on,” said
Friedman. “It’s pretty demanding to run that game and
work through 61 pieces of game material in every half
hour. He’s pretty much working every minute, following
who said what and watching who signals in next. It really
requires a tremendous attention.”
And what do viewers tend to focus on? Trebek’s
mustache. Trebek noted that he was the first game show
host with a mustache since Groucho Marx, and when he
shaved it off on a whim in 2001, “it was traumatic for
a number of people. They made such a fuss about it.”
Studio audiences bring it up at every taping, he said, even
though it’s been gone for a full decade. And Will Ferrell
didn’t give it up either, continuing to sport one whenever
he did the comic impersonation of Trebek on “Saturday
Night Live.”
“It’s so interesting how some facial hair is so much a
part of how he is perceived,” said Friedman.
Trebek, a Sudbury, Ontario native, studied philosophy
at the University of Ottawa and spent 12 years working
in news at the Canadian Broadcasting Company before
he hit Hollywood. American viewers became familiar
with him as the host of “Wizard of Odds” in 1973, and
then numerous other game shows, including “High
Rollers” and “Battlestars”--he can’t remember how many.
In 1984, without a tryout, he found a perfect match when
the producers tapped him when they wanted to launch a
new syndicated version of “Jeopardy!”
Over the years, Trebek—who also hosted “Classic
Concentration” for five years beginning in 1987--has
won five Emmys for Outstanding Game Show Host. He
is also one of the few to have been honored with a star
on both the Hollywood Walk of Fame and the Canadian
Walk of Fame in Toronto. “I host ‘Jeopardy!’ because I
like the show and I believe it’s a quality program,” he said.
It remains popular year after year, he thinks, “because
Americans are very competitive, and particularly in areas
which command respect, like knowledge.” Not only is it
“popular with ordinary folks from all walks of life,” he
said, but “it’s the kind of show that people can watch as a
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