No question Alex Trebek loved Jeopardy! job Winnipeg contestants share memories of late game-show host By: David Sanderson Posted: 7:00 PM CST Monday, Nov. 9, 2020

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/11/2020 (1544 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Derek Rolstone was relaxing with his family Sunday afternoon when he learned that Alex Trebek, longtime host of the popular game show Jeopardy!, had died at age 80, after a nearly two-year battle with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer.

The news hit a little closer to home for Rolstone than for most, owing to the fact he is one of just six Winnipeggers who have competed on the show during its 56-year-run. The married father of two finished second, $1,101 behind the winner, in an episode that was filmed in August 1996, when he was 26 years old.

During the taping, he was able to chat with Trebek, a native of Ottawa, about a common life experience: both men had been torch bearers ahead of the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary.

Reached at home, Rolstone, a management consultant, recalls Trebek as being a “good guy, not like a stereotypical celebrity.” Besides their on-air conversation, they also spoke briefly before the lights went on, mostly about their shared Canadian heritage, he says.

“My mother was at the University of Ottawa at the same time as him,” Rolstone says. “I also mentioned that I had been on (high school academic quiz show) Reach for the Top, where he got his start on TV. He said, ‘The thing I liked about that show is that people could ring in at any time, so when I stopped the question and they gave their answer, more often than not (their answer) was the next word in the question.’ I always got a kick out of that.”

In July 2019, George Buri, a university history professor, starred in his self-penned, one-person play I Lost on Jeopardy! at the Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival. As the title indicates, the 60-minute production centred around Buri trying his luck on Jeopardy! in the spring of 2017, and coming up just short after being in the lead for Final Jeopardy!

“Alex struck me as someone who loved what he did and had a genuine passion for the show,” says Buri, adding that although he wasn’t surprised to read about Trebek’s death, given he had been ill for some time, the announcement hit him hard nonetheless. “I hope with so much news going on right now — COVID vaccine, Biden winning the (U.S.) election — that Trebek’s passing doesn’t get lost in the shuffle. He was Jeopardy! and it will not be the same without him.”

Buri, 41, says Trebek, a five-time Emmy Award-winner for outstanding game show host and Order of Canada recipient, struck him as a person who loved what he did, and was genuinely passionate about the show, which he hosted from 1984 up until the time of his death.

“Even though he’d taped hundreds… thousands of episodes, when there’s a close one like mine you can see him get excited as he reads the clues and makes comments about how the players are doing,” he continues. “I recall him saying, ‘George takes the lead,’ and then correcting himself immediately when he realized I was still a couple hundred (dollars) behind. I replied, without thinking, ‘I’m trying!’”

During the short getting-to-know-you portion of the program, Buri was expecting Trebek to quiz him about a couple of life events he had discussed earlier with producers, namely how he met his wife because of the Dave Matthews Band, or how he had travelled North America extensively, playing a highly competitive brand of ultimate Frisbee. He was a bit surprised, therefore, when Trebek brought up Winnipeg instead, and began probing him about the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and the rule variances between the Canadian Football League and the National Football League.

“Perhaps it was to show that he knew (the CFL) existed, and he knew the differences in the rules,” Buri says. “You could see he was very proud of knowing stuff like that.”

Buri mentions that during the commercial breaks, he was able to observe Trebek interacting with members of the studio audience. He got the feeling that if the show’s producers hadn’t reined Trebek in, letting him know it was time to get back to work, he would have happily chatted with them all day.

“I’m happy that he stayed doing the show to the end,” he adds. “You could see there was no place he’d rather be than on that stage, hosting. For me, that’s what I want: do what you want until the day you die.

“That’s why I don’t see his death as sad, so much as I see his life as being a model of how, if you find something you love, you do it as long as you can.”

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca