Posted in: TV | Tagged: jeopardy, Ken Jennings, Mayim Bialik, sony

Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions Delayed; Winners Back WGA Strike

The Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions is delayed, with the 2022-23 season winners & host Mayim Bialik standing in solidarity with the WGA.

The Jeopardy! Tournament of Champions will be delayed as competing 2022-23 season winners are taking a cue from one of the series' hosts, Mayim Bialik deciding to stand in solidarity with the Writers Guild of America as part of their ongoing strike until it is resolved. The syndicated game show employs WGA members and is planning to rely on material from its 39 previous seasons as tapings will begin for the 2023-24 season with Ken Jennings, who shares hosting duties with Bialik. The Tournament of Champions, which usually tapes in late August and September, will be moved until after the strike.

"'Jeopardy!' never had any intention of producing a Tournament of Champions for season 39 until the strike is resolved," a spokesperson for the show said in a statement (via The Hollywood Reporter). "Further, no contestants from season 39 have been contacted regarding their availability for any postseason tournaments, including the TOC. The Jeopardy! postseason represents the pinnacle of our competition, and it should feature our strongest players playing our toughest original material. 'Jeopardy!' has a long history with tremendous respect for the WGA and our writers. We have always been careful to honor our WGA agreements, and we would never air game material not created by WGA writers. However, just as we did, led by Alex Trebek, during the 2007-2008 strike, we will deliver first-run episodes again this fall to more than 200 affiliate stations nationwide. Our current plan is to go into a holding pattern of sorts, pushing back the season 39 postseason to first produce original episodes featuring the best of our WGA written material." The statement also explained the shows' hopes a resolution will come between the guilds, and AMPTP can reach a fair resolution and both Jeopardy! and Celebrity Jeopardy! are covered under the SAG-AFTRA Network Code, which remains in effect."

Ray Lalonde, a TV set builder and painter from Toronto who won $386,400 over 13 games last season, told The Washington Post he emailed the show's producers on July 21st saying he won't participate given the ongoing strike. Writing on the Jeopardy! Reddit forum, "I am and will always be grateful for the experience I had on the show, and the opportunity to participate in the TOC is beyond a dream come true for me. That being said, I believe that the show's writers are a vital part of the show, and they are justified in taking their job action to secure a fair contract for themselves and their fellow WGA members. As a supporter of the trade union movement, a union member's son, and a proud union member myself, I have informed the show's producers that if the strike remains unresolved, I will not cross a picket line to play in the tournament of champions."

Other winners – Chris Pannullo, Hannah Wilson, Ben Chan, Troy Meyer, Ben Goldstein, Luigi de Guzman, and Suresh Krishnan – replied in the forum in solidarity with Lalonde and Celebrity Jeopardy! winner Ike Barinholtz also declined to participate in the Tournament of Champions as a WGA member. The WGA has been on strike since May 2, and SAG-AFTRA has been on strike since July 14th; a major contention in both labor stoppages is the paltry residuals stemming from streaming services.

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