New host for ‘Celebrity Jeopardy!’ has been revealed
“Celebrity Jeopardy!” is getting a new emcee for its second round.
The star-filled game show’s original host Mayim Bialik will not be returning for the forthcoming season, according to Entertainment Weekly.
Ken Jennings will instead be replacing the “Big Bang Theory” actress, 47.
While both still co-host the OG “Jeopardy!” series, Bialik had also been hosting the A-list version solo.
The actress is reportedly refusing to head “Celebrity Jeopardy!” so she can stay united with her peers engaged in the screenwriters’ and the actors’ strikes.
Bialik had even walked off the “Jeopardy!” set back in May to stand in solidarity with Hollywood creators.
Michele Loud, a scribe for the trivia show was on the picket lines and told Variety at the time: “Our words are on the screen every night. There is no ‘Jeopardy!’ without writers. Without us it’s just an empty blue screen.”
Loud and Bialik were also joined by series’ writers Jim Rhine and Billy Wisse.
“Celebrity Jeopardy” is set to return next month, and the parent show had just one week of filming left for season 39 when Bialik first dropped out earlier this year. Season 40 is still slated to make a comeback in the fall.
Showrunner Michael Davis got candid on his Inside Jeopardy! podcast recently where he discussed how the strikes have affected both trivia shows and “derailed” them.
The new season of “Jeopardy” will continue on with “a combination of material that our [Writer’s Guild of America] writers wrote before the strike, which is still in the database, and material that has been re-deployed from multiple seasons of the show.”
Contestants from the past will also be recycled to create content.
Davies explained that it “wouldn’t be fair to have new contestants making their first appearance” on the show with material that isn’t original or that was penned prior to the strikes.
“So we decided that really we needed to invite back and give a second chance in general to players who probably thought that their chance to come back and play on the Alex Trebek stage had gone forever,” he said.
The TV producer also revealed a raise in prize money for the upcoming 40th season.
While contestants who will compete in season two of “Celebrity Jeopardy!” have not been disclosed yet, the pilot season included starlets such as Simu Liu, Constance Wu, Iliza Shlesinger, Ray Romano, Patton Oswalt, Michael Cera and B.J. Novak.
The Post has reached out to Bialik and “Jeopardy!” reps for comment.
