‘Jeopardy!’: Kid from ‘Bad Santa’ Has Nightmare on Show

ABC

[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for the October 23 episode of Jeopardy!]

Jeopardy! viewers were buzzing about the appearance of Brett Kelly ahead of Wednesday, October 23’s episode. While Kelly didn’t disclose his acting credits on stage, eagle-eyed fans earlier recognized him on the Contestant Zone. That’s because he starred opposite Billy Bob Thorton as kid sidekick Thurston Merman in the very R-rated Christmas comedy Bad Santa (2003). Now all grown up, Kelly did not have a jolly outcome on the quiz show.

Listed as an actor from Surrey, British Columbia, he faced Will Wallace, a game design director from Austin, Texas who became the new champ with the sole Final Jeopardy get last episode, and Sophia Maymudes, a software engineer from Seattle, Washington.

Wallace entered with a one-day total of $18,799. But after the Jeopardy! round, it was crossword puzzle savant Maymudes who stole the show. She crossed out the entire “Be Witched” category and led with $6200 despite a Daily Double miss. Wallace held $4,400, and Kelly was in the red with -$1,200. Ken Jennings remarked how Maymudes had “gone on a tear.”

In Double Jeopardy!, things hit a snag for her and the Bad Santa star. Maymudes got seven clues incorrect, including the two remaining Daily Doubles, dropping $2,600 on the “Four Legged Friends” clue looking for “Chameleon,” and $2000 on “The Trojan War” clue seeking, “Troilus and Cressida.” Meanwhile, Kelly struggled to get in edge-wise only getting 4 clues correct and 3 incorrect (including a mix-up of Memory from “Cats” with “Wicked?”).

Going into Final Jeopardy, Wallace had a runaway with $10,800, Maymudes’ momentum from the first round had dissipated and she had $2,800, while Kelly had $0 so he was ineligible to answer.

This made my brother fall over. pic.twitter.com/peg9a55AYR
— Kevin Daly (@kevinddaly) October 23, 2024

The “THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH” clue was “This day involving the Holy Spirit & the Apostles is sometimes described as the “birthday” of the church.” Neither player came up with “Pentecost,” and Wallace dropped $800 to win with $10,000 for a two-day total of $28,799.

Jennings concluded, “Great game!” but fans took to the Reddit thread for the episode where many had other thoughts. Namely, it was tough to see all the Daily Doubles and Final get whiffed, as well as Kelly wind up with $0.

“Gotta feel for Brett here,” one Redditor wrote. “I found this to be an extraordinarily difficult game today, some of these were categories and clues I’d expect to see in the TOC or even Masters. He was also up against two strong players who were quick on the buzzer, so he was never really able to even mount an offense. Still, just making it on the stage alone is an accomplishment, you can’t really feel bad for yourself.”

“Thurman Merman just can’t catch a break, huh?” quipped another.

“He should have made some sandwiches,” joked a third referencing a famous line from the movie.

“This was a hard game today,” wrote a third.

“This game was difficult enough that a single Jeopardy question was used as a late-round LLRC question last year. Definitely some hard content here that would be challenging for all but the very best,” wrote a fourth.

“Yeah, I personally didn’t find today’s game abnormally hard at all,” argued a fifth, as others agreed that a game’s difficulty level can also depend on the contestants’ strengths with the categories.

That said, Kelly can hold his head high knowing fans felt this was a particularly unforgiving board, and he’s booked and busy having starred in Bad Santa 2 (2016), and the CW series Family Law (2021-current). “I’ve been living an extremely normal and boring life. I went to a regular high school, graduated from university, and basically that brings us up to this point,” he recently told Today.

What do you think, was the episode particularly difficult? And did it hurt to see the Bad Santa actor come up with a lump of coal? Let us know in the comments section!

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