Mayim Bialik to Strive for Integrity on ‘Jeopardy!’

Bialik wants to do her best with the show to move past the recent controversies.

Bialik wants to do her best with the show to move past the recent controversies.

What was originally supposed to be a fun and competitive means of selecting a successor for the late, great Alex Trebek, the Jeopardy! host selection process has turned into a bit of an awkward legacy. The host the network settled on was the show’s own producer, Mike Richards, though a combination of fan backlash and some unearthed unsavory comments resulted in Richards being stripped of both the host position and his job. This has left the show scrambling to find replacement hosts, with one of the celebrities chosen being Mayim Bialik.

Bialik was selected alongside Richards to host Jeopardy! for special prime-time events, though she’s now pulling regular show duty as well. When asked in an interview with Associated Press if the process was awkward for her, Bialik said “There hasn’t really been anything that’s been a surprise, so there wasn’t really awkwardness. I’m just excited to be able to do my job and do it to the best of my ability, as someone who likely would get everything wrong on Jeopardy! It’s a real honor to get to stand up there.”

“For me, I’m getting more and more comfortable with the language of Jeopardy!, as we call it, and making the crew and the staff feel like we have consistency and that I’m a person really interested in maintaining the integrity of the show.”