These days, it’s impossible to picture Alex Trebek as anything but the iconic “Jeopardy!” host. But there was a time when he saw himself with more of a dramatic flair. Can you even imagine the movie star version of Trebek?
The late game show host claimed that he originally wanted to be an actor. But the first job he took in broadcasting sealed his fate.
In a 2010 interview with Time, Alex Trebek explained his career path.
“But I got into broadcasting by accident, if you will, because I needed money to pay for my college education,” he said. “I applied for a summer announcing job at a couple of radio stations. I was turned down by two of them, but then the CBC hired me one summer and the rest is history.”
According to the Canadian Broadcasting Company, Trebek did nearly every job possible in broadcasting. He worked every announcing job, from hosting a music show to reporting the news.
And he clearly had a talent for it. But if everything played out a little differently, and we did end up with an actor version of Alex Trebek, what kinds of roles would he want to play?
‘Jeopardy!’ Host Loved HBO Western ‘Deadwood’
Alex Trebek was no stranger to appearing on television shows and in movies as himself. But he didn’t see that as much of a challenge.
In the Time interview from 2010, the late “Jeopardy!” host revealed the roles he would have liked to play.
“Anything that would stretch me dramatically,” he said. “It’s hard to say because I’ve been so fortunate in my career and comfortable in my own skin that I’ve been able to play myself rather well. It might be a little scary trying to be somebody else, but I’m willing to take a chance. I would have loved to have a role in the HBO series Deadwood. It was Shakespeare in the Old West.”
HBO audiences would have delighted in seeing an 1800s Alex Trebek character passing through the town of Deadwood, South Dakota.
Trebek added that he would have liked to play a character on “Law and Order” as a judge, criminal, or otherwise. Seeing him as the prime suspect on an episode of “SVU” might have been too much for us to take.
