Johnny Oleksinski
TV
June 16, 2023 | 6:47 p.m
Pat Sajak will retire from hosting Wheel of Fortune in 2024. Replacing him will be difficult. ABC via Getty Images
When Pat Sajak announced he was leaving Wheel of Fortune in 2024, having hosted the show since 1983, the news felt a lot more important than a fancy hangman game.
The 76-year-old has been a staple of American living rooms most weeknights for four decades and sadly represents a dying breed.
Sajak is the last representative of the golden age of game show hosting.
You know who I mean. These costumed, talkative, cheerful gentlemen with a Las Vegas touch. They look like they just came to Earth to excitedly shake hands, take quizzes, and hand out cash prizes.
They are icons.
Bob Barker from The Price Is Right, Richard Dawson from Family Feud and Match Game, Alex Trebek from Jeopardy!, John Charles Daly from What’s My Line? and Regis Philbin from Who Wants To Be a Millionaire” were like jolly uncles alongside other greats, hailing from a more boozey era of show business where anything was possible.
Bob Barker was a popular guest on The Price Is Right. WireImage
At the same time, however, they also embodied a far more civilized society.
For example, in “What’s My Line?”, the well-spoken Daly jokingly implied that he and panelist Bennett Cerf were hungover…in a tuxedo!
Of course, after Sajak announced the sad news of his departure, there was wild speculation about who would replace him.
But you can’t easily trade someone for Pat Sajak.
Ryan Seacrest, Whoopi Goldberg, Stephen A. Smith and Sajak’s longtime co-host Vanna White have all been tipped as possible candidates for the gig, and there will surely be another obsessive on-air audition process like the one that took place to ” Jeopardy!’ following Trebek’s death in 2020.
After “Jeopardy!” host Alex Trebek died in 2020, Ken Jennings and Mayim Bialik got the job. Getty Images
That answer-and-question show ended up with Ken Jennings, the Jeopardy! contestant with the longest winning streak of all time, and Blossom’s Mayim Bialik.
meh The duo is sufficient at best. More Geek Squad than Hollywood, there’s no substitute for Trebek’s easy-going, cultured demeanor and rich speaking voice.
Game shows always lose their sparkle and luster when a younger, less venerable and, frankly, not-so-interesting host takes the reins of a beloved legend.
Dawson would never be allowed to kiss the ladies in “Family Feud” today, but he had an electrifying 1970s touch that nice guy Steve Harvey can’t even match.
Richard Dawson had a head start that new Family Feud host Steve Harvey can’t match. Courtesy of Everett Collection
Barker — who is 99, by the way — had a ton of behind-the-scenes drama on The Price Is Right.
However, his excitement when telling a contestant that he had just won thousands of dollars felt real and grandfatherly.
To be honest, Drew Carey was way better on The Drew Carey Show than he was on Bob Barker’s show.
Being a great host is a very special skill indeed, and – as we learn more and more every year from pathetic awards shows – it’s a skill that cannot be fully learned.
You must be authoritative but sympathetic; deliver bad news but make people happy; Be both a comedian and a scholar. In short, you have to be an old-school entertainer, and Sajak is one of the last.
It will be almost impossible to reinvent the “wheel”.
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