The Man Who Gave Us Everything
Jeopardy! (and this Substack) only exists because of Merv Griffin. He also gave me my career.
In March 1991, I flew to Los Angeles to meet with an exotic and powerful man named Merv Griffin at the hotel he owned in Beverly Hills, the Beverly Hilton. I knew he was exotic and powerful because those were the two words that my friend, Jim Marcione, who had been the director on the game show I'd been writing on in Florida, Let's Make A Deal, had used to describe him.
Where I grew up in South-East London, people didn't own hotels, people were not exotic and powerful, and I'm not sure I'd ever even met anyone named "Merv". But I did know one thing about him - that he had come to fame with the hit 1950 single - I've Got A Lovely Bunch of Coconuts - because that was my Uncle Robin's favorite record. I had known it since childhood. And I knew he loved tennis. Because Jim, knowing that my side hustle was as a tennis pro, had told me to bring a racket.
Merv was seeking a development executive and writer for his production company, Merv Griffin Enterprises. My friend Jim was about to direct a new show for him, and he'd spoken to Merv and his team about me. I was desperate for the job. Turns out Central Florida was not Hollywood East as I'd been gullible enough to believe. So, I was back teaching tennis, trying to figure out a way to get back into the entertainment business.
We met at his favorite poolside table in the restaurant downstairs at the mid-century Hilton, designed by the same architect as the Capitol Records Building in Hollywood and the Contemporary Resort at Walt Disney World, as I later discovered. I wish I could remember the name of the restaurant - perhaps the Palm Terrace? He was tan, had extraordinarily white teeth and possessed a giant and mischievous laugh. He was wearing a casual white shirt, its sleeves rolled up, flanked by a couple of executives in dark suits and wide-striped ties. They were all wearing sunglasses.
For some reason, and probably mostly "cash at hand" related, I wore only vintage clothes back then. I looked like an extra from Grease. But at least I was tan. And back then I was 25, thin, a little taller, and had hair.
Merv had lots of stories and warmed to me during lunch. I think mostly because I told him how much my Uncle Robin loved his Coconuts record - ooooohhhh, tell me about your Uncle Robin! But as he was talking, I realized he's subtly interviewing me: What did I think of American television? My favorite films? What did I miss about London? Did I know the bar at the Connaught? Your brother is a screenwriter? What has he written? Does he also look like an extra from Grease?
I may have imagined this last one. At specific points, Merv would scrawl down notes or instruct his executives to take notes. He wrote at least three Wheel of Fortune puzzles, one Jeopardy! category, and two clues before the appetizers were cleared.
Suffice it to say, I got a call on my screenwriter brother's answering machine from one of his people later that afternoon that I was hired and would start on Monday. There was no mention of tennis. But I never returned to Florida.
Fortunately, there were also vintage clothing stores in Hollywood.
I have often told people that my life changed that day more than 34 years ago when I met Merv Griffin. It was my first development job. And led to my big break at Disney a year and a half later. And that in turn led me to ABC and to Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, the show that changed my career.
But in reality, my life actually changed almost 30 years earlier when Merv created Jeopardy!, the show that would give birth to his company, rescue the quiz show and make possible the most challenging and rewarding producing job of my career - taking over as the Executive Producer of what I am convinced is the greatest quiz show of all time 4 years ago next month.
And right off the bat I want to make clear that none of this happens without Julann Griffin, Merv’s wife of 18 years, who on a flight from Duluth to Los Angeles was the first to suggest creating a game in response to the quiz show scandals of the 1950s with a unique twist, actually giving contestants the answers and having them come up with the questions.
And of course, over the course of its 61 years there are many others who are responsible for the enduring success of Jeopardy! (and I will credit several of these people at the end of this entry). But as someone who knows a thing or two about the Herculean task of getting and keeping a show on the air, Jeopardy! in all its forms (including this Substack) would simply never have existed, let alone endured, without the brilliance, the charm, the toughness and the foresight of Merv.
Here are nine things that Merv Griffin did brilliantly as an Executive Producer and show creator with Jeopardy!:
He took a great idea and developed it - Julann had a great starting concept. But it wasn't a show. That had to be worked out by putting it on its feet in run-throughs and getting a network (NBC) interested and vested in the process. Initially, the show was called "What's the Question?". The game board was much larger - too big for television. The show had no progression, no build, no "Jeopardies" as one executive at NBC noted.
He listened to notes and adapted - Merv took the "jeopardies" note and rebranded the entire show*. Way to take a note, Merv! He also divided the game into its rounds of ever-increasing difficulty: The Jeopardy Round!, Double Jeopardy!, Final Jeopardy! He also created the early version of the Daily Double.
He repeatedly ignored notes to make the show easier - Yes you also have to overlook some network notes, and from the beginning, and for years after, Merv famously and consistently nodded in the room when network execs told him to make the show easier and more accessible and walked right out of the room, called his Head Writers, and told them to "make it harder!"
He cultivated champions at the network - you don't get shows on the air without executives at the network, junior and senior, championing your idea. The thing I learned most from Merv in the year and a half I worked for him was that relationships are everything. When I got my first very junior television executive job at Disney, it was Merv who told me to have breakfast, lunch and dinner every day with someone important in the business. It was Grant Tinker, the future Chairman of NBC, who championed Jeopardy! at the network as a young executive.
He got the format almost entirely right from the beginning -
These are the framed show scripts I keep in my office from one of the earliest episodes of Jeopardy! It's a daily reminder for me of how right Merv got the show from the very beginning. Yes, the writing style has changed somewhat; the dollar values are much larger, and we now have computers (and even a database) rather than typewriters to put together our gameboards. However, the shape of the show remains the same. And our show scripts look almost identical to this day.
He got the look, feel, and sound just right, too - From the beginning, Jeopardy! had a signature look - logos, fonts, and sets have all been progressive and at the same time classic, even as they've evolved over the years. Merv wrote all the music, derived from the Jeopardy! theme, "Think!", which originated as a lullaby for Merv's son Tony. It took less than a minute for Merv to write and has made him and his family a fortune. Moreover, Jeopardy! is unimaginable without its signature sound.
He made minimal and mostly brilliant changes to the format over time - Yes, there was that brief flirtation with Super Jeopardy! instead of Final, but most of the changes have been minimal and inspired. The Daily Double evolved into its modern form and frequency throughout the show's history. He introduced tournaments, such as the TOC, and celebrity appearances in the show's earliest years. And don't even start me on the evolution of the fonts and logo.
He made amazing deals for the show's long term future - almost every deal that Merv made for the show - with NBC, with the music, for its syndication launch, pairing it with Wheel of Fortune (which he also created) with the King brothers, with the ABC stations, his company sale to Columbia, Coca Cola and subsequently Sony Pictures - was the perfect deal at the perfect time. This is probably the most underrated aspect of the show's success and Merv's legacy. They call it show business for a reason.
He selected the perfect hosts - Art Fleming, whom Merv saw in a TWA advertisement on television, hosted almost 3,000 episodes of the show. Alex Trebek hosted more than 8,000 of them. Neither of these men was an obvious choice, and yet they were both perfect decisions. And because Merv was both a host and a producer, he knew how important they were to the relationship viewers had with the program, and he wanted to give both men the spotlight. Merv was a producer and creator who, above all, believed in talent. He was a showman. And that is probably the greatest thing I learned from the man.
I had never seen this interview before I started working on this newsletter. It took place in 1986, about five years before I met Merv, but it is very much the man I remember. The charm, the mischievousness, the "oooohhhh", the smile, the cheek of the man.
In truth, I never got to know Merv well. I probably had no more than five or six interactions with him when I worked for him for around 16 months between 1991 and 1992. At the Hilton, then at his casino in Atlantic City, where we developed a show for NBC, at his house in Beverly Hills, once with Eva Gabor, when we finally played tennis. And after I was offered a job at the Walt Disney Studios, we had a brief phone call when he was overarchingly positive and gave me such sound advice - he was the first person who told me that the studio mantra was "If you're not in on Saturday, don't bother coming in on Sunday." Years later, after Millionaire had become an enormous hit, the man who ran his company called to find out when I would be available for a call from Merv — he wanted to congratulate me. The call never came. But honestly, I was just delighted that he still remembered who I was. And hope that he knew the role he had played in my career.
What he couldn't have known, of course, is the role he continues to play, as I steer the ship of one of his best creations (along with Tony and Wheel of Fortune) daily. I literally think about the man constantly. Every single time I have faced a major creative or business decision at Jeopardy! I have thought about Merv and what he would think or how he would advise me. I was so fortunate that when I started at the show, co-executive producer Lisa Broffman, who had worked for Merv for years before joining Jeopardy! (and adored the man) was always there for me as a supportive sounding board. I would always ask, What would Merv think? Mostly, she thinks he would like the direction we're going with the show and the business.
But my God, I would love to have his notes. Like Jeopardy!, he was a man with all the answers.
There are, of course, simply so many people who deserve credit for the enduring success of Jeopardy! beyond Merv and Julann Griffin.
Art Fleming was the show's original host, a U.S. Navy pilot and World War II veteran, who hosted almost 3000 episodes of the show between 1964 and 1979.
Between 1999 and 2020, the incomparable Harry Friedman served as executive producer of Jeopardy! for 23 years (and Wheel of Fortune) and protected the program through the existential threat of the reality television era, growing both shows into ratings juggernauts and taking Jeopardy! into prime time.
Steven Dorfman started his career at Jeopardy! as a writer in 1984. Credited with crafting over 50,000 Jeopardy! clues, Steven invented the modern Jeopardy! writing style and infused the gameboard with his unique combination of intellect and humor. When Steven passed away in 2004, Alex Trebek flew to his memorial service in Michigan to deliver the eulogy.
Alex Trebek, of course, is regarded and revered as the heart and soul of Jeopardy! Alex became the host of the game show in its syndicated debut in 1984 and hosted more than 8,200 episodes of Jeopardy! throughout nearly 37 seasons. Sony Pictures Studios renamed the Jeopardy! stage, formerly known as Stage 10, as the Alex Trebek stage following the legendary host's passing in 2020.
And ever since the syndicated debut of Jeopardy! in 1984, the one and only Johnny Gilbert has announced every single edition of what has become the show's iconic three-word intro: "This … Is … Jeopardy!" He is really getting good at the job!
Ken Jennings has now transcended the role of Greatest Jeopardy! Contestant of All Time and is now taking the show forward as its dynamic host. Who could even imagine Jeopardy! without him? I wish Merv were around to see how great he is at the job.
And beyond these bold-faced names, all the producers, staff, writers, researchers, crew members, directors, editors, and executives have ever worked on, for, or around the program. Each one of them has contributed to Jeopardy!, and Jeopardy! would not be the same without any one of them.
But one thing that's certain - we all owe our time on the show, every moment we'll never forget and every cent we've ever made, to one Mervyn Edward Griffin Jr.
* The parallels to the development of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, more than 30 years later, are uncanny. After viewing the pilot of "Cash Mountain", the original version of the show, Claudia Rosencrantz from the British network ITV gave perhaps the greatest note in television history. Why do game shows always have to be so cheap and cheesy? Why can't they be classy? You know, Bing Crosby, Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, High Society? Who Wants to Be a Millionaire! The team at Celador Productions then rebranded the entire show, making every decision, from the lighting and music to the camera moves and the host's wardrobe, follow the note about class.