Local woman gets her chance on Jeopardy
On Jan. 27, Janice Timm’s episode of Jeopardy was being discussed on national news. While Timm’s performance on the show did not result in a win, the way she played the game contributed to the fall of the 40-day Jeopardy champion, Amy Schneider.
“I kept getting calls from people who said they saw my face on Good Morning America,” Timm says with a laugh.
Although it has been one of Timm’s lifelong dreams to appear on an episode of Jeopardy, when the chance finally came, her intention in going was not to become champion.
Timm became a fan of Jeopardy in the black and white days of television when Art Fleming was still the host. Her love of trivia matured from the late ‘60s to the ‘90s, when she first went to take the test.
Historically, the Jeopardy test has consisted of 50 timed questions and requires at least 35 correct answers. The clues, according to Timm, have all been taken from previous episodes.
While she didn’t pass the first test she took, or the second one, Timm has religiously continued to try out for the show. She works the New York Times crossword every morning and watches Jeopardy every night, preparing for her shot.
In January of 2020, Timm took the Jeopardy Anytime Test for the last time. As is typical, the test did not show a score, but Timm’s results landed her in the Jeopardy pool of contestants. In July of 2020, Timm was contacted by Jeopardy officials and was then interviewed over Zoom in August.
When she didn’t hear any official news by November of 2021, Timm started planning to take the test yet again.
“A little before Halloween, I got a call about going to a taping on November 9,” Timm says. Her time had come.
Timm arrived at the Sony lot in Southern California at 7 a.m. on the morning of her Jeopardy filming. Due to the studio’s COVID-19 protocols, Timm had been at the lot for a PCR test the day before, but she was cleared to participate.
“My fear was, what if I freeze?” Timm says. “Being a Jeopardy champion was not the goal. Getting there and playing the game all the way through was the goal.”
Timm was one of 12 contestants gathered in the Wheel of Fortune studio, which neighbors the Jeopardy set, to be led through the show rules and given direction for how the day would go.
“If you’ve never been to a TV show taping before, it’s a completely alienating world,” Timm comments.
Jeopardy tapes five games in a day, which usually have an air date more than two months away. Years before her appearance on the show, Timm had attended a Jeopardy taping, so bits and piece of the set were already familiar.
However, during the morning, all of the contestants were given the chance to play four practice rounds on the stage to become comfortable with the podiums and the way that the buzzers worked.
Timm was set to play in the third game of the day, so while taping got underway for the first two shows, her and the other contestants observed from the audience.
“That was the best part, was meeting other people who are true fans of the game who have been watching it every day since I don’t know when,” Timm says. “It was instant kinship over this one thing.”
During taping breaks and lunch break, the comradery grew. Timm visited with Schneider, who was also from Northern California, and with other contestants from across the United States—such as Rhone Talsma from Chicago, the third participant in her game who came away as champion.
When Timm walked in the building that morning, she was unaware of Schneider’s championship run. At the first taping of the day, Schneider had already won 38 games. By the time she went up against Timm, she had a 40-game winning streak that had earned her second place in Jeopardy record books.
“She was a master,” Timm says. “She won by making most of them runaways, where if she lost Final Jeopardy, she still couldn’t be beat.”
In the third game of the day, Timm was up against Schneider and Talsma. Though Schneider’s record was impressive and Talsma was a formidable opponent, Timm was focused on playing the game and ringing in to answer questions.
“That’s what we’re coached to do and that’s what I tried to do,” Timm says. The pool of contestants was instructed earlier that morning to promptly ring in, even if their answer was a wild guess.
Timm adds, “I thought answering questions would be the hard thing.”
Though Timm rang in as often as possible with respectable answers prepared, most of the questions went to Talsma, who eventually went on to win the episode with a total amount of $29,600.
When the three reached Final Jeopardy, both Timm and Schneider blanked on the answer—”What is Bangladesh?”
While Timm’s wrong answer to the Final Jeopardy question did not affect the outcome of the game, her style of ringing in aided Talsma’s win and prevented Schneider from making the game another runaway, evident from the computer printout the stage crew shared with Timm following her game.
Schneider claimed second place in the game, while Timm came in third.
“My goal was to get to Final Jeopardy without embarrassing myself. I was very proud of myself because I reached my goal,” Timm shares. “I always wanted to stay present in the moment and enjoy the whole day.”
It was nearly 7:30 p.m. by the time Timm drove away from the Sony lot and away from her one day of being a Jeopardy contestant, an unforgettable experience that was every bit as rewarding as being Jeopardy champion.