JEOPARDY! contestant Isaac Hirsch has revealed that his recent winning streak unexpectedly made him a smash hit with "the gays" in a wild new interview. The nine-day champ shared on the What is..
. A Jeopardy! podcast that he received "many thirsty DMs " while competing and most were from men. Isaac is a fan-favorite Jeopardy! champ who won $215,390 in July 2024 before his streak ended due to a math mistake .
It's no secret that viewers adored Isaac more than the average player for his comedic Q&A stories, mustache, and '70s fashion A-game. But apparently, and despite his stating he had a longtime girlfriend on the show, he attracted a certain fan base which even fewer players can boast - gay Twitter. During the new interview, podcast hosts Emily Heller and John Cullen mentioned Isaac became a "low-key gay icon" from the game show.
Read more on Jeopardy! 'COMPLETELY UNEXPECTED' "It was maybe the most surprising part of all of it," Isaac said. "Because I've been out in public, and as far as I know, I've never been hit on." "So to see the gays be so thirsty and complimentary of me - deeply flattering but also completely unexpected.
"I don't know what you'd call me - am I a twink?" he joked. Most read in Game shows "I'm currently undergoing twink death; lot of grey hairs lately," relenting, "I'm a gay icon now." Isaac hinted he was getting a lot of attention from LBGTQ+ Jeopardy! fans as his streak was airing.
He wrote on X in July, "My big takeaway from this past week is that if I were both single and not straight I would be having a really good time right now." However, he shared on the podcast that he didn't only receive flirtatious tweets but "a lot of DMs" or direct messages. 'MANY, MANY MEN' "[There were] many, many DMs, probably a 70 to 30 [ratio] of men and women in terms of flirtatious DMs," he said.
Isaac shared that many of the DMs were platonic, others were a little more direct. Jeopardy! has had a tumultuous history regarding hosts after the death of the iconic Alex Trebek in 2020. Here are all of the hosts since the game show's inception in 1964.
Art Fleming - 1964 to 1975, he was the original host of the daytime version of Jeopardy! on NBC. Alex Trebek - 1984 to 2020, the late, great Alex hosted Jeopardy!'s modern iteration for 36 years until his death from pancreatic cancer. Guest hosts - 2020 to 2021, Jeopardy! tested out a series of guest hosts for week or two-week stints, including Anderson Cooper, LaVar Burton, and Aaron Rodgers.
Mike Richards - 2021, he was named host for one week before resigning amid controversy. He was the show's executive producer at the time. Mayim Bialik - 2021 to 2023, when Mike was announced as the show’s new host, Mayim was chosen to host tournaments and primetime specials.
Mayim and Ken Jennings - 2022 to 2023, 74-time champion Ken (the longest-winning contestant ever) joined Mayim as a guest host and they split hosting duties. Ken Jennings - 2023 to present. Last December, Mayim announced on Instagram that she would "no longer" host Jeopardy! after a lengthy hiatus, having stood with the writer's strike, and Ken was named sole host.
Ken now helms all editions of Jeopardy! including Celebrity Jeopardy!, the nightly show, and other primetime specials like Masters. "Lots of very nice old people and very nice regular people saying 'hey, loved you on Jeopardy!.' "And a lot of people are saying, 'Hey! You're hot' or whatever they say in DMs.
" Isaac shared he ignored the flirtatious DMs, however flattering they were, but they would have gotten NSFW if he'd interacted. "They were all relatively polite for an intro DM. If I had responded, I'm sure they would have gotten dirty.
"My policy was if a DM is not overly flirtatious, I will respond and say 'Hey, thank you so much.'" Isaac recalled a DM in which someone tried shooting their shot in a particularly strategic fashion by asking if he was an ally of the LGBTQ+ community. He shared he replied "yes," and the fan asked if he was "more than just an ally," to which he said "no.
" "I've been with my girlfriend for five and a half years, I am just an ally." Further calling his attention an "online renaissance," Isaac said his girlfriend loved the side effect of his show appearance. "My girlfriend watches RuPaul's Drag Race, she's more into queer spaces than I am as a whitebread straight guy.
" "So she was all over it, 'your boyfriend's on gay Twitter,' she really enjoyed it." 'RAW, SEXUAL ENERGY' Isaac finished with the second-longest winning streak of Season 40, only behind 15-day champ Adriana Harmeyer. One major draw of his stint on the show was how funny his Q&A stories with Ken Jennings were.
During one game, the part-time comedian shared he had an acting gig in which he played Jeff Goldblum in a pool ballet performance. "And I understand a one-time Jeff Goldblum impersonator," Ken had asked. Isaac explained that there is a group in Baltimore, Maryland , that puts on water ballet.
"Sort of in the vein of old Ethel Merman movies in public pools," he said. "They did one of the life of Jeff Goldblum and they cast me to play Jeff Goldblum, like in the interstitials between the ballet pieces." Ken joked that Isaac is like an "aquatic Jeff Goldblum.
" "I'm not graceful, and I can't swim very well, so I literally show up in the middle and go to The Fly or whatever, and just do a fly thing," Isaac said. "But, yeah, I can't hope to capture the raw, strange, sexual energy that Jeff Goldblum has," to which the audience died laughing. "Well, I don't want to say too much, but you're coming pretty close right now, Isaac," Ken surprisingly told him.
Isaac looked into the camera and raised an eyebrow with a smirk [seen above] before they got back to the game. "He did straight up call you sexy," podcast host Emily said, recalling Ken's chat. Isaac told the podcast hosts that Ken's compliment was the "highlight of his life.
" Read More on The US Sun The big winner will return for the next Tournament of Champions, which will take place midway through Season 41. Jeopardy!'s 41st season premieres on September 9, 2024..
