In the weeks leading up to NBC’s three-hour 50th anniversary celebration on Feb. 16, the team behind Saturday Night Live selected one sketch from each season — 50 seasons in 50 days — to celebrate the show’s rich legacy across five decades to reflect. Introducing the sketch selected for Season 40: The Celebrity Jeopardy episode of SNL40, the series’ 2015 celebrity 40th anniversary special.

When Will Ferrell was a SNL A cast member from 1995 to 2002, his time on the series produced memorable original characters (like Gene Frenkle from More Cowbell) as well as unforgettable impressions. Top of the list: Ferrell’s hilariously testy version of “Longtime.” Danger! Host Alex Trebek, who appeared in no fewer than 15 skits on “Celebrity Jeopardy.” And the final part with a star-studded cast took place later in the year SNL40 Anniversary special in 2015. It featured the return of former “Weekend Update” anchor Norm MacDonald as Burt Reynolds along with season 40 cast members Taran Killam and Kate McKinnon and several special guests.

Originally written by Longtime SNL Writer and producer Steve Higgins – who has a supporting gig as Jimmy Fallon’s announcer The Tonight Show – For Adam McKay, the idea for “Celebrity Jeopardy” actually came from Higgins’ wife (more on that later). And fortunately, the parody received the stamp of approval of the real Alex Trebek, who died in 2020.

“Trebek told Lorne (Michaels) that he loved the skit. I’ve always been very happy about that,” Higgins told Variety shortly after Trebek’s death, noting that he and MacDonald were big fans of the game show and used to play together Danger! in the SNL Offices. “That would have been terrible if he had thought it was anything but love. You really can’t parody something if you don’t love it, otherwise it’s just mean.”

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The cast of “SNL40: Celebrity Jeopardy” included Jim Carrey, Alec Baldwin and Norm MacDonald, aka “Turd Ferguson.”

As with every entry in the classic sketch series, SNL40’s edition featured Ferrell playing Trebek as a troubled straight man tasked with rounding up chaotic celebrities who are largely useless when it comes to trivia. For this reason, some of the categories are generally geared toward the preschool level, from “Letters Starting with G” to “Give Your Name” to “Famous Oprahs.”

Among the contestants was Trebek’s frequent “Celebrity Jeopardy” nemesis Sean Connery, played by Darrell Hammond (Hammond is the second-longest on the show). SNL (Player after Kenan Thompson in the story and current announcer of the series). McKinnon was introduced as then-teenager Justin Bieber, while Alec Baldwin played a gleefully clueless Tony Bennett.

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After Trebek gave Connery a “time out” for one of his classic “The Pen Is Mighty”-style mispronunciations, Burt Reynolds (MacDonald) showed up at a mobile podium to appear as Turd Ferguson, a pseudonym intended to carry Ferrell’s name Trebek nuts. Featuring Killam as actor Christoph Waltz, who replaces Bieber, and an impeccably groomed Jim Carrey as Matthew McConaughey

The extensive cast of the anniversary sketch made for an even crazier edition than usual. Watch SNL40: Celebrity Jeopardy from the SNL40 Special above.

“SNL40: Celebrity Jeopardy” was written by Steve Higgins and Seth Meyers

The recurring series “Celebrity Jeopardy” ran between 1996 and 2009. After Adam McKay’s departure from SNL in 2001, Higgins said diversity that he wrote the following together with Mike Schur – for whom he later wrote The office and create classic NBC comedies parks and recreation, The good placeAnd Brooklyn Nine-Nine – frequent collaborator of Tina Fey and 30 Rock Showrunners Robert Carlock and Erik Kenward.

But it was Seth Meyers, a SNL Head writer from Season 31 to Season 39, who co-wrote the 40th anniversary “Celebrity Jeopardy” with Higgins. Meyers passed on Late at night that Lorne Michaels has made “contact” about this SNL50: The Anniversary SpecialSo we’ll have to wait and see if the sketch resumes on February 16th.

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Steve Higgins’ wife pitched the Celebrity Jeopardy sketch idea

One of the biggest appeals of “Celebrity Jeopardy” — aside from watching Ferrell slowly grow annoyed with the contestants — is the fact that it’s the perfect opportunity for actors and celebrity hosts to showcase their impressions.

In reality, “the idea for the sketch came from my wife,” Steve Higgins said Diversity. “She said to me, “You should do ‘Celebrity Jeopardy!’ write. Sketch because these celebrities don’t know that much.” The pitch turned out to be brilliant – and that is by no means the only contribution from Ellen Niedert-Higgins Saturday Night Live: She is the mother of Please Don’t Destroy member John Higgins.

Trebek confirmed his affection for SNLParodies from 2009 Time interview. “We’ve never had a candidate as recalcitrant as the Sean Connery character portrayed by Darrell Hammond,” he added. “I was asked how I would feel if we had Sean Connery there Celebrity Danger! I tell everyone that I would just walk up to them and turn their lights out.” Imagine The in a sketch.