Scripps asks America to get out of Jeopardy!

US media conglomerate EW Scripps is producing new shows of its own to replace Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! across its local TV stations stateside.

Let’s Ask America will be a nightly 30-minute gameshow in which contestants play from their own living rooms via a digital link with a studio, answering questions related to topical events for a cash prize.

It is produced by Telepictures and Para Media, with Jim Paratore, president of the latter and creator of celebrity gossip website TMZ, on exec production duties.

The other format, a 30-minute news magazine show called The List, will also air nightly and looks at the top-trending stories of the day in news and pop culture.

Both series will be distributed internationally and outside of the Scripps markets for a fall 2013 launch by Warner Bros Domestic Television Distribution.

Let’s Ask America and The List will replace Scripps’ current line-up of syndicated programming in the network’s access hour and early fringe hour in seven of the company’s 13 TV markets on September 17, 2012. When contracts for other syndicated shows expire in the remaining Scripps markets, the two new shows will move into those vacant timeslots.

EW Scripps decided not to renew the contracts for the two long-running gameshows earlier this year and commissioned the new shows in order to “take more direct creative and economic control” of its content, according to Rich Boehne, the company’s president.

“There’s no more important place to be an entrepreneur than in the creation of programming for the growing menu of screens that carry our brands,” he said.

Currently, EW Scripps partners with Cox Media Group and MagicDust Television to produce Right This Minute, a daily 60-minute programme that tells stories of the day through cell phones, webcams, digital cameras and Skype accounts.

Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune made their debuts on US television in 1964 and 1975 respectively.

Earlier this month, Candian public broadcaster CBC announced it too would be dropping the gameshows from its fall schedule in 2012. Reports suggest the shows cost around US$20m annually in broadcast licence fees. It is not known whether it would have cost EW Scripps the same amount per year to keep the shows in its schedule.